How do I get rid of all my doom boxes?

[coodawoodashooda]

Yesterday I committed to a massive clear out. We simply have too much stuff. I want everything streamlined and simplified with a place for everything. I have doom boxes as part of household administration and in the garage. Any tips please?

You have all convinced me. I'll go and look now.

I find the toys difficult because my kids are still little. We just have too much stuff!

Thank you very much.

I have one of them too. Am seriously wondering about just ditching it.

a few things that might help

1. Try to recall stuff in doom box before looking at it….anything you can actually remember being in them may be worth keeping. If when you open you hadn’t remembered still having item , then it’s not worth remembering and get rid of it


2. set a target of say 3 or 5 or 10 things from each box. Go through. Curate. Select the most important ones. Then Get rid of rest of stuff


3. photograph items in physical box…then dump. Not only do you save space but the memories are easier to access in your on line images


4. remember old adage of not having anything in your house that you don’t find useful or beautiful…and I’d add memorable. If it’s not beautiful enough to put on display - ditch. If you’ve not used in last 2 years it ain’t that useful so ditch…and if you didn’t remember it till point you saw it again it isn’t memorable so ditch

For last 10 odd years I have used a marker pen and tape to label all plugs, chargers and cables to avoid this. Saw advice from someone else. Works a treat. Can now chuck out redundant stuff with confidence

Re photos I sent all my old printed ones to a company to scan them all in and return as digital

They are now on shuffle as my screensaver and I look at them far more than I ever did

It was a while ago but cost approx £400 for 5k photos I think

I do now do the Kondo questions - do I absolutely need it or absolutely love it? If it's a no, it's a go

Watch ‘The minimal Mom’ on YouTube! You don’t have to go as extreme as she does, but her videos are really inspiring and eye opening. I’ve seen/read loads of things and she’s the best by far for learning to declutter.

I've found my people! DOOM box may be my new favourite phrase. I've been trying for years to shift some of it. Struggling with "hoarding" in the non clinical sense as feels like waste, even though lots of it must be utterly useless to me. Same with clothes. I think it comes from emulating what I saw growing up. There's form for it, my DGM has wardrobes upon wardrobes of brand new clothes she is saving for a special occasion, despite the fact she never goes anywhere.

OP, I found donating to church groups or refuges where I know the items can directly benefit someone (rather than sit to rot in a charity shop) really helped with letting go of some of it. "Would I give this or be happy to receive it to/from a friend" is my yard stick. Everything else gets recycled.

@NoToLandfill I love Dana, she's so brutally honest!

When we needed to clear the loft out I was going to go through all the boxes but my DH said that as I hadn't looked in the boxes for 12 years I didn't need anything in them. So I took them to the tip without opening them!

We've just moved house OP, and we had a whole garage of DOOM, as well as drawers and boxes elsewhere. Those things have gone unmissed for 6 years, so I realised there was no way we needed any of it. We hired a clearance company to come and take it all away. We did rake our eyes over the boxes in a lip service kind of way, and kept a few items here and there, but the vast vast majority got taken away. It felt WONDERFUL! Aim to do a couple of boxes a day, nothing too intimidating. And just keep in mind that if you haven't missed it already, you won't in future! Good luck!

I had a garage of doom. I hired a big skip and threw everything remotely doom-y into it without looking at it or thinking too hard. At the end I bought some garage shelving and organized what was left. It makes me feel good now every time I go in. So liberating.

@Cheesepleeze I love the minimal Mom too. So many tips on how to figure out what you actually need and what you can chuck.

It took about a year to do the whole house but I did it in 20 minute chunks when I felt like it.

It was worth doing as I finally sorted out the mass of paperwork shoved in every drawer and found so many documents we needed to sell this house. They're now in a labelled folder with labelled poly pockets. It's amazing and I feel very smug. It took a really long time to get there though!

As of this summer we are a house of 5 adults yet we are swimming in stuff that goes back to when 3 of them were toddlers. Their Mog books are still on the bookshelves fgs.

I've kept a few of my kids' childhood toys (my favourites, admittedly) so that when we have grandchildren, or when random small children visit, they will have something to play with. Turns out neither of my kids want kids of their own (might change, but seems unlikely) and we haven't had random small children visiting ever. So I've been giving away or selling some of these - it's definitely progress!

Cables breed. They must do. I threw out literally dozens of them when we moved last. I still find them feckin everywhere

Ditto😀

DH is meant to be doing a car boot

the thought of this stresses me out so much! Even though it’s not my stuff I’m thinking what was in it/?what if it was important?!

my whole house is full of doom- boxes/ bags/ corners. I know there’s important stuff in it as occasionally I’ll clear it and find something I’ve been looking for.

i like the idea of putting things where you’d look for them. Sounds sensible / logical so now to try it.

@Rummikub I like where would I look for this first? much more than where should this live. It gave me permission to accept that some things like nail clippers and tape measures live in one of the big pretty bowls I use to dump things in.

I clear them out when they're full but some things stay there forever.

Yes that’s very true. I keep my daily meds in the cutlery drawer as it reminds me to take them.
o can’t think of a where would I look for nail clippers hence it’s in my shopping list for the fourth time in months..

I've inherited a doom box of cables from my DF. I was hoping I would be able to match them up with various electrical items he also left, but just end up shuffling them around. Problem is I appear to have mixed in a cable for charger for my camera, so don't wan't to just check them away

Nope! Couldn't do that. Just the thought of YOU doing it with YOUR things it's stressing ME out too much.

I just......I ju....nope! How???? How does that not torment you? Every time I was looking for something Id be thinking maybe it was in one of the unopened boxes?

Aghhhhhhhhhhhhhh! Runs screaming from the room. I think I need a lie down after that!

😂 me too

i also recommend Minimal Mom and A slob Comes Clean for practical and realistic tips with humour and understanding!

I’ve also been watching various minimalist YouTubers - mostly Scandinavian or Dutch women whose videos are very serene and calming. A bit of inspiration!