May Purge

[ejchase]

Chicken Lady, I couldn't tell if your new thread was an "elephant" thread or a purge thread, so I'm starting a purge thread here. Hope that's okay.

I weeded out 37 items from my panty here. Still working towards a goal of getting rid of 1,200 things this year!

[JaneV2.0]

Delivered a back seat full to the thrift store Friday. Starting up a new "to go" pile.

[pinkytoe]

Had our pre-moving sale this morning. Made $300+ and got rid of a lot of little stuff. The leftovers went to Goodwill.

[Lainey]

Delivered a back seat full to the thrift store Friday. Starting up a new "to go" pile.

Jane, I know you've been doing this for a while too. Am just curious on how you see your progress - are you half-way there? almost done?
Wondering because I've done what I consider a fairly good initial purge, but I've decided to do another, and hopefully final round, next summer after retirement.

Also had to laugh because a friend who is retired said her husband read Marie Kondo's book and is now walking around the house during their purge sessions saying "does this spark joy?" - he's really into it!

[JaneV2.0]

Jane, I know you've been doing this for a while too. Am just curious on how you see your progress - are you half-way there? almost done?
Wondering because I've done what I consider a fairly good initial purge, but I've decided to do another, and hopefully final round, next summer after retirement.

Also had to laugh because a friend who is retired said her husband read Marie Kondo's book and is now walking around the house during their purge sessions saying "does this spark joy?" - he's really into it!

I do everything at a leisurely pace these days, and I don't really know the answer to that. I have a house with limited storage space--unless I want to pack seasonal clothing off to the garage, or something--so it's hard to tell. The eventual goal is to be down to the stuff I want to move. Most of the furniture will be jettisoned (not the bookshelves!), so the ultimate truckload should be far smaller than the average household's.

[Chicken lady]

It was meant as spurge thread, but no big deal. I don't so much "purge", do i. Is there a synonym for purge that implies "trickle"?

right now I'm feeling really set back by Dd's stuff. I've been working in my barn, where I'm doing a pretty good job throwing away and recycling things. The barn has never been fully cleaned out - this place was actually purchased from landlords to a hoarder, and I kept some of the hoarder's "useful stuff" when we cleaned out the barn.

[shadowmoss]

When Mom and I started this process to move from here (separate mobile homes, she's done, I'm not) we put some of the things out on a table in the community room for the folks here in the park to have first option. I went down there yesterday and the table is covered. Another couple is moving into a mobile here and everything left behind by the previous owners they put on the table. I now feel bad about putting anything there. With the snowbirds gone there aren't many folks here to take our stuff. :) So, back to daily trips to the thrift. I did thrift a wedding present last week. A glass relish tray I've never used. I was married in '80 and divorced in '82.

[Chicken lady]

Well, today we are CLEANING OUT THE GARAGE. I'm up for it. I'll let you know how it goes.

[Teacher Terry]

I like to do big purges and work at it all day and get it done. Everytime I think I have nothing left to get rid of for example a group will ask for donations and then I will purge some more. When my MIL died 9 years ago we got rid of a lot of her stuff but my DH also put a ton of boxes in our small basement and forbid me to touch them. He told me that this summer he is going to go through them and get rid of stuff. I think that if you get rid of a bunch of stuff at once it feels better because you can visually see the progress you have made.

[rosarugosa]

I started working on the seasonal closet shift/review/cull today. I have a spreadsheet where I track purchases, so I know I've brought 15 new articles of clothing into my home this year. I haven't really ever tracked outflow vs. inflow, but I think I should start doing this with clothing. Right now, I have pile of 4 things to go out, so I have a ways to go. I've also decided that if I still can't fit into my currently too-small pants by the end of the summer, out they will go. Size fluctuations are definitely not frugal!

[Chicken lady]

Well, we ended up working on the garage and the yard and finishing neither.

however, the leftover good lumber is now stacked neatly in the shop/studio barn instead of in the yard under plastic. We found a bunch more "non-.recyclable, non-burn able" construction debris and now have 5 full trash cans - we had to spend about an hour cutting some of it up because two weeks ago they left all my cans because one had a piece of plastic trim more than 3' long in it.

stuff went into the basement that used to live there before construction (coolers, canning jars, folding chairs) and our outside chairs went on the new front and back porches, tools went back to the barn, the recycling bin was filled, the floor was swept and I threw away 4 items that were no longer good for their original use and were not recyclable instead of saving them for "something" and added two things to the goodwill pile. I still have a metal shelving unit to clean off (3 ft wide, 4 shelves tall) that is mostly mud shoes and work boots for me and the kids, dh has his "corner" that we didn't dig into, and there are some materials leaning against one wall we aren't sure about using vs. tossing, vs will anybody take this stuff?

my assignment for tomorrow is to collect the rest of the burnables from all over the yard and stack them in the lean-to for use in barrel firing my pottery.

i looked at it and said "I think the garage looks pretty good."

dh said "I wouldn't say that, but it's better."

[Chicken lady]

Well, I threw out a handful of stuff from the top of the blue shelf.

dd went through her clothes today. She filled a big black trash bag with clothes and shoes to donate. She also gave me a sweater, a frog, and a pair of dress boots. I gave her a pair of pants.

one of my goats kidding with a single buckling, but a guy came out this evening and committed to buy two of the winter bucklings. He gets paid Friday, so I'm not counting them gone yet.

[iris lilies]

After a big flower show, I have crap strewn all over our downstairs area, so I have the urge to purge.

Today I tossed several kitchen items and a few from the basement. DH moved all of the tender plants from our basement, so now I can sweep and clean it up.

I am bummed that my garden club requires clear bottles for horticulture entries. F--k that. I have 75 wine and beer bottles I,use for iris shows, all green or brown. I really do not want to start collecting a whole other set of bottles to meet a different show standard.

[iris lilies]

I also cleaned the refrigerator, cleaned all surfaces. I tossed only two items. Our 'fridge is normally not chock full o' stuff that goes unused.

[Chicken lady]

New plan (you may have noticed that I really like new plans but have n staying power, otoh, if I came up with a new plan every few days, would that be a workable system? - lol!)

i'm going to see how many days in a row I can get rid of something.

Rules -
the thing has to be on my property right now, not in my classroom or yet to be acquired.
the thing has to be removed from the property, or put in the goodwill pile, recycling, or trash. Taking out the goodwill, recycling, or trash doesn't count because the items get counted when they go in.

today - put the handful (around the hooks) of rusty hangers I was saving "for wire" into the mixed metal recycling, creating two empty hooks on my barn wall.

[iris lilies]

I'm on a little roll.

Am gathering spare pet equipment that will either go to Bulldog rescue, or if our keeper of rescue "stuff" doesnt want it, it will go out in the alley and I'll post photos on our neighborhood listserv and on Craiglist.

I have a small group of slightly nice stuff to go to our neighborhood's "Antiques and Collectibles" sale in June. Somehow DH has slipped in another old Shopsmith thingie into our basement. He doesnt use them at all. I hope I can talk him into donating.

[sweetana3]

Emptied my entire wall to wall closet to install a wire closet system to replace the one shelf and rod that were in the closet. When I refill it, it will only have the things I love and wear. The rest will go. Found my husband's boy scout vest from 50 years ago hanging in my closet.

[Chicken lady]

Six things that have "gone" in the six days since I started the new plan with the hangers:
T-shirt (goodwill)
graduation regalia (goodwill)
my mom's hat (back to my mom)
a special doll display box (trash)
a post card (recycling)
the antique rope bed dh's parents "gave" us, which I gave them back when they left to return to their home state this morning because mil didn't want us to get rid of it.

[Teacher Terry]

Giving items back to people if they want them is a good idea so no hard feelings when you no longer need things. I think purging can kinda be a learned behavior. The more you do when you see nothing bad happens the more you want to do and finally you enjoy the open space. When I was younger I kept many things and so did my then dh. WE moved ourselves all the way from NY to WIS and then because of a few moves in the city never unpacked a bunch of boxes for 2 years. What did we find when we did? A hood from my oldest son winter coat but no coat, and a bunch of crap like that. That really taught us a lesson. Then we moved into an old home with stuff in the basement and garage that my dh thought would be useful. 10 years later we spent the entire summer with our boys help hauling it to the curb for free pickup. What a huge and not fun job it was. The neighbors let us use in front of their property so literally we filed the entire block over and over again.

[JaneV2.0]

We have a neighborhood recycling event coming up, so I will be able to get rid of a couple of broken small appliances, styrofoam, and cardboard. The less in the landfill, the better.

[Chicken lady]

This thread has been kind of quiet, but I just wanted to check in again that I am managing the purge something every day system. Mostly small things, but also mostly trash - things that were saved for possible reuse that I have been letting go. So not a lot of improvement space-wise, but developmentally healthy.

i wish I could recycle styrofoam!

[JaneV2.0]

We just had a neighborhood recycling event that included styrofoam. Check your county recycling web page to see what the scoop is.

[Chicken lady]

I googled my county and discovered that you can recycle many things in counties with the same name in other states.

when I added my state to my county, "styrofoam", and "recycle" Google gave up on even trying to find a related page.

[mschrisgo2]

How much styrofoam do you have? Is there some place DS can recycle it on his travels to and fro?
Personally, I go to great lengths not to bring any of it home, although I do see people asking for it on freecycle a few times a year.

[Chicken lady]

We bought these new windows to install in the addition and they came with huge styrofoam frames around them. It's a lot!

also, people bring me styrofoam egg cartons to reuse and eventually they wear out. That's most of it. Sometimes meat trays. Peanuts get dropped at ups when I pass on my work commute.

i had a relaxing weekend with lots of quality time with all the kids. Dd1& future sil are back at home/work of course, and ds took his gf, dd2, and my grand dog back to gf mom's house to meet the moving truck this afternoon. Dd2 is going to ride out with them and help unpack. I'm back to working my plan. Ds did slip his rock collection (fits in a diaper wipe box) back into one of the three childhood bins I agreed to store for him.

[ejchase]

Big step forward today. My daughter and I had gone through her clothes a few weeks ago, and she had picked out different items to hand down to two different friends and a cousin, but those bags of clothes had been sitting in my bedroom for quite a while. Today, I mailed and delivered them to their intended recipients, dropped off a load of stuff at Goodwill, and returned clothes I'd bought but realized I didn't want or need to three separate mail-order businesses. Total for today was 72 and for this month is 109! Total for the year so far is 176, which means I'm way behind on my goal of reaching 1,200, but I'm not giving up on it yet. In any case, getting all that stuff out today felt good.

[Gardnr]

We cleaned the cabin from ceiling to floor Thursday. (day 1 of our vacation). Out: 2 emptied cleaner containers into recycle(broken sprayer on 1), a never-used cheap dollar store bath pillow, the hairdryer that died as I was using it, 6 paint cans will go to hazardous dropoff, a basket, 2 photo collage frames, a small area rug, a wall hook. The useable items will go to the thrift store.

A few of Mom's things are still here-when she died, we brought here what I just couldn't part with yet. 2 are going to my little sister this week along w 2 jigsaw puzzles we've done. And the biggest of all: the large box of Mom's photo albums. It's going back home. I will attempt to scan the ones that hold major family history and get it to everyone via zip file. The box of photos goes to little sister per her request. She does not want them trashbinned.

We're fairly minimalist here as we are not fond of "taking care of stuff". And we've been babysitting it. done!

[Teacher Terry]

filled my car with stuff and dropped it off. I never count but it was a lot.

[Gardnr]

I burned the remaining candle in a ceramic jar. I wasn't in the mood to attempt to clean the jar for donating so I actually threw it in the trash. It's a nice jar but I doubt the thrift store will want to sell a "dirty jar".

[iris lilies]

We are getting ready for the annual Antiques sale run by the Park Cnsrvancy in our neighbhood. DH and I pioneered the first sale several years ago, and it was a success. since then I scour our house annually for things to to donate to the sale.

Ive got a small pile and if things sell at my suggested prices, it will bring in $200.

The sale usualy nets $5,000-$7,000. We sell object donated by people in our neighborhood. There is almost $0 cost in putting on this sale so its a great fundraiser. The downside to the sale is that someone feels compelled to save all of the crap leftover from the sale, so that is always a problem. But I stay completely away from that issue. I refuse to help pack up leftover stuff. When we ran the sale I told the Board "all that is leftover will be donated to the Methodist Church's rummage sale" and we got rid of each and every thing but for a few items that I promosed would go back to the owners if not sold.

The current group running it has inflated ideas of the worth of things, they move the same objcts back and forth to the sale each year, and they wont deal to move the onjects. I just smile and make deals on objects I brought if it is near the end of the sale. I just want them gone.

I still roll my eyes at the sets of "grandmothers Haviland" and silverplate trays that people firmly believe will find a home at their fantasy prices.

[iris lilies]

This is less about purging than cleaning, but yes I did get rid of a few things yestrday as we cleaned up our 2nd floor.

Our niece and her husband are coming to stay for a few days. I like having overnight visitors once a year because it forces us to clean all surfaces. Our upstairs area is dingey but it will be a while before that comes into focus for updating. In the mean time our hosting spaces look like a low end but respectable motel. As long as everything is clean, I guess I dont mind.