Keep on getting rid of one thing a day decluttering challenge!

[StealthNinjaMum]

After a thousand posts our homes are beautiful, decluttered places of harmony and relaxation….. or perhaps not?

We’re still trying to recycle, freecycle, sell our unwanted stuff and most of all clear out our houses, garages and sheds.

It’s easy to get involved, literally get rid of one thing a day and report back for support (and sometimes finger wagging if you’ve ‘accidentally’ bought a load of new clutter!)

Please join us and a warm welcome back to

@SandSnakeofDorne @PenelopeFlintstone @MajestyRoyal @Cupoteap @Gibble1 @SandAndSea @Medwaymumoffour @Rainbowqueen @Namethecat @lljkk @CapricornWithAUnicornHorn @Helsingborg @Panda81 @abitoflight @fannyanddick @AbbieLexie

(Apologies if I missed anyone out)

Original thread here

Wow Medway! You make me feel better! I have over 6K on gmail. No idea in Hotmail! Need to get rid!

No decluttering here today. Although I have done two big Washington big loads of my summer clothes, pjs etc which have been lurking in a large laundry basket since the end of last summer. Some of that will definitely be going.

The veranda is coming along. Sofa sorted and looks good. Went to HomeSense and bought seat pads to replace the old faded ones on the old chairs. And spotted a small ‘rattan’ round table/footstool that perfectly matches the new sofa. Need to add more colour so will order an outdoor rug for the floor which is a bit tatty even after DH power washing it.

medway wow, that is record breaking! I have about 2000 unread and probably should delete them all. About 500 seem to be school demanding I do something or sign something.

I had an electrician in. My wardrobe has no lights now so there is a space but the hall has lots of old lights now so I need to go to the dump.

I spent most of today hoovering, dusting and making the electrician cups of tea. I have done more shredding, chucked out some instructions and generally tidied. I have gone through my sewing kit and chucked some things out.

abstardust I feel the same that I am doing more tidying than decluttering but it is easier to throw things out when you can see them all together. I have screwdrivers / batteries / usb sticks / coins / pens / sellotape etc spread across the house and I am gradually putting them in one place and finding containers for them to go in.

My emails are in the thousands too Medway, it's so down heartening.
For many years I kept on top of them almost daily, but then I had a couple of difficult years and the emails were not a priority.
I'm wondering if deleting a set number every day would put me back in control.

What's got you down Queenie ?

For what it's worth, an early night may be what you need. Get some distance from everything. I find whenever I feel really overwhelmed and like everything is too much, I'm not in the right frame of mind to deal with stuff properly. Hopefully your DD will be tucked up in bed soon, as will you.

How are your lights looking Stealth ?

I found MORE BANANAS IN THE SPARE ROOM. FRESH ONES. WHAT IS ACTUALLY WRONG WITH MY HUSBAND?

LilQueenie perhaps an early night would do you good. You've been so busy. Come here and moan / vent if it helps.

cashew we have new lights in the kitchen, landing and toilet and I love them! They do make the rest of the house look tired, I might look for some paint (then buy it and ignore it for two years!)

I meant to ask how the bananas and coffee got in he wardrobe in the first place. It was dh not a child? That's annoying, I sometimes think we're fighting a losing battle trying to be tidy.

DS is only four months old, so he can't be blamed for food in strange places

Ugh. Basically, DH will work away, buy food, and rather than be a normal person and unpack his bag, it will be thrown all over the spare room and the half eaten food/drink is forgotten about. I guess on this occasion, he threw the bag into the wardrobe and it fell out. He just seems to live out of his travel bags at the moment.

Do you think you could get away with just giving the walls a wash? I sympathise, I hate painting with a passion.

Its a worry to run out of bananas.......

Verbena I think it's a very real fear. He told me once about how his science teacher in school told him about how all the banana plants are clones, and if a disease came along that killed one plant they would all die and we'd never have any bananas ever again.

I'm not sure how accurate that is. But he does seem to hoard them!

Day two back at work after Maternity leave.

I decluttered he House by taking all my work stuff back to work and then decluttered 24000 + emails from my inbox. That’s 7 months of mail.

Oh. I also deleted Facebook from my phone. Just casually deleted the app. Poof. Gone.

It’s rather liberating.

haven’t actually deleted my Facebook account just decided not to look at it so often

Wow- I just came on to brag that I had deleted 200 emails today but Medway wins today!

It must be the season for sorting emails as it was on my list for today too (it's actually been on my list for the past few weeks...)
Definitely doing it tomorrow morning. I 'only' have about 600 though...and what I love about gmail is how it categorises them so you can basically delete a whole swathe in one go. Very satisfying.

I start a new job next week after having had a few weeks break from my last one, and although I haven't achieved everything I wanted to in my time off, I have certainly made a lot of headway.

LilQueenie - sorry I missed your post earlier. Yep. Often feel that way! Early night and plan something easily achievable for tomorrow.

Cashew - laughing at Bananagate but I would find it v annoying! And when your DS becomes mobile it will be dangerous to have foodstuffs lying around and going off.

Cashew not got proper shoe storage yet but I am planning on buying a shoe rack, attaching wheels and trimming it so it will fit under the stairs in the triangle gap bit. Any 'extra' pairs will be put under the ottoman bed and inside wardrobes and will be moved up/downstairs depending on the season. Right now we have a fabric box with a lid so the shoes have a place to go.

Sand I have 2 drawers of plastic bags. One has scrunched up normal carrier bags which I reuse for lining the bathroom pedal bins as they're small. The bags for life (the plastic ones that are a bit thicker) are folded up and put into a drawer. They are good for eBay stuff. I put anything I have sold in them, seal them up and send them off in bags for life. My proper bags for life (the woven ones that you pick up for a quid at the tills) are in my recycling cupboard. About 7 of them folded up in one big bag for life and then I just take the whole bag of bags with me when I do the big shop.

Medway your post gave me a panic attack it makes my eyes twitch when I have 1 email, I literally have to get rid of it immediately.

Queenie take some time out to relax a little. It's good to have a break every so often so don't feel like you've let anyone down. Take a bath, get a new magazine and treat yourself to some chocolate hope you feel better soon

at bannanas being repeatedly imprisoned in the spare room

Today I got rid of

Broken coat hanger
Off cut of plastic tube
2 cardboard boxes
6 led candles

Total out is 12

Ah you see, I could make you all feel like fantastic declutterers if I posted some pictures of my house too! I both love and loath clutter. I hate it, but can’t seem to break away from it.

I’m down to 6000 unread emails. To be honest they wasn’t read, just hoarded into another folder. Never to be seen again. That’s what’s known in the hoarding community as churning 😂

Still I’m getting it to zero and from then on it will stay at zero and I will deal with them as they come in..... hopefully!

At some point soon (not setting a date but before school summer) I’m doing a hard sort of the kids clothes. That will be my true test. I think I’m ready but it will be hard.

Lilqueenie - if you still don’t feel motivated tomorrow just do one small thing. Write a test like

1. collect all dirty cups, glasses etc
2. wash everything up

Then cross it off. That helps me. I have four kids so wash clothes every day but I still write it in my diary and cross it off. Feels good to see it done even if doesn’t really make a massive dent overall

The email chat has inspired me to sort out (upload, print or delete) the 3000 photos on my iPhone. I just am finding it so hard to start. It hurts when I get the 79p bill from Apple each month for the extra storage.

Namajesty. I like your list, you can sing the last bit to 12 Days of Christmas!

Thanks for all the bag tips. I think I've been a bit tight with them and have tended to hang on to them rather than give them away.

I think I will get rid of all the bread bags to start with - they're awkward to re-use because of their size and I can easily recycle them.

I will also sort out the bags for life, put the holey ones in the car and get them replaced. Good idea to use them for posting too - thanks for that.

I've got about 2000 unread emails - nice to know it's not just me.

I didn’t know you could recycle plastic bread bags etc at Sainsbury’s. And toilet roll wrapper someone said up thread? That’s really good to know. Is it all of that type of plastic?

We still have a stash of plastic bags. They are handy for taking stuff to charity shop etc.

My bags for life live in one of those big Sports Direct bags in the car.

Cashew just read yr reply about bananas and reminded me that I have to buy some today-OH has one everyday!! Mind u I love one in a sandwich..... We have a banana tree (not a real onejust one of the metal ones that keeps them fresher for longer) maybe yr dh would store them on one if u pitched it right? !!! Or am I just being bananas??.....

Ahhh bloody bananas. He rarely eats them, so god knows why he buys them.

He's taken DS out for the day so I can have a boozy lunch with a friend who's coming to visit. Some useful clutter will be coming in today, hopefully a new dress. And a new glue gun, I wasn't going to replace it but then realised how much I actually use it.

@CiderwithBuda Yep, at large Sainsbury's (where they have their carrier bag recycling points) they also accept other plastic bags. So banana bags, cereal insert bags, toilet paper bags, bubble wrap and so forth. You do have to check the wrapper to make sure it can be recycled but I am saving loads of space in the bin by shoving them in a separate carrier bag that just comes to the shop with me when it is full. Other supermarkets must do it but since Sainsbury's is local to me I haven't looked into it.

@IHateToCashew Perhaps your husband could hoard the bananas in the freezer for thick smoothies or banana ice cream?

And yes, your husband is right about bananas being cloned--that's how there aren't any seeds in them these days, they're all infertile clones of one variety. The good news is that there are thousands of other banana species out there and lots of researchers who are working on The Next Banana to prevent us from running out of bananas!!