To clutter or not?

Parent Cafe
1

<p>My DH, usually a peaceful man, goes <em>bonkers</em> when he thinks about all the piles of “clutter” we have around our house. I’m actually not a big fan of all those extra papers either, but I do find them useful so I don’t do collective tossing. Instead, I shuffle through my collection and trim wherever I can.</p>

<p>One problem with my piles is that I save for my whole family: my kids stuff, and specifically college, current HS stuff, their activities (i.e. lots of theatre mostly, but some sports and diversity clubs, etc.), all their bank statements, medical stuff, legal stuff, etc. etc. I save these piles in the kitchen because I like to have access to them there; no one else bothers to even look at them. But, as ‘house historian’, I am often asked for this paper or that letter, so I save.</p>

<p>But his biggest problem with my collection of piles, sadly, is what I like to save for myself. And that’s in the garage: my small business which involves tons of books and papers (I call it a business, but I just volunteer). That too is boxed, but to my DH, it’s still taking up too much room. (His stuff is in our den.) Just to get a picture of this: my stuff is in front of my car, and stuff for the house (bikes, grill, house gear) is in front of his.</p>

<p>Does anyone have a good solution to this problem of what to do with all those papers? I’d love to hear how to organize, and suggestions about what to toss/what to save, what belongs in a garage vs in the house, in the kitchen vs in a basement, best methods to save: boxes, file folders, bins, etc., and your experiences and ideas. I’m not interested in spending $$$ for systems or consultants. Those glossy pictures —especially for the garage–always look so nice, but doesn’t tackle the reality of the issue: what to do with all those papers. Any help is appreciated!</p>

2

<p>If you husband is anything like me, this issue won’t go away on its own until (a) a relationship catastrophe, or (b) you retire to a 1200 sq. ft. condo. (After ten years of complaining, cajoling, threatening, etc. with no improvement, I’m planning the latter.) If brinksmanship isn’t your thing, hire a professional organizer.</p>

3

<p>I also go bonkers when there is too much disorganization(I’m not known as a neat freak around my house). But enough is enough. We moved several times and stuff are still unpacked in the garage. I tossed out stuff that I don’t need, and stuff that I can’t neatly organize to go somewhere, I throw them in a box. They can be messy in a box but from the outside of the box, it looks neat. My kids outgrown a lot of stuff and I’m taking some of these clothes to the local church. I think it will take me time to get things in order. But I have to do it, the clutterness is driving me absolutely crazy.</p>

4

<p>I worked as an organizer for a time. If you study storage patterns, you’ll find there are some good principles to follow. Your kitchen, front closet/hall, desktop, etc. are quick access areas. All of these, including cabinets and drawers, should be reserved for current papers, projects and items in use. It’s having the old stuff in with the new that makes areas unwieldy. You shouldn’t have your historic files in the quick access area. And, if the information is older than 3 years, you will never need most of it. Exceptions would be tax information or estate information (10 years), but these don’t sound like your problem.</p>

<p>As stuff comes in, especially those innumerable college catalogs, immediately toss the ones that are irrelevant, then keep a box for the ones that might be useful. If you box this sort of thing by function, it can easily be tossed/recycled as a whole when its time has passed. I keep a paper bag in my pantry for all the recyclable paper products that come through in a week, and every Saturday, the bag goes right into recycling without a second look. Each kid should have his own box to work out of during the school year. All their clutter can be kept in the one box and sorted twice a year when on vacation.</p>

<p>Set limits for yourself, and you can get the “must keep” piles down to a manageable size. Assign one box for each family member’s old files, but keep it to ONE box for every 4-5 years. Of course, you should label your boxes in detail. The bonus of separating the kids is that you can just hand them the box when they need to look for something. And, when it’s time to leave home, their papers are ready to go with them.</p>

5

<p>To me paper would be easy. It is all the things, that might come in handy some day, or the outright broken things that my h plans to take parts off of for something else- when he has time /energy, which I expect will happen right around the time when we both are physically returned to our mid twenties :wink: </p>

<p>For instance our house is 970 sqft. Plus detached garage and small shed. Although I have removed all the sod from our front, back and side yards , we still have a gas edger, two gas lawn mowers , two weed eaters all sitting in the shed, while my garden tools and potting bench are crammed under the eaves of the house.</p>

<p>I am tempted to push all that stuff onto the planting strip with a free sign when h is at work. ( along with the two aquariums plus stands that haven’t seen water for 30 years, the television with a dial!, and the dining room set that was his grandmothers and has been in the basment for 25 years but that he won’t part with not even any of the eight chairs)</p>

<p>so I am not the best one to give advice on paper that is in boxes which to me seems already managed:)</p>

6

<p>Yup - it is always MY stuff that hubby complains about. Not his magazines, tools, camera stuff, the boys hockey gear, etc…grrrrrr</p>

<p>A couple of years ago I thought I had struck it rich when I purchased a 4 drawer metal file cabinet for the basement. I spent countless hours making folders and sorting my stacks. Well two years later, I haven’t even looked inside. I finally learned that because I am a very visual person that I need to SEE everything.</p>

<p>I took one of my upper kitchen cabinets and converted from shelves to vertical mail slots. Best thing I ever did! One for each kid and hubby, one for me and the rest are all filled with the other household essentials. I bought manilla file folders (envelope style that expand to about 1 1/2 to 2") On the ends that face me I wrote the contents. Like current year taxes, insurance, medical, dogs, loose photos, loose recipes, one for each car, etc. I LOVE this system. All I have to do is open the cabinet and I am at eye level with my papers. I have also become a big fan of those clear plastic sheet protectors. </p>

<p>I did the cabinets in my laundry room with refrigerator ice buckets from Target. They are about 6 high, 4 wide and 11 inches deep and cheap. I took out my trusty labeler and now when I open the doors I am met with organizational bliss. One for glue gun, sunscreen, ace bandages, paint brushes that I don’t want the boys to use, gift wrap ribbons and bug spray, etc.</p>

<p>I am so proud that I had to brag! :D</p>

7

<p>“… paper that is in boxes which to me seems already managed.”</p>

<p>Um, what we have here is a failure to communicate. My Dad worked nearly fifty years for the same company. When he retired he brought home “some files” in boxes. Fortunately there was room in the (large) basement. He never looked at any of it. When he died my Mom started taking two boxes a week to the transfer station for recycling. After two years she quit because “I don’t seem to be making any progress.” Nearly a ton and a half remained.</p>

<p>From my experience I know materials retention can be a very tender area. People keep stuff they’ll never use for a reason. (For my Dad, those files represented the only thing he had left from his career.) That’s why bringing in a professional organizer, who deals with “stuff” only, can be an effective, non-threatening solution.</p>

8

<p>Part of my issue is that we’ve been living in the same house for 28+ years, so I haven’t had the need to toss. We’ve also added/renovated to our house three times, so it just grows and grows and grows. (now about 4,000 sqft) In the last renovation, I insisted we include a drawer in the kitchen for all the kids’ papers. My H was skeptical. Now, I have an incredibly helpful, organized place for each child’s papers, but I still have a mound in the kitchen. I just can’t seem to shed that old habit!</p>

<p>Tossing out all the college stuff has become easier now that my youngest is done with applications. Still, I’m amazed how much continues to come in: four envelopes just today (4 from schools he applied to, two other colleges still hoping)</p>

<p>Thank you midwesterner. Are there certain categories I should organize my papers into? or should they just be in chronological order?</p>

<p>Great ideas Kajon!! I’m a very visual person too. I think I keep going back to those old papers just to “see” them again!</p>

9

<p>Ah, but NewHope, not only does my H detest all these papers, he’d really go <strong>bananas</strong> if he had to PAY for someone else to remove them! I also don’t want to leave behind all these papers for others to sort or toss, like what happened with your dad. I know I can do it. I just need to understand the way to do it that makes sense.</p>

<p>I know what doesn’t work: a box filled with loose papers. I’ve tried that, but I never get down to the bottom for ages. I’m guessing I’ll try Kajon’s method. Sounds good to me. I do that with medical / insurance forms now; I can do that with other topics too…</p>

<p>Just now, my husband needed to go to Staples. My ears perked up. Then he said he was getting paper, more and more paper, because we didn’t have enough in the house. Ah well. At least he jokes about this issue too.</p>

10

<p>limabeans - Well if you’re committed to doing the job, then I think Kajon’s post is the key … find a method that suits you. I’m a visual learner but a spatial storer. Eyes closed, I can tell you where every important family file is located. A few are in boxes at the right front corner of the attic … historical stuff like tax returns, sales records for property we no longer own, etc. A few are in boxes in the basement … old medical records, primary school records and the like. And the rest is in … gulp … seven four drawer filing cabinets in the basement. To a visual person I know that sounds nuts. But when my D asked for her yellow fever innoculation records, it took less than a minute for me to retrieve them … because I knew where I would find them.</p>

<p>Note that none of the family records are stored in living space. DW considers that space her domain. She’s a visual storage person like Kajon, and finding anything in the living area requires a visual search “until found” … which of course requires piles to be physically searched. Based on my experience, I can’t recommend that approach. “Hon, I’m sure it’s in that pile … search it again. Oh wait a minute, it might be up in the bedroom.”</p>

11

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<p>We get a dumpster every five years or so. It is VERY liberating. We toss tons of “stuff” into it that we really are NOT using. Old books go to the library for their used book sale. Old clothes go to goodwill. EVERYTHING else we dont’ use goes in the DUMPSTER. Once you’ve paid for it, you have two choices…either they haul it away full or haul it away empty.</p>

<p>My mom was a packrat. She died and left me with more than 40 moving boxes of “stuff”. I swore I would NOT do that to my own kids. </p>

<p>I also do my closets several times a year and I have no trouble tossing anything I don’t CURRENTLY wear. No more “gee…maybe it will come back into style”. It usually doesn’t. </p>

<p>In this house, we read magazines and then keep them for three months. Then they get tossed too. </p>

<p>We still have plenty of clutter as some of you who have visited me will attest to. BUT believe me, it’s way better than having the excessive clutter. AND I have two kids too, and I’m also the “family historian”. There are under the bed boxes for their “stuff” that is kept. Banking is done ONLINE (so is ours) so there are no “bank statements”. Credit card bills…online. Bills…online. They don’t HAVE paper accumulating. </p>

<p>I vote for NOT cluttering. Like I said…when I die, I don’t want my kids to have to sift though a bunch of clutter to find the few things that they might want. I don’t want them to be burdened with getting rid of stuff that <em>I</em> should have gotten rid of.</p>

12

<p>When we moved, we used 800-gotjunk to come and take the stuff. They do all the sorting for you, take computer to reuse, books, etc. Only stuff that has to be landfilled actually ends up there.</p>

<p>When my mother died, her 400-sq-ft apt was packed to the gills with boxes. All her old bills, tax records, and journals back to 1937. My sister took the journals (9 book boxes) and we tossed the rest of the papers. Twenty contractor garbage bags just in the first fifteen minutes!</p>

<p>The IRS will tell you what kind of records you MUST keep; if you have a biz, your accountant should be able to help; I try to get rid of anything that would cost more to move than it’s worth! It’s still a work in progress, though. [Keeping</a> Family/Household Records](<a href=“Pueblo.GPO.gov Main Page”>Pueblo.GPO.gov Main Page)</p>

13

<p>Buy a scanner. We have the Scan Snap S510, whatever that is, and I love it. Scan the documents you want to keep and organize them in folders on a hard drive. Much faster to access than documents in boxes and they take up a lot less space. I like to scan photos too.</p>

14

<p>I’m no help. Clutter is in my DNA. I keep it manageable, but it’s there just the same. Please don’t open that cupboard, or that drawer, or that closet! ;)</p>

15

<p>OP - don’t check out the “Hangups you thought you’d outgrown thread.” you might take offense, ha ha.</p>

<p>(beginning at post 15, and scattered after that)</p>

16

<p>Seconding the recommendation to buy a scanner. We just got the ScanSnap S1500, and it is amazing. It’s a little expensive, but so worth it.</p>

17

<p>If you scan, especially those family photos - think of signing up for a service like Mozy or Carbonite for off-site storage - it’s worth the price of the service. </p>

<p>I have scanned thousands of old photos and if anything happens to my computer, I can still access them. </p>

<p>I have also scanned bunches of old documents that I needed, but didn’t want to hang on to, anymore. I am in the process of taking photographs of kid’s old artwork and notes with funny things they said.</p>

18

<p>We have mail slots in the front hall. Bills go in a monthly file. Tax related stuff all gets boxed up and shoved in the basement after the taxes are filed. College stuff is in a cupboard in the dining room right now. It will all get tossed except the file with the awards and transcripts. </p>

<p>My biggest problem is that I can’t seem to get through the entire New York Times each Sunday. I get through 95% of it, but I can’t seem to bring myself to throw out that 5% each week. </p>

<p>I also let to much of my architectural paperwork escape into the rest of the house, but it do have a file system that works as long as I keep up with it. </p>

<p>I think it can be helpful to corral papers a little bit with a shallow inbox or two that collects things that need to be taken care of sooner rather than later. The stuff that I hate is things like dentist bills that need to get copied and sent off for reimbursement. It always seems like too much trouble to do now, so they float around instead of having a good home.</p>

<p>The best advice I got for clutter is that everything needs to have a place and that place has to be somewhere that’s so convenient for you that you will actually use it. For example, I no longer keep scissors in drawers because they don’t get put back, but they do get put into canisters on the kitchen counter or my desk. So that’s where they are supposed to go now. Who cares if they are living with my whisks or my colored pencils? I now keep my drafting pencils on my window sill, because that’s the only way they don’t get lost.</p>

19

<p>I think my accountant has the most effective method of paper control … he returns EVERYTHING with the completed return. At first I thought it was kinda weird, but now I see the genius in it. It’s kind of like thumper’s (post #11) suggestion of having an online payment system … no bills, no receipts, no checks, no credit card files. I have a friend who lives in a house with essentially no storage space. He pays the bill by check and then throws the bill away. I suppose it just depends on how much one “needs” the paper. I wonder how all those “pay and pitch” people do their taxes?</p>

20

<p>While you might not mind the paper as much as your husband, I bet you’d both prefer if it got cleared away as much as possible.</p>

<p>If day-to-day clutter management seems difficult, I suggest you set a goal with a date, or a very specific plan where you are accountable, and focus on achieving this very important goal. Here are just a couple of ideas, such as… </p>

<p>Plan a big party within the next few months, for any occasion that is appropriate: child’s graduation, family reunion, birthday, holiday dinner, whatever. Knowing that you will open up your home, go through a room each week, streamlining, tossing absolutely everything that is not essential, preparing to present a beautiful, clutter-free home to your guests. Basement, attic, garage are all included, as you should assume you’ll keep all doors open for the party. Try to imagine what you want your outside guest to see, and in the end, you can enjoy the party, celebrating both the occasion and the work you did to create a clutter-free environment that will ease up tensions and frustrations in your home.</p>

<p>Another idea: if you don’t want to hire a professional organizer, find a friend or sister or neighbor who is also trying to streamline. Work together, first going through one house and then the other. You will both end up with clutter-free homes, and having an objective eye will be better than trying to do it yourself.</p>

<p>Buy a book (there are tons) that addresses de-cluttering. Don’t just read it. Follow the instructions.</p>

<p>If you visit anyone else who is a pack rack, make a mental note about what you would streamline about their house. Imagine being their organizer, and see how from the outside it seems so obvious that they need to clear space for better mental health and productive use of their home. (The thing that did it for me was visiting my mother who should so clearly have 90% of her things tossed. - While she wasn’t at a place where she was open to clearing out her life - just paying attention to that sure made me decide to clear out mine.)</p>