I can’t believe that I just saw this thread which was begun in 2014. Yes, I need to be in. Need it badly. Count me in. Thank you for the goal.
I’m in. DH and I have both been working hard on controlling incoming items. Hopefully this will keep the space from filling up as soon as we get things out.
Right now we’re staging late MIL’s things in our house on the way to donation. I took two large Hefty bags worth to Goodwill this morning and am sorting through the next CR-V load.
Welcome to the thread, @epiphany. It’s a great thread, and we’re very supportive of each other.
Thank you for the kindness, @VeryHappy
We just had a new shower installed, which didn’t generate trash other than the old flimsy bath/shower, but they also put in a new faucet for the sink, and I filled a bag while I was emptying the under-sink area for them to work. Yay!
Jumping back into the thread after a year(?) away. It was very inspiring, and for many months I tried to pick one thing a day for the give-away pile. I need to start doing that again!
DH is talking about a proactive replacement of our 25 year old water heater. That might be the incentive we need to do more declutter of the junk in the unfinished basement.
In the continuing quest to get our home ready to put up for sale, we got rid of 7 large trash bags of textile recycling (clothing, stuffed animals, linens, etc. not good enough to donate). We also have 2 bags of decent clothes for a local agency’s clothing bank. And S2 is donating alot of books from HS and college that he no longer wants.
It feels good to declutter. Still more to do.
Dropped off a carload of clothes and household linens at Goodwill yesterday afternoon. The back of the car is almost full enough for the next run.
@swimcatsmom : How are you doing??
I’ve kind of come to a dead stop. It’s funny, I was doing really well during the period I was especially busy at work and working 7 day weeks 10-13 hour days for 3 months and now I have more time I seem to have lost my motivation. Doesn’t make sense! Have tried to get back with it but am back to feeling quite overwhelmed.
I was planning to try and do some this weekend as it is a long weekend but our car got burglarized Friday night and we spent till 3 in the morning Saturday dealing with security then police then cancelling credit cards and most of the day trying to make sure we have changed passwords to every account we have(our Kindle fires were in the car as we were going to spend the night in a hotel in the city after an evening out) . The whole experience has left me exhausted and a bit down and a little depressed - I did rearrange my closet Sunday but didn’t purge at all - just moved stuff round. Trying to make myself get motivated to get out of bed this morning.
Well, that’s certainly bad news about the car. Of course you need to take care of that, and recuperate from the trauma as well.
And you’re allowed to only do a bag a month, if that’s all you can handle right now!
Sorry about your bad luck, @swimcatsmom.
@swimcatsmom - What a bummer! Glad you were quick to deal with securing measures. That’s a big deal. Declutter can wait.
We spent another weekend in my parent’s old home. We shredded six garbage bags of documents and went through all of the drawers, cabinets and clutter from the dining room, living room, parlor, front foyer, and an enclosed porch.
It’s just so overwhelming making snap decisions over and over about what should be kept and what should be sold. I had a nightmare last night that I ended up with a random collection of objects I’d never seen before, filling every corner of my basement!
^That’s great progress @NerdMom88! I’ve had similar dreams, as I’m also in the process of cleaning out my parents’ home.
D was home for the weekend, and I finally got her to spend an hour going through her closet. 4 huge bags to donate, and 2 huge bags of garbage. A small dent for our household, but good progress since she is unlikely to live here again and repopulate that room with stuff.
Congratulations to everyone making even tiny progress. Tiny progress is still progress.
Very smart, psychomomma. We’d been after S1 and S2 to go through their rooms when they were home. S1 hasn’t been here in 1.5 years, and did go through some stuff before then but not his entire room. I’ve bugged S2 everytime he’s been home to visit and he only went through very little of his room.
Over the past few days, DH and I have been going through their rooms. I’m more ruthless about tossing stuff then DH is, probably because I’m less sentimental and more annoyed. DH has taken photos of things and sent them lists of books and other items so they can make decisions long-distance. I’m assuming they’ll want to keep less than DH thinks.
I’ve read this thread with interest since my house is filled with decades of stuff that no one needs or want anymore. My H recently sold his business and has begun to spend hours shredding documents, both personal and professional, that populate almost an entire room in our admittedly way too large suburban house. However, there are three bedrooms filled with the detritus and memorabilia of childhood – these kids are now 33 (and married!), 31, and 28. They live close by and always say they will come clean out their rooms but somehow life gets in the way (and they have absolutely no room for anything else in their small NYC apartments). The eldest had cleaned out some, but then wedding presents were delivered here and many remain.
I have made a little progress on the spaces that seem easy to address, like cabinets and drawers in the bathrooms and kitchen that were overflowing and if you came into my house (well, the first floor), you’d probably not think we have a problem, but I know that when we’re ready to sell this house it will be a disaster if I don’t get a handle on some of it now.
How did you guys get started? I’m in the “just throw all out” camp, while my H is the “examine everything and apart with nothing” type.
Start with something small – e.g., take out the shoes belonging to just one kid, line them up, photograph them, and tell the kid to tell you within 48 hours which to save. If you hear back, great; if not, toss them all.
Rome wasn’t built in a day.
^^^ Yes, this. Deal with one box, one item, whatever, and then change the subject.