The minimalist quiche

[educatingarti]

This is a new thread to replace the minimalist journey one which is nearly full!

[BabCNesbitt]

issimma and QueenofWhatever, I'd love to see your Pinterest boards. I'm mildly addicted to it, but as far as minimizing goes, it's got its pros and cons. Mostly I pin fairly calm, minimalist rooms (and clothes), but I get lured in by some of the more cluttered, bohemian/hippy looking rooms on there, and it undermines my desire to get rid of stuff. It's very easy to get suckered in by it! Should probably do a bit of virtual decluttering...

Good luck with everyone's weekend minimizing!

[SilentMammoth]

Minerva, I upload my photos to photobox every month and create a photo book every year, I find it overwhelms me a lot less, if that is helpful at all?

Got two items on ebay last night, I know it doesn't sound like much but one of the down sides of living where we do is am awful internet connection which takes ten minutes to load a photo after tring all week, so was pleased with that.

Have been eating up freezer and cupboard with aim if not doing full shop til feb and switching off extra freezer. Then will try and shop very frugally in feb so have extra money to do biiiiig shop when go on maternity leave and do lots of batch cooking. Well, that s the theory anyway! Dh away a lot of february which will help.

[becstarlightstarbright]

Thanks bluecarrot I'll watch that podcast, I like Joshua Becker. I was just re reading this post on Leo Baubata's minimalist blog (archive here) The image of a billboard in Time Square saying "you already have enough" and an amazon pop up that says "you don't need that my friend"... I love those images.

harrietspy we gave our excess furniture to a local charity that picks up furniture and gives it to previously homeless people who are moving into a council or charity property. But we have bought second hand furniture for our new flat from eBay and from www.preloved.co.uk/ with good experiences each time. (The desk that our Mac sits on and DHs record cabinet were the two purchases.) If you don't want the hassle of ebaying you could look through ebay seller ads to find sellers of furniture near to you - you might find a secondhand furniture dealer who'd pick it up from you.

SilentMammoth - I'm doing that cooking from the cupboards thing too at the moment. We just had lentil Dahl for lunch which was yummy and it was all store cupboard - there's something very satisfying about it isn't there?

Thanks for making me so welcome on this thread everyone - nice to talk to like minds

[bluecarrot]

The popup is an interesting one as one thing Joshua said in that podcast was about taking his son to the toys hop to buy a skateboard. The son got distracted by another item but his dad was there to guide him with his spending. He had the aha! Moment- who keeps my spending in check. So while he was letting go of stuff he wasn't really paying much attention to stuff coming in :) that was interesting to me though I already do keep myself in check.

My cc is wrapped in a piece of paper with a pic of a vw camper van. I'd love to own one and it means that everytime I go to spend ( everything paid for on cc, except milk at corner shop, then paid off in full each month) I have a visual reminder of what my bigger goals are.

Today's keeping it simple job for me was food based. I did two weeks worth of shopping for £42 ( with £10 budgeted for milk and bread during the fortnight). Plus I have some stuff in freezer. Keeping it simple. No fancy meals ( well, dd is excited we are having naan- that's fancy to her!) no plans to bake random cakes "just because",

And broken freezer and borrowed fridge are both leaving the house in half an hour :)

[educatingarti]

I'd also be interested in seeing pinterest pages if anyone can send me details of their boards.

bluecarrot I love VW camper vans too!

[wendybird77]

This is such a lovely thread. I like it here . Well done to all making such great progress and process. I have stopped decluttering for the moment and have been focused on decorating a couple of rooms. We are having the bathrooms and kitchen done and work starts in 2 weeks. I need to have a couple of 'done' rooms so I can relax whilst everything else is being torn apart. At the moment the walls are freshly painted white with no holes or visible blemishes. It is lovely. I have plans for a small gallery wall to display photos in frames and will put something over the mantle, but think I'll leave the rest blank. I am really grateful that we are able to pretty much start from scratch and am trying to be very conscientiousness with what I bring in and ensure that everything has a purpose and a place. We plan to be here for a long time and I want to get it right, particularly getting the storage balance right so that I have places to store what needs storing without creating too many spaces that are easy to shove stuff in to deal with later. Lucky for me our garage was converted into an annex by the previous owners and the loft is getting new insulation which requires us to pull up the boards already there. DH doesn't realise I'm in clutter prevention mode bwah ha ha!

[SilentMammoth]

Who was the wise soul who commented that the happiest "stuff" had made her wad when it left the house.

Yy to that. Wise words indeed.

[harrietspy]

Ok, so I'm off to the Garage tomorrow. Thankfully we're breaking up the day with lunch then tea with good friends who are looking after dc while we start to deal with the Stuff. I don't know how much we'll be able to achieve but it'll be good to look it squarely in the face.

I'm hoping that Sport will feel able to let stuff go too although I fear he'll want to bring back the 'useful' stuff, including the 50 wine glasses left over from his mum's 50th birthday party that we somehow inherited. (She's 70 now). We'll see.

Please send calm thoughts!

[CremeEggThief]

Very best of luck with your garage, Harriet. Just think of how you will feel once it's starting to take shape.

[SilentMammoth]

Calm thoughts on the way. Hopefully you wont have to take refuge in a dumb waiter (doesn't she do that at some point?)

[educatingarti]

Hope things go well tomorrow Harriet.
Can you get Scout to take responsibility for storing any rubbish precious items he can't bear to part with?

[AntoinetteCosway]

Only just found the second fred and there's already 86 messages!

IWipeArses what you want is this: Giorgio Armani Luminous Silk Foundation I am a freelance make up artist (as well as rather more boring English teacher) and it is, hands down, the best foundation in the world. (If you have slightly dry, sensitive skin like me, that is.)

We're still working on the attic of doom so I sympathise with all you garage avoiders. It somehow seems to be a never ending job

I have followed the example of the all the nice American ladies on YouTube and made myself a Household Management Binder It is a thing of beauty. Everything in one place, including pens, stickers, stamps etc, so it's done away with all my desk junk (which, bearing in mind I don't have a desk so this stuff was just all over the kitchen and sitting room, is quite important) and put everything together. If anyone is interested, my sections are:

A folder with stamps, Royal Mail postage leaflet, stickers and post it notes (this is cool - it's from Ryman's and I'd never seen one before. It's a v slim plastic folder but hole punched so it fits in a file.)
Calendar (one page with the whole year, one page with a list of birthdays, 12 months over two sides that get a section each along with a to do list, a menu plan and an empty folder for the random crap that I never have anywhere for, like train or theatre tickets booked in advance)
Important numbers (things like insurance companies with the phone number and account number plus the date the premium's due)
Budgeting
Master to do list
Cleaning (checklist, stain removal guide)
Goal planning (because I'm actually turning into one of those nice American ladies - DH thinks this bit is hilarious)
Wishlist
Holiday planning sheets
Christmas section (card list, thank you list)
Babysitter section (pre-printed info that just needs the place we're going to added each time)
A business card sheet (it's A4 and SO useful - before I had a drawer full of business cards, reward cards etc and could never find anything - now they're all together)
Tutoring section (so I can keep track of who's done what and who's paid what)
A notepad.

Now, am I not the coolest saddest person in all existence? I do love it so

[AntoinetteCosway]

Oh, and the very first thing in it after the folder is our family mission statement.

DH think I'm actually bonkers but did sit down with me to write it, after a little bribery!

[educatingarti]

Antoinette - glad you found the thread! Are you a fellow tutor?

[educatingarti]

I've just spent an hour "decluttering" my admin "to do" list (personal one as opposed to work one). It's been a bit frustrating as I haven't been able to fully complete some tasks but I have:
Sorted a parcel to be returned to Amazon (needs to go to post office)
Packaged up a disposable camera to get photos developed (needs stamps)
Researched a the phone number of my local furniture recycling charity so I can phone them to offer a chair I no longer need.
Posted some ink cartridges ( fit a printer I no longer have!) on freegle
Packaged up empty ink cartridges to post in envelope to recyling company.
Picked out some paper work from one of many a box of doom on the side table in my work room. It contains random paperwork from more than a year a while ago. Most of it is so out of date now it can just go in recycling, but some needs to be filed. I reckon if I do a few bits each week, it has got to be empty sometime ( as long as I don't put more in!).

Feeling better but frustrated at not being able to complete some tasks. - Well I did come out as a completer-finisher on Myers Briggs!

[AntoinetteCosway]

You've been busy educatingarti! I'm a part time English teacher during the week, freelance make up artist at the weekends and English and Drama tutor in the evenings. And Mum, in between! What's your subject?

[QueenofWhatever]

Just back from seeing Django Unchained at the cinema but wanted to say good luck tomorrow harrietspy.

[blossombath]

Wow antoinette I am so impressed! Will definitely be following suit, in fact next room on my list is nursery/spare room where we have all the bills/manuals/household stuff filed/thrown in boxes. So your binder can inspire me.

And arti you, too, have been very industrious, inspiring me to keep plugging away so i have something to write about by tomorrow eve...

Trying to persuade dh merits of scanning in most or all old bank statements etc. wondering whether to also scan in manuals/guarantees, but it can be handy to have hard copy of manual with you when trying to fix/work things. Hmmm...

Calm and decluttery thoughts to you harriet, and to Sport.

[notcitrus]

Back from declutter clothes swap party. Took more than an entire bootload of clothes and other stuff, came home with 5 tops and one toy set. The unclaimed stuff has been bagged up for taking to a charity shop tomorrow, along with a whole lot of baby toys and kids' books.

Last week I found myself wandering through Islington, past loads of shops selling nothing I want - not useful nor that beautiful, as William Morris might have said. I don't buy very much stuff as either I don't want it or shops dont sell what I want - I went round Croydon in the sales, wanting some pajamas. You can't buy pajamas any more, only bottoms plus a sexy slinky top. Even in the men's dept. And I wanted a handbag, but all were too big or too small or too hard to hold. So many stores yet nothing to buy!

Most of my friends are fairly cynical about consumerism so no pressure there for stuff. I think my main fear has been that I might have to buy new things if I got rid of stuff needed later, and not be able to afford it. And I'm getting over that, not because i have more money, but stuff is so much cheaper than it used to be. And the net means it's so much easier to find. Add numerous incidents when MrNC or I haven't been able to find stuff we own so have had to buy replacements, getting rid of the excess makes so much sense.

Equally, much of the stuff going to charity could be sold, but it's time-consuming. I'd be better off using that time to apply for new jobs...

Good luck Harriet!

[AntoinetteCosway]

Hope all goes well at the garage today Harriet

[sommewhereelse]

I have decided to get rid of our spirits. Neither of us drink spirits and our friends so rarely do, that I have decided that rather than have all these bottles in the house, I will give them all to my in-laws next time I see them. I think we have served about 3 measures in the last five years!

It seems so obvious but I know that my mother would have thought that I should have this sort of thing in the house to be a proper hostess. I have difficulty doing things she wouldn't approve of, despite her not being alive to disapprove. I still feel her sense of what's right and proper when I fold away unironed sheets but she didn't go back to work until I was 10 so I feel that she would have probably let me off that one. Storing spirits or fish knives or whatever isn't time consuming so she wouldn't have understood.

[pixiestix]

I've got so much to catch up on with this thread, but I just wanted to say good luck to Harriet for today - you will feel amazing once it is done and also to say, Bec I loved what you wrote about

"giving up money and possessions is not the same thing as poverty. In fact the treadmill of buying more and more unnecessary stuff and working to pay off the debt you incur from buying it all - that looks more like poverty to me."

Really beautifully put, and inspiring to read!

Back later after I have properly caught up with everyones news.

[QueenofWhatever]

Just renamed my Pinterest board so I'm now on there as Queen of Whatever. Feel free to follow me and it would be nice to see some of your boards.

Going back to bec's earlier comments aout people judging, I get the same thing. DP and I both work part-time but still go out and also go on holiday a lot. My comeback is usually 'well, it's all about living within your means' and then silence. That usually does it!

Two big bags to the charity shop yesterday, still selling a few bits online so it feels like it's steadily heading in the right direction. I'm still aghast about how much stuff we have.

But I had a bit of a breakthrough this morning clothes wise. I bought a lovely dress from Monsoon three weeks ago but still haven't worn it. By reading some of the fashion blogs I'm signed up to now, I realise that I often buy dresses because I like the look of them but in reality it's not how I dress. So next weekend I'm taking it back - I don't think I've ever taken anything back before just because I don't like it.

Thanks to whoever put me onto the Putting Me Together blog. She's doing a really good series at the moment on a wardrobe from scratch. Today's article was about colours from a (sadly now defunct) clothes blog by a group of US feminist academics. Love it!

[AntoinetteCosway]

I think I've just followed you Queen - are you in Aachen? I'm Chadpie on there if you'd like to follow me, though I can't promise that my boards are very minimal... Well done on the Monsoon dress-v disciplined of you to take it back. I am bad at that, so I'm trying to focus on only buying things I know fill a gap in my wardrobe, as previously I'd buy ludicrous things like evening dresses just because I loved them, with no occasion to wear them

[BabCNesbitt]

Queen, I had the "a-ha!" moment when I realized that I was trying to dress for the way I used to live. I hadn't really admitted to myself that the life I lead as a SAHM (and, frankly, the shape of my hips!) isn't going to be the same as pre-DD, when I was going out to gigs regularly (and drinking too many pints, ahem). So, lovely as they are, there's no point in buying little 60s dresses - no access for BFing, for one thing - and when I do get one from eBay, it's because I'm a little in denial about not being that person any more.

harriet, you mentioned Into Great Silence - I've actually had it on my Netflix streaming queue for a few months, but by the time DD is asleep, I can never be motivated to sit and watch a film that long! I do really want to see it, though. Hmm...