To just get rid of it all?

[Hoardernomore]

So far this week I’ve got rid of 18 bags of rubbish / recycling / stuff for charity shop from our average sized house. I’m still going.
I’ve got rid of christening cards, scan photos, wedding cards, thanks you cards, Mother’s Day cards, baby memory boxes, new baby stuff and momentoes. All gone. Drawings by the kids, photos, hand made stuff from school and nursery.
Also gone are all my books and cds, toys my children don’t use, random stuff we’ve accumulated like wires that I have no idea of their purpose anymore.
My gran died last year and she’d kept so much, and we had to chuck most of it. I’ve concluded it is all just stuff, at some point it has to be thrown away and actually it’s easier for me to do it than my children once I’m dead.

My friend thought I’d lost the plot when I told her everything had gone. Aibu? I just think it’s stuff. It’s all pointless really.

Also, photograph stuff before you bin it. That way you have the memory.

Its so so hard to get rid of all the things that you have mentioned, but, its very freeing big time. My Mum died 13 years ago,she was 86. but for the previous two years before her death, she began to start getting rid of things in her home, saying that she didn't want to leave a load of stuff for others to sort out when she was gone.(she had also organised , and payed for her own funeral) and given me the undertakers receipt !

To be honest, my Mum was very very organised, and did a brilliant job sorting her things out, so much so, that when I had to go and sort her flat out after she died, ( I had to drive miles to her place to do so,as my sister who lived near to her, refused to help in any way, as they had fallen out years before., and sister refused to attend Mum's funeral also.

I have kept only a few small things from Mum's. mostly her many photo albums from over the years.

But the point of me saying all this, is that I am now myself doing exactly the same, I am over seventy now, still in good health etc, but I want, and do so, keep clearing things out most weeks. and even if I live till I am 100, omg, I will be super organised !

I have given my son and daughter,, both 40 ish in age, all the things I have saved of their's, like their cards sent to me, their school and Uni reports, and early chlldhood medical papers etc, They will not be wanting any of my type of reading books, nor any of the pictures on my walls, and definitely not my small collection of duck ornaments ha ha. (they might like my houseplants though !!)

I do know how very attached to things that most people can be, I have been the same for years and years, but now I need to be organised like my late Mum was, especially as she always thought I was never organised at all ha ha.

I wish we could do this. We live in a two bedroom flat but sleep in the sitting room because we are storing so much stuff in the second bedroom. We also have stuff in the attic and then a study type room full of other stuff. Every other room is filled with clutter. I just don’t even know where to start to be honest. We are not really hoarders as such. Just busy, tired and a bit lazy. It plays on my mind though. Next house move am going to be ruthless.

“Well, what’s left? No books at all?”

I don’t find books particularly decorative, and there are so many in the world that I don’t feel the need to re-read the same ones again. When I’ve read one I pass it on to a friend or give it to charity (which is where most of them come from).

I think I would want to keep sentimental things. I'm not sure exactly what I've got to be truthful, probably not as many things that I would have liked to have kept but DH is rather ruthless when it comes to decluttering.

OTOH my parents have kept every little thing - we are in process of them moving into a care home and at some point in the near future I will need to empty their house to put on the market - the thought of it breaks my heart

I don’t keep the kids art work but will always keep photos (including scan photos), my daughter has kept a couple school reports but I have got rid of the rest, I just don’t have the room to keep everything. We never keep birthday or christening cards. I can remember my mum keeping everything including cards and school work.

I am very much a minimalist and feel much more 'at peace' with less stuff. I think it's because I travelled a lot when younger and part of me feels I'd like to be able to move without too much hassle (still renting, can't afford to buy). I also love a good sort out.
I have no CD's and only children's (DD's) books. I'm aware that is a heinous crime in many eyes, especially the books thing!
Having said that, weirdly I would love a room with a red velvet chair, mahogany furniture, brandy in a decanter and wall to wall bookcases of old diary books I'd never read

I did this after my father died. All my teenage diaries, lots of photos, letters...things that made me feel sad. It was freeing and I don't regret it for a second. I also have nothing from my early childhood - my parents couldn't afford camera, photo development. Actually I have one teddy. That's enough for me... but actually the pressure I feel sometimes when I think about losing it. We shouldn't be shackled to our belongings.

Dusty not diqry

I have special boxes for kids, which they will be given to move into their own homes when they are older, they love them and ask if things can go in them. It’s their stuff and decision to keep or bin when they are older

When my mum died I found bags and bags of birthday and Christmas cards from close family, not just sent to her, but also sent to my grandparents. It would have filled about 3 black sacks (I recycled them though). It was nice to see a few of them but tbh after that I just found it depressing that 2 generations hadn't managed to bring themselves to throw this stuff away. I don't think I could throw everything out, but I keep just a select few things - a small folder with some drawings, home made cards, etc.

My aunt once came home to find my dgm piling everything on the fire. Photos, birth, wedding certificates, information about my dgds family (his parents died when he was a child), his war records. Everything gone. My mum and sisters were devastated. There's a fine line between hoarding crap and losing family history and memories.

There is a member of my family who had been a keeper, not really a hoarder, but when that person took up with a new partner absolutely everything has "gone missing". Even toys and games given to their DCs disappear. The result is that this same person is never given anything of the family history type of thing.

I have no idea if this is the choice of the family member or the partner.

I also think that these terribly minimal houses look as if people don't have any family history. I look at houses for sale and think how can people live with out a mirror or a photo of the DCs or Grandparents. I am proud to have a photo of my Great Great Grandfather.

I think you should keep at least some of the important things. I kept a memory collection for each of my DC. I am so thankful I did, because my eldest son died suddenly and those things are very precious to me now.

I love a good declutter and live by the 'keep nothing that's neither useful or beautiful' rule. I have a minimalist wardrobe, and the bare minimum of everything else and I feel free of it. I also deliberate over buying stuff and constantly ask myself if I need it, 9 times out of 10 I don't so I put it back. Less things means less cleaning, tidying and sorting and I'm all for that

I've kept everything. I have three teenagers so that's a lot of paintings, drawings, books, school work, toys, Lego etc etc. Plus 1000s of letters from their grandparents.

I could count on one hand the stuff I have from when I was a kid and young person and would still have fingers spare. That's why I've kept everything.

Dh wants to get rid of their outgrown toys. Would eBay be the place for that?

I have hardly any photos from my childhood. No baptism cards, no communion cards. All momentos of my life start at 18.

There were loads of photos but my dad decluttered and got rid of everything 😢 except school reports which I found behind a cabinet when clearing the house for sale.

It makes me feel very sad.

I have kept all my wedding cards, all my children’s “birth” cards and first birthday cards, their baptism, communion and confirmation cards. Baby boxes with scan pictures, little hospital bands etc. I also have a few select pieces of art work by each child. They are all precious to me and I couldn’t throw them out.

BUT we don’t send cards to each other at Christmas or birthdays so I certainly won’t be keeping one and changing dates!

So you cross out the old days and write a new one? Really odd.

What’s the point in opening the same old Christmas card every year?

Actually I really like this idea!

I’m trying to get rid of our clutter. Desperately trying, but it’s a mahussive huge task, so I’m trying to take it one day at a time. Well done op!

As a genealogist, I am crying on the inside 😞. I would have not thrown all of the kids stuff away and made them a box as that’s all their early childhood no more, and they may have wanted it. My nan did exactly the same to my mum and she has never forgotten it and to a certain extend is angry about it.

I also forgot to say she lost her dad at 14 and now has no photos of him to show us really. I think her aunt had one that she now has but it’s nothing really

My aunt once came home to find my dgm piling everything on the fire. Photos, birth, wedding certificates, information about my dgds family (his parents died when he was a child), his war records. Everything gone.

Oh god, this makes my stomach drop through my feet...

I moved house a couple years ago and massively decluttered, however i still have
For me, ticket stubs, grandads war medals, actual photos (never had many so not a huge deal)
For each child, first blanket, first lock of hair, first shoes, a few "artworks" and the child immunisation book thing.
All fit into one decent size plastic tub.
I did charity shop a lot of clothes and books and dvds and kitchen equipment and bedding and towels. Ended up moving house with one decent sized plastic tub and one suitcase.
I did go a bit too far with the clothes and have since bought more, but I try to do one item in the house, one out. Mostly successful.

I was given some wise advice to photograph some things and post on faceache, where it will stay forever more.
For the poster with slides and viewer, there are slide converters which will digitize slides, and then you can get rid. They cost about £40 but keep the value when you sell on.

Seems really sad to have binned your scan photos and baby boxes.