Kondoing away the chaos: Kondo thread 7 for yet more life-changing magic

[LinzerTorte]

The Book: The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up: The Japanese Art of Decluttering and Organizing by Marie Kondo, Cathy Hirano

Summary of the process link from mipmop

Article of top tips by Marie Kondo

Thread 6
Thread 5
Thread 4
Thread 3
Thread 2
Thread 1

Tips and links thread

And BeCool's copy of Coughles list of ORDER from Thread 2 for everyone:

"ORDER TO DECLUTTER/LOCATE THE JOY*

Clothes folding by rummy
Books
Papers
CDs
DVDs
Skincare products
Make-up
Accessories
Valuables (passports, credit cards, etc.)
Electrical equipment and appliances (digital cameras, electric cords, anything that seems vaguely ‘electric’)
Household equipment (stationery and writing materials, sewing kits, etc.)
Household supplies (expendables like medicine, detergents, tissues, etc.)
Kitchen goods/ food supplies
Other (If you have many items related to a particular interest or hobby, such as ski equipment, then treat these as a single subcategory.)

KonMari stresses that sentimental items should be left till the end. So for example, when you are doing papers, don't include photos of your children, love letters, old school reports etc, leave anything with a sentimental connection for later."

*As discussed in previous threads, your order for decluttering and finding the joy/spark/recognizing may be different to recommendations.

I haven't really done any proper kondo recently, but have done some little odds and ends.

I got some plastic wallets for paperwork. I now have it grouped into types with a wallet for each and them all in a single box file. Lovely

I've also rearranged dd's toys a bit so they fit better.

The other thing is that over the past few weeks I've got a bit obsessed with the idea of emptying my bag everyday. So I've finally sorted out places to put all the stuff I keep in my handbag. It is now empty and hanging on a hook with my clothes. It does feel nice but not sure if I'll be able to keep up with taking all the stuff or everyday just to put it back in the next day.

I'm trying to summon the strength to face the kitchen now.

What's everyone's targets this week?

I'm planning to declutter personal letters and photos. DH needs to do his study too but then we are semi finished. I say semi finished because I keep finding odd things to chuck and I need to update my clothes before chucking old joyless clothing as otherwise is be walking round naked.

Cadbury - try calling Angels costumers or the V&A on how to store clothes - or a dry cleaner may have tips. Probably want a good quality bag to keep moths and damp out. Sorry for your loss.

After I get books on the bookcase, I'd like to get ds and dn to agree to get rid of a few toys, fill an archiving box with MrNC's remaining sentimental stuff (we went through it a couple years ago), and then try to get Wierd Electronic Bits into the lounge Cupboard of Doom, so that I can thwap MrNC with a couple each time he's on the sofa. He has genius identifying skills for such stuff, but zero organisation skills. Or less!

I am busy refilling my wardrobe - out shopping child free

The beginning of my couple of days away.

It has made shopping harder though, not that I've ever been that great at it or into it. But having to ask each item do I really love you/do you bring me joy? It exhausting! But will be chucking out some tips I kept in the first wave.

Re the uniform. I think the question has to be - do you want it on display or stored away but safe?
You could get it framed?
Or Ask at a dry cleaners who deals with wedding dresses about a good quality box?

Cool well done on kondoing so much sentimental stuff. It's really hard going... Are you on Pinterest? If you search 'display marine uniforms' there are images of uniforms framed with pictures/medals etc. But if that's not something you wish to do, maybe you could find a beautiful box to put it in or even just make a cloth bag (or get a seamstress to do it) from a piece of special cloth... You could get it embroidered with his name etc.
I know we all get great satisfaction from kondoing stuff, but think it's equally important to treat the things we are keeping with care and give special significance to them. Very hard for your DH to deal with these things though

Cross post with jks! Enjoy your shopping.... Definitely deserve a few treats;)

Thanks JKS, I'll try try the paperwork a bit at a time with dh. Don't want to frighten him off. Did manage to get him in the bedroom where all the paperwork is, but he said we had to do clothes category first (he has been listening!) We are half way through his clothes which is good, don't mind if paperwork gets delayed now! Dsd saw our drawers and loved them, she want to do hers in both homes so see can see all her clothes at once. I love doing this

So I'm back (rubbish idea to try and give up this amazing thread for lent!! I'm not even religious...)

Anyway, here's my problem. My house is a very very very slow work in progress. How do I stop my dp piling up loads of crap on my newly kondoed surfaces?! Kitchen windowsill- covered in his junk again. So annoying

www.nytimes.com/2015/02/16/opinion/the-clutter-cures-illusory-joy.html?rref=collection%2Fcolumn%2Fpamela-druckerman&contentCollection=opinion&action=click&module=NextInCollection&region=Footer&pgtype=article

MK gets a special mention - holidays and half term have dragged house down, looking forwArd to getting restarted.

Interesting article Lego.

Welcome back zippy!

Could you create a place to put his random stuff. Just a box somewhere out the way. Then whenever he leaves anything in the side you just chuck it in the box.

Wow it's hitting much just how much work this is! DS2 has ebayed his Lego (got over £700!) but we've spent half the day packing it up, finding the boxes were too small, finding more boxes, discovering the boxes are too big for Parcelforce, finding smaller boxes......!!! Will be worth it as DS bedroom now clear of dust gathering boxes of unused Lego now :)

I have faced the final Kondo frontier: my garage! It was my 2015 resolution, and I had a dread of leaving it 11.5 months and having to deal with it in December. It was pretty much full of stuff that definitely brought no joy (now, or when it was chucked in there over the past 5 years)

It now contains: lawnmower, 5 garden hand-tools, extension cable, 2 medium-sized boxes of items being stored for family members, and a dis-assembled cot awaiting collection. The thought of the empty space makes me very, very happy!

Have Kondo'ed my Kindle eft only the books I have yet to read on it, no more scrolling through a dozen pages to find what I want to read !

Thank you lions!

I have been putting his stuff in a bag. Today I made the fatal error of putting something back where it belonged!!

I have started some more of the kitchen/futility room cupboards but had to pause for about five hours to do schoolwork, and now I'm in bed!

Well done with the garage USO! Now don't fill it up again!

Well done USO, your post gives me hope for our garage. Bin bags are not going to cut it with that one. We will need a skip. And some warmer weather.

DH has finished his paperwork (well, just about, he still needs to go through the longer-than-2-minutes-to-sort-out pile, but it's in a box and stored vertically!) which means our office space is almost finished, and the rest I can do myself. I also made an envelope rack out of some of the cardboard boxes I've been saving up, and covered it in nice paper. So they're vertical and pretty. :)

I have no boxes or piles of books in my room! They are all neatly on one bookcase as are various papers. Some more culling will be needed but it's not vital now. Some books ds might like.

Half an archive box is now full of MrNC's folders and I've scouted round finding his various other things. Diaries from university... Once the box is full it can go under a bed and be ignored for another decade.

Just popping in to say I've read the book and have been following the threads (although they tend to move too fast for me to post!). :-) It has genuinely changed how I think about my home and how we use it! I've done clothes and books and now starting on papers.

We have decided to change the cluttered study/junk room back into a dining room (as it originally was), which means we can get our dining table out of the lounge and use that properly.

We are also considering a garage conversion to create a utility and new study/bedroom, but we have no other storage for bikes, tools etc... So sorting all that out will be a major project once the weather gets a bit warmer!

feeling a bit of a failure kondo-wise.
I had last week off work and was planning at least to get stuff that is in bags out to chazza and do some catch-up housework including kondoing, but then got ill with a "notasbadasflubutsomeofthesamesymptoms" virus. Then got a chest infection and lost my voice! Showed a friend my neatly kondoed underwear drawer though and now she blames me for the fact she was still up at midnight folding knickers and bras and filing them vertically! So I might have made a konvert!

Progress is very slow with a 12 week old but I've managed to get rid of all the small baby stuff including the Moses basket by donating to a teen mother through a Facebook homeless charity. And today I've got rid of 2 bin bags of my old summer stuff and dresses.

How funny educating. My DS's have caught the folding bug and like to show their sock folding ability. However DH hasn't quite caught on despite two demonstrations. He's developed what I call a roll and stuff in drawer technique. We even had a conversation about what to do to clothes and it went 'fold like this' (me), 'roll' (DH), no fold' (me), 'roll?' (DH), 'no it's not rolling, it's folding' (me). DH continues in his rolling technique and I give up temporarily.

So much great progress! It's all very inspiring.

We've accepted the offer on our flat and made a reservation on a house so I've developed a lot of drive to do this now.

Sorted papers yesterday and they're now ready to go through with DH. Have started on the children's toys today and 3-year-old DD1 is excited about going through her soft toys to choose which to keep and which to give to "children who don't have much".

I'm battling on. Ugh. Piles of clothes on the bed - yet again! Still far too many... but some more has gone in the charity sack. Yay!

Managed to kondo various scattered bags and boxes of random komono, (including sewing patterns that will never fit me again) over the weekend, which gave me joy. Sorted my sandals, for the coming summer and ditched another (worn out) pair into the bin.

I'm chucking small, random 'found objects into a 'Komono Box' - anything that is a genuine keeper, or that hasn't got a proper home yet. When I have kondoed all/most of the categories, and can 'see the wood for the trees', I can just whip round homing/chucking these items.

I'm definitely making progress, very slowly, but each little victory is making me less tolerant of clutter - I'm really tempted to hire skips and ditch the lot!