I Declare Phase One...

[Life_is_Simple]

of my decluttering officially over. :+1:

I am celebrating with salad. !Splat!

I will relish in the neatness.... maybe do some Olympic style gymnastics across the wide open space we call the floor. :cool:

That is all. ;)

[Tradd]

Hee ha!

[rosarugosa]

Hurray for you, LIS!
!pow!

[danna]

Way to go girl!!!!!!!!!

[fidgiegirl]

Awesome! You sure have been working hard!

[Tussiemussies]

That is GREAT! :cool:

[bunnys]

Yea for you!

I, on the other hand, don't even bother to look at most of these decluttering threads because I do NOTHING to declutter and wouldn't even know how to start.

Although I don't really have that much stuff and it wouldn't be that tough to do something...

[iris lily]

hey, that's GREAT! Give us a recap of what you did.

[Float On]

I too want a recap of what was in your phase 1 and if/when you'll start phase 2 and what that's goal is.
Great job!!!

[Life_is_Simple]

hey, that's GREAT! Give us a recap of what you did.


I too want a recap of what was in your phase 1 and if/when you'll start phase 2 and what that's goal is.
Great job!!!

You guys are a tough audience! :D Ok, I have to look back in my journals for this...

In February, I decluttered the kitchen cabinets and the bathroom cabinet. I sent BEFORE, DURING, and AFTER pictures to my online decluttering pals "J & S," for comments, tips and moral support. The kitchen cabinets involved more organizing than decluttering, and being able to reach most-often-used items. I had some empty shelf space when I was done.

In the bathroom cabinet, I tossed old deodorant, creams, towels and washcloths. I used large plastic food containers from the kitchen (the kind you might put flour in), to organize razors into one, toothpaste/toothbrush into another, and other stuff into 2 others.

I had written: "Decluttering is fun. It is TOO fun.":cool:

On vacation in June, I helped my Mom and sister declutter in their respective houses.

Then when I got back home, motivated from the relatives, I immediately pulled out 6 bags-worth of clothes from my bedroom closet and dresser drawers for donation.

July 15: "Sometimes I wish to have more of a minimalist place. What would that be like?" and "Maybe with less stuff I would feel richer. Like the stuff I have is meaningful." I also started to write out plans for what I wanted to get rid of.:idea:

Then decluttered bedroom:

Winter scarves and mittens - gathered and washed them all. Tossed unmatched mittens and others. Put all in one drawer.
Gathered all christmas items, and put in a container on one closet shelf. Donated some. Tossed unused christmas cards.
Gathered all spare blankets which had been on top of armoire, and put in one closet shelf. Tossed burnt electric blanket.
Took the golf tees and balls from one dresser drawer, and put them in the "sports closet" in another room. Donated tees I had gotten from a job I didn't like. Threw out golf ball personalizer that didn't work.
Took old prescriptions to the local police station drop box
Put 7 old computer hard drives in the "to be smashed" box.
Tossed broken mirror
Removed/tossed stuff on top of dresser
Donated more clothes. Clothes all fit in closet or dressers. There is some bare space on closet shelves.:+1:


To be continued in next post...

[Life_is_Simple]

...continued from previous post.

Hall closet. Moved christmas and sports stuff to their correct closets, donated some jackets. Now vacuum cleaner fits in there ;)

Basement storage. Put a lot of cardboard boxes from the basement into recycling. Kept 10%. Found a plastic container which I now use in my office as for "paper to-be-shredded" box

Living room bookshelves. Showed my online friends "J&S" BEFORE and DURING pictures. Long, long, LONG pause! Suddenly realized that there were a lot of non-books on them!:0!

Donated some of the knick-knacks
Created a "Mail Center" on a smaller bookshelf in another room, with packing tape, envelopes, postage stuff. It's really cool to have a Mail Center, with stuff all in one place.
Moved some books from the office onto these bookshelves
Moved bike helmet to sports closet :laff:
Created a "photo center" on one bookshelf to scan old family photos. Photos now in plastic drawers, where their previous contents had been decluttered and tossed.
Some photos in frames actually now hanging on the wall ;)

During this, my online friend "S" would send me photos of her organized stuff. She mentioned she has clutter elsewhere, but "the immense clutterfication gets left out of the photos." :laff:

Kitchen closet. Combined laundry detergent into one bottle. Organized and culled shopping bags, coolers, and other stuff in there.

To be continued in next post...

[Life_is_Simple]

...continued from previous post.

Office.

I started with the computer desk, which had all kinds of things I never use on it, so there was no room to use it as an actual desk. I sent my online friend "J" the DURING picture and he said: "it kind of looks like, you were only allowed to put things on there by throwing them from a distance." :laff:

Computer Desk

Took a big old Mac off the desktop, and put it elsewhere
Put the modem and router on top of the hutch, out of the way of everything
Put computer paper and replacement ink on an upper hutch shelf, next to the printer.
Put pens in a wooden box on the lower hutch shelf, and postits in a basket next to it.
Organized office supplies drawer
Threw out a bunch of stuff - I don't even know what.
Desktop completely bare. I even dusted it ;)

Work papers.

Tossed 20+ garbage bags of shredded papers
Current client major results in 2 3-ring binders where I can look at them easily.
Top lateral file contains those 2 binders and a few folders with papers on one side. And empty hanging files on the other side :laff:
Files from former clients (years ago) shredded down to the bare minimum, and put into one small plastic accordion file folder.
Papers from past jobs shredded.
Anything left over from past jobs/clients, or career related papers are in a plastic storage file box.

Taxes. These are semi-organized in multi-pocketed folders for each year. I moved them to a small file cabinet - old years in the bottom drawer, new years in the top drawer.

Bookshelves

One contains books in my field, and computer disks
The other contains a shelf of empty folders, binders, etc., aka my "office supplies" shelf. Many became empty after shredding the papers in them. Another shelf contains binders from the next list.

Home papers. These are the Auto, Retirement, Bank Statements, etc, that we have been talking about in the "Organizing Files and Papers" thread. This is by far the most hideous part of decluttering! :0!

Shredded older utilities that aren't part of taxes.
Organized flexible spending in a folder by year
Dental/eyes, other health, retirement, car, bank statements, credit cards in 3-ring binders by year. Shredded some.
Medical receipts in accordion file by year
Downloaded financial statement pdfs
Put sentimental cards/letters from family members in a box
Started a multi-pocketed home inventory folder
Sorted through all my incoming-paper-mail baskets, to go into above folders/binders

Once I did the above, I had hardly anything left in my A-Z hanging folders :0!

And there were 5 items left of my incoming mail, and I acted on 2 of them.

Gosh, it's easier to get things done when decluttered! :cool:

Thus ends Phase I.:+1:

[nswef]

Powerfully impressive and inspiring!!!

[Blackdog Lin]

Incredibly inspiring.

Did you do all this while working fulltime? I am getting ready to retire from fulltime work, and swear that day 3 of my retirement will start my decluttering lallapalluza. (Days 1 and 2 I plan to sit around, and doing a lot of sighing from pleasure and release from the clock.)

How do you manage/find the time for all this?

[fidgiegirl]

What is Phase II?

You kick butt!!

[Life_is_Simple]

Incredibly inspiring.

Did you do all this while working fulltime? I am getting ready to retire from fulltime work, and swear that day 3 of my retirement will start my decluttering lallapalluza. (Days 1 and 2 I plan to sit around, and doing a lot of sighing from pleasure and release from the clock.)

How do you manage/find the time for all this?
I am self-employed and work from home. So as soon as I got done working for the day, I would take a break for supper, then declutter until 10pm.

Early on, I would relax on the couch and think "Maybe I have done enough." Then I would put on an episode of Hoarders from the internet, and in 5 minutes I would be decluttering again. :laff: I would think what the professional team on Hoarders would say about my stuff, and in my mind I would have arguments with them about what I was keeping! :laff:

I wanted to declutter while it was too hot outside to do much else.

There were some days I took off, if I was out with friends, or if I had to catch up on my usual errands.

[Life_is_Simple]

What is Phase II?

You kick butt!!
HA! I am going to just enjoy the results of Phase I for a while. ;) I can't think about Phase II yet!

...though I did notice areas at times where I would say to myself, "I'll get back to that later." This might consist of going through clothes one more time, and coordinating papers and binders a little better. I got overwhelmed with papers toward the end, and just had to find a reasonable stopping point. The papers are all put away, but they look at me menacingly from bookshelves, filing cabinets, and closet shelves. :0!

[Life_is_Simple]

Powerfully impressive and inspiring!!!

Thanks ;)

[iris lily]

I've been doing my own version, started working in 2009, on getting rid of childhood stuff that I've carted around for decades. And, it's not only getting rid of it, it is re-jiggering the "Stuff" so that if fits my current lifestyle. Yesterday I picked up, from the jewelry repair place, a pair of costume earring from the 1920's that an elderly friend gave me in 1985. One has been broekn for many years, but I loved these. It cost only $29 to repair them. Egad why did I wait so long to get to this task? I also am having them convert a pair of Victorian earrings from screw backs to ones for pierced ears. This will cost more since they are gold, but if I;m going to keep these family earrings, I will wear them.

[cjones]

Very impressive, major kudos to you, Life_is_Simple! How many weeks/months from start to end? Doesn't it feel great?! Was it the Hoarders show that provided the initial motivation? I think you in fact have completed Phases 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, and 10!

[Life_is_Simple]

Very impressive, major kudos to you, Life_is_Simple! How many weeks/months from start to end? Doesn't it feel great?! Was it the Hoarders show that provided the initial motivation? I think you in fact have completed Phases 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, and 10!
It took less than a month. Is that possible? :0! I worked on it every spare moment though.

My motivation... After helping my family members declutter, I thought "I probably have a little bit of clutter." Once I started, I kept thinking "There can't be much more, right?" :laff: I put the Hoarders show on to get me going when times got tough. Maybe I'm a little OCD too :laff:

It is nice to have gone through all areas one time. Now I know what I have.

[ejchase]

Very impressive and inspiring. Thanks for giving us all the details.

I think when you are learning new habits you feel "a little OCD" at first. That's what happened to me when I was working through some compulsive overeating issues and learning to eat only when I was hungry and stop eating when I was full. I got very exacting about it which felt compulsive at times. But now those habits are ingrained, I hardly think about them at all and am looser and more flexible with them.

[Life_is_Simple]

Very impressive and inspiring. Thanks for giving us all the details.

I think when you are learning new habits you feel "a little OCD" at first. That's what happened to me when I was working through some compulsive overeating issues and learning to eat only when I was hungry and stop eating when I was full. I got very exacting about it which felt compulsive at times. But now those habits are ingrained, I hardly think about them at all and am looser and more flexible with them.
That is exactly it! I am in the habit learning stage. Part of it is, I am nervous about the habits not sticking, and am almost hypervigilent. Thanks for making me feel normal about this! :+1:

I thinking with the systems I am setting up, that will help the habits become ingrained. Like, labeling compartments things in my Mail Center (e.g., envelopes, packing tape, address labels...) may help so I don't overthink, and just put items where they belong.