The Hoarders Anonymous Thread Part Three...Still Sorting It Out ~ Together!

[Solo]

Are you are any of the following? Can you be described as a clutterbug? Are you a hoarder, in a mess, untidy, disorganised, lazy with housework that has lead to something that you now feel unable to deal with. If you are ill and not coping with the housework. If you are emotionally attached to items for whatever reason. If you cannot just ask someone in for a cuppa at a moments notice or dread the meter reader asking for access.

Are you nodding whilst reading any of these words? If you have a combination of any or all of these things or something completely different, please join us. No one here will judge you. We have something in common and we have a common goal. We share our ideas and we share our disappointments no matter how big and our celebrations no matter how small. We cheer one another along and drag the drowners from the depths of despair.

Join us; we don't bite :) Welcome to thread number 3.

White angora jumper - sheds so many fibres, it's like owning the actual rabbits....

Well done gingernauts!

I've done a lot of what's called "churning" today, basically ordering and sorting what is clutter rather than chucking it, but it has achieved something...a bare floor in the playroom/study. I also forced myself to throw away various bits of plain paper as a bit of mental exercise rather than painstakingly piling them up to re-use (source of much clutter in this house and paperwork impasse).
I've done quite a few things that only a serial clutterer would do. Put in first aid box the Daktarin which is 3 years out of date, in case someone gets athlete's foot in the middle of the night...
put various jumpers in odd places in case someone gets cold in the middle of the day (like squirrel with acorns)
put rolls of sellotape all over the place, in case I cannot find it and need it in a hurry.

There now that that is written down, I see it is quite mad!! sellotape extras are going to be chucked and so is datkarin, and the jumpers...well I need to go for run in the next few days and use them or they are going back in the drawer upstairs..

lots of laundry done though.
Ds2 has returned in a very good mood, bringing with him the sleepingbag that has no zip..I need to chuck that too..what a lot of hassle a zipless sleepingbag causes, never mind that one day it might come in useful as another layer..

As long as I know something is going to the right place, I'm happy to get rid.

Energy saving lightbulbs - Tesco recycling bin

Old, out of date or used medicines - local pharmacy will take them

Old plastic bags - Sainsbury's has a bin

And so on.

Good luck with your decluttering and start getting rid of stuff instead of churning.

I've got a set of cardboard desk tidies and one drawer is reserved for 'Things that stick things'.

Seriously. 😳

Sellotape, double sided sticky tape, a variety of glues (including Sperglue, epoxy, Gorilla and PVA), sticky dots (permanent and removable), adhesive velcro, duct tape - it all goes there.

Whenever I need a Thing that sticks things, I know where to go.

Hi ginger :)

I have a set of craft drawers for the Caglets so theoretically all Things That Stick Things should be in there. Theoretically. The drawers need serious sorting, along with the home ed supply drawers.

Ohhh churning. Yep. Just... yep.

I am getting absolutely nothing done, this week has been a write off and I’m so frustrated and anxious I want to cry. Home ed ‘term’ starts tomorrow, all the clubs are back, busy busy busy. The need to be more organised, save money, be visitor (pupil) ready is utterly overwhelming right now. Gaaaaaah.

Cag, you are getting something done..you are caring for and feeding a baby!!! Surely one of the most educational processes any child can hope to witness. Could you drop some of the clubs this week if they are too much? A bit like taking a few days off "school"..after all that is what home ed is wonderful for, utterly flexible. [I home edded ds2 for two years and would quite often suspend my formal efforts at intervention in favour of collapse... but I am not really ashamed, it was a good response in particular circs..) Having said that, one or two sports a week were worth it.

Churning is something I only discovered about when reading a mumsnet hoarder thread. I never knew that existed before, that one can sort and sort and get nowhere very laboriously yet be convinced one is tidying.

Ginger any attempts at classification are my undoing! I once had a set of little tiny drawers, I think there were 30 x 2, I divided things into curtain hooks, stamps, dice, drawing pins, pennies, hairbands..goodness there were so many random categories it was disastrous. I still never found anything and I spent more time allocating things to their categories than just throwing them all in a big drawer and keeping the stamps in my handbag I threw the drawers away a while ago.

Things that stick might be a big enough category though

Stamps, drawing pins - Stationery. I keep stamps in two places. First with paper clips in an old tin and the second in my wallet, for when I need a stamp when I'm out and about.

Pins, needles, curtain hooks - Sewing stuff. I have a big 'man sized' toolbox where things like that go. Small sweet tins are handy.

Pennies - money. Big jar for coppers somewhere obvious, have a little dish on a dresser for the contents of your pockets or keep them in your purse

Dice - Games. A shoe box sized container for cards, dominoes, dice etc. Duplicate or spare bits that might come in handy.

Because of the random nature of what goes on in any single house, the amount of random stuff is boggling.

As soon as you start to sub categorise some stuff, any system falls to pieces.

Oh yeah, drawing pins are stuck to a cork noticeboard, ready to be used.

Allow me to introduce Don Aslett.

He's an American who set up his own cleaning business and started to get into decluttering as a way of making life easier to clean and tidy.

He has written a number of books, I can personally recommend Clutter's Last Stand.

They are written for an American audience so some of the references may need to be looked up, but basically, he's not as bonkers as Marie Kondo with her thanking things and bowing to the house....

Hi all. I've not stopped again today. Still not found 'the thing I need' but, I can safely say it's not in the living room or kitchen or bedroom. It must be in the Chinese laundry dining room ^ that's for tomorrow afternoon after work. I must fight my way in get all the clothing/clean washing folded and put somewhere^ and check through the crap on the table and underneath it too. That room is a disaster zone; but so is every other room in the house. I can't see the wood for the trees but, I have got rid of so much paper crap this weekend. Dd has been a flaming pita; it's like she flicked a switch as she passed by her 11th birthday...

Aw, she's a bona fide tweenager. Good luck with that....

Solo yes dd was awful at that age, but the good news is that the earlier it kicks in, the earlier it is over. I have friends whose teens are only just going through bolshy stage now, having been as good as gold before, polite, cooperative etc.

Well first fallout of yesterday's massive overhaul was that today dh pointed out to me that the compost was all over the garden as I had not taken it to bin and foxes had searched through it (this is just veggies) I pointed out to HIM that yesterday I was determined not to do the garden, but concentrate on just one room as well as make a stew. He was not impressed - how much time does it take to go to the compost? (Probably as long as it takes to write this post

But there you go, the reasons why we dont declutter, there is always something else stopping us, so I am glad I DID not do the compost yesterday, because now there is a clear space in the tv room/utility, and ds2's desk is workable on, and I found all his uniform where it should be etc etc, and have started finding dd's ski stuff before she flips and wants to buy more because the other stuff is "lost".

So I am feeling cheerful and motivated. And will not let the negative voices in. So Solo don't despair, you will find it, and in the process you have done so much paperwork even if everything still looks unfinished to outside observer.

Dd has tidied her room beautifully too. Really beautifully, down to folding the bedcovers etc, taking out the bins and hoovering. This is a child whose room was absolute mayhem for the last five years, partly due to self inflicted clutter/favourite things. She removed seven items of clothing and I am taking them to charity shop. She is good at decluttering books sadly Dh promptly removed one of the clothes items on the charity pile and put it back in her room because he had bought it for her 4 years ago...grrrr. He just doesn't get it.. THE SUM OF THE PARTS is MESS, yes each individual item is lovely but somehow some of it HAS TO GO.

The sum of the parts! Yes that is such a good way of thinking of it.

Thank you nettle I realised yesterday evening that Sundays are just going to have to be a write off. I'll feel better if I don't expect anything from myself. DH works and the Caglets are playing outside with neighbours all day so nobody to hold the baby (normally DD is desperate to all day so I at least get opportunities for such luxuries as using the bathroom on my own!). So I think on Sundays I'll just have to accept I can't get anything extra done.

I feel good that it's the start of term, I think a bit of structure will help. We slacked off a lot of activities last term but I do think that really helped them bond with baby as we had so much quiet time together.

I feel a lot more positive today, there has been family tidying (I was feeding the baby so my job was mostly supervisory... Shame) so at least I feel a bit ahead of the game. If 'slightly less cluttered' can be classed as ahead!

I decided a while back to stop churning. I moved lot of stuff into our room and although every few months I sort out the pile and throw as much as I can...it is still there. According to my old photos it IS getting better and certainly more organised. So I guess I need to keep on going until I finish.

I am getting much better, at being able to put my hands on what I am looking for. I have a tool box, a sewing box, doing hair box, stationary box (which includes two selatape dispensers and 4 spare rolls as I used it all at christmas) and my useful box.

My useful box is a very small collection of things I need all the time. Pens, Tape measure, calculator, stapler, sticky address labels, scissors, bluetack, glue stick, super glue, string, nail clippers, selatape, school money envelopes and letter envelopes, stamps. In a small box, under coffee table. I love it and use it so much.

I am going to finish packing Christmas decorations away tomorrow, more laundry and I want to try to clear rest of downstairs hall if I can.

Oh dear Nettles get the dress back out of DD's room and get the whole pile out of the house before your DH sees it again.

Well done all on the efforts - this thread is very inspirational.

I found my hall ! Very pleased.

Going to grab a quick lunch and have a go at the little kids room. Then change all the beds and sew on two cub badges by 3pm :)

Hurrah for hall discovery!

We’ve made some progress this week, as following on from Monday’s success we started tackling our bedroom today. Again I couldn’t contribute much physically due to hungry baby but all five of us were in our room helping out (we have a lot of the Caglets’ clothes and toys in our room due to space so some mess is theirs!) and the result was one massive bin bag filled, lots of stuff put away and some visible floor space! Long way to go yet but feeling positive.

Will have to return focus to living room though and tackle the bathroom, as first pupil on Friday (and much as I love the kid, he’s not exactly tactful when it comes to observing mess). We will be out much of the day tomorrow - DD has an occupational therapy assessment and then we need to schlep over to a different town to buy tap shoes before St. John Ambulance club.

I’ve also realised that the key to achievement on DH’s day off is to keep up with stuff during the other days. So laundry, washing up, making sure any new rubbish is binned etc. Otherwise we spend all day catching up and not making any new progress, which is frustrating. Thankfully I’m a bit fitter these days, so it’s easier to do things myself, when baby allows.

Yay for progress!!!

I too have had some progress. I have two big bags for charity shops, several bags of toys and clothes for a friend's children, one big bag and a bit for C4C's, a bag of Ds's things which will be growing before delivery to him. The unfortunate thing is that try as I might I haven't found the missing thing and the house looks dreadful; meanwhile, I have put things in storage bags such as clean, spare quilts and pillows, towels and bed linen and there are lots of clothing in neat piles in large blue Ikea bags. Lots and lots of shredding done and a mountain of waste paper recycled along with plastic stuff; I hate plastic!

I've really realised how unhealthy my home is; I mean, I knew it was minging but, I've really seen it over the past week, you know? And, I can't move for stuff which is just so annoying and dangerous so, I'm really really going to do it. I'm going to try to get back to the way I used to be: fairly straight, pretty clean and really cosy.

That's great! Sounds like you've got loads done, and the shock is a positive I think.

Today I've been sorting some clothes so some chucked, charity, put aside for friends. Not proving easy with baby though, she is rather hard work today

today I haven't manage to throw much, but I have managed to hang up the clothes which are littering my bedroom floor, and wash ds1's sheets.
Next plan is to hoover and get rid of the 20 year old components of the Hi Fi which have been in the cupboard since forever. Dh finally admitted they did not work and they hadn't worked when he put them in there AAARGH. -he obviously thought he might get around to mending it and have a "spare" that is the way madness lies who needs 2 hi fis?

what else have I done? Not much, set back in that milkman spilled milk all over the path and dh decided to scrub it, which made it go everywhere. Front garden decluttering beckons..truly dreadful out there for last few months.

And I seem to be keeping on the top of the washing recently. That is a positive. Three clean towels now in the airing cupboard, where once everyone seemed to have several towels on the go.

Solo minging is right. My house is thoroughly minging. However, I am not going to beat myself up about it, just try and improve the situation little by little. Well done on the paper shredding, that is such a big issue here.

:) I've got Dd to put her already read books into boxes and she went through the rest of the bookcase at the bottom of the stairs so, it is lovely, neat and tidy! I did two 10kg wash loads, hand washed the washing up that needed hand washing, emptied and partially refilled the dishwasher, got rid of (put away) some kitchen worktop rubbish and clutter, cleaned the very old and horrid 'white' kitchen sink which is toooo badly stained now. I put the flour into the correct Tupperware and soft brown sugar into another. I sorted out loads of outgrown knickers for C4C and some vests too. I cut up some outgrown girls tights to make into dog toys. I chucked out and recycled loads more paper and plastic and I added more things to the charity bags and will try to deliver them tomorrow.

I had an evening out :)