Has annyone had a huge clear out and regretted it?

[YourHandInMyHand]

I'm seriously thinking of doing a MASSIVE declutter of my home.

A few things I'm mulling over completely getting rid of are things like CDs. Can't remember the last time I actually played a CD and I have a massive box full. If I get rid will I regret it?

DVDs: I'd maybe keep some but I reckon I'd get rid of any boxsets for example as they're so easy to watch on Netflix or elsewhere. I think I could half what I have.

Books: Do I really need a massive bookshelf full of books? Some are fiction, some are sen related (sen child), some are work related. Do I really need to keep hard copies of books when we have several fab libraries in our area?

Clothes: These could do to be hugely streamlined too. I'm currently too fat for most of my clothes and will soon be in maternity wear. I don't want to get rid of all of my usual clothes but I think I could massively cut them back, and stick what I want to keep in the loft until I've lost the baby weight.

I work from home as a childminder and could easily cut a lot of my toys and resources back too without it affecting the quality or range I offer the minded children.

The same sorts of things could also be tackled with DP and DS but I reckon both of them will be much more resistant. They are both ones to hang onto stuff, messy, not bothered by clutter whereas it drives me bonkers.

I just feel like our house is getting more and more cluttered with "stuff" that doesn't actually add to our life in terms of enjoyment, and visual clutter really gets to me.

I clear out quite regularly and make a bit on ebay doing so.

Dvd - we put ours into the zip wallets a few years ago and have never looked back.

Books - I like paper books and often re-read favourites, but slimmed them down dramatically about a year ago.

Clothes - review at the beginning/end of winter or summer. I tend to put these on ebay. I also have a storage box of ‘good quality but too small’ in case I ever get back to a size 10!

For anyone who doesn’t know, charity shops also take ‘rag’ (tatty bits of clothing etc) that they sell on for recycling. It really helps them if you label the bag!

We sold all our CDs and DVDs via some music company, filled a few boxes, printed off labels, posted them off and got paid.

We have a Google Play account so any album we came across whilst sorting that we thought we loved we just added it to our play list. We don't have any physical device to play CDs on anyway.

Clothing - turn all the hangers in your wardrobe backwards, when you wear something put it back the right way. After a year and 4 seasons if you haven't worn it you never will. Charity it.

Books, I did do a massive clear out, but I kept some back as they are the ones I dip into on a regular basis. I have kept the special books that we read to the children when they were little as they have lots of memories.

I have "memory boxes" with loads of pictures in etc but the mission is to go through everything, take a photo of it and upload it to the cloud. That way, I can look through it whenever I want, wherever I am and if the house burned down I would still have it.

I have been listening to the minimalists and a lot of it rang true with me.

I had a huge clear out about 4 years ago. No regrets whatsoever.

I like the idea of the coat hangers trick to see what you don’t use, I might try that.

We moved house last year so aren’t too bad just now but it’s so easy to accumulate stuff.

I clear out everything apart frrom books. I love the look of a house full of books.

We move next week and will be ruthless with everything else. Only DVDs we keep are some old favourite tv series that aren’t available to download, and we do watch those.

I never regret chucking clothes or shoes, or other stuff.

I think you need to do a cull before the hanger thing.
I find grouping things together helps with that. Faced with a huge pile of similar items makes you aware that you might not need the ill-fitting or out of date ones.
If you take things to the charity shop, take it little and often. It's much easier to take in a few books and couple of items than to take a huge sack.
If you list things on eBay, put a time limit on how long you'll re-list it - I find that if I have listed something I have mentally said goodbye to it. I'm not keen on it but a few £ here and there soon adds up and you can treat yourself to something with the proceeds.

Do it!

I love a good clearout. Today I’m doing my wardrobes actually, I’m going to move the shelf and rail to make more useable space.

We do have a whole shelf of cd’s though- and don’t even have a CD player!