Decluttering one item a day thread number 18 – quickly stashing our clutter in charity shops now we can let people back inside our houses

[stealthninjamum]

Here we are again, still decluttering and still chatting and sometimes getting rid of some clutter.

This is a group of mumsnetters who aspire to live in a lovely clutterfree environment, usually scuppered by husbands, children, dogs and in my house ‘valuable’ bits of twig and stone or origami versions of aardvarks and komodo dragons.

We are slowly decluttering our houses, chatting and updating each other on our slow progress as we go. We only aim to get rid of one a day but often manage more. Newbies are welcome to join us.

Since the last thread charity shops reopened and things got closer to normal. I’ve now invited friends over for the end of June so have a month to get the house ‘guest ready’.

Previous thread here.
www.mumsnet.com/Talk/housekeeping/4183135-Decluttering-one-item-a-day-and-counting-down-til-the-opening-of-charity-shops-thread-number-17?pg=38

Oh and dsis has given me a bag of towels to go to the stables to dry the horses. Yay. So those will go tomorrow.

Tomorrow’s job is also to clean out the car. Again.

OMG !! Ds id doing his room as well..
Under his bed/ in the draws ..
Full set of cricket " whites " that i bought him in yr 7 of secondary school ...he was 20
Last month !!

My car is awful ememem, it's one of the jobs I hate doing.

So pleased the landing is done Stealth, sounds like a great improvement.

4 beds must've made a huge difference bizzey. Welcome to the thread.

I idly looked at CEX yesterday and turned out that DH's unused games consoles might actually be worth something. Nor a lot, but potentially about £50 which tips the balance towards being worth selling. Just need to convince him and check we have all the controllers etc.

Otherwise a really slow week on the decluttering front. I've found a box for the books I mentioned before so must package them this weekend. DS has also destroyed yet another pair of wellies so they'll be going too. This is about the 4th pair this year, I've no idea what he does to them! Am torn between buying the cheapest replacement I can or investing in some decent ones in the hope that they are more robust!

Me too raspberry sadly two dc under 4 make a hell of a lot of mess. Also Dh is a messy bugger. So there are empty packs of stuff everywhere. Masks water bottles. Ick.

It’s a monthly job as a minimum. But I don’t think I’ve cleaned it properly for a long time.

Car done. It’s still not clean. But it’s cleaner than it was. One bag for life of rubbish.

I’ve thrown away all disposable masks that were out of their packs. And have put the rest in an old cosmetics bag along with hand sanitiser and wipes. And stashed this in the glovebox with the mini first aid kit.

In the boot is a box with a couple of towels, first aid kit, fire extinguisher, yellow jackets, triangle, breathalyser, bottle of water, wayerproofs for the kids, wellies. And in another box buckets and spades, a small blow up paddling pool and a football.

I’m also adding the kids library books as I need to take them back next week and if they’re in the car I won’t forget them.

With CEX ..do you have to bring everything into the shop , and they price it there ?

I have got loads !!

I would love it if it was collected .
I dont have a car .

I'm finally feeling good about my decluttering.

Last weeks total was 84 out and 7 in ( mostly clothes)

Today 14 items of clothes are going into the clothes recycling bin that luckily I can walk too. So that's a start of 14 this week. I can see more to donate and some bits that I have on Vinted I will bundle up for a fees offer day on Ebay than they can be donated. I'm finally feeling like i can crack this.

Once everything fits into wardrobes and draws and i dont have any bags / boxes on top of and in the wardrobes ( except a sensible number of hand me downs for the youngest two) I'm.going to declare myself a recovered hoarder.

Another thing I used to do is buy something for my daughter in a size or two up and stash that away. Then forget I had it so I had tonnes of things for her to grow into. That will also stop now.

I'm going to set myself a target of the end of August to get where I need to be on the clothes. I really think I can do this now

Bizzey I think you have to take everything to CEX. I have never sold there but I do buy my iPads etc from there. It saves a fortune

Incessant I think I've spoken to you before, possibly under another name myself - is one of your DSs dyspraxic? I think we may have discussed the invaluable nature of joggers! You're doing so well, I'm very impressed.

Welcome, bizzey! I found bedding so hard to declutter, as I still had some from my own childhood, and flat sheets inherited from my grandmother that now count as mid-century chic 😮. I like the idea that someone else gets to love those things though. I may be about to lose a selection of bedding as DS1 is moving into his own flat next week and DS2 is also making noises about independence, from September.

This week's out have included two suits and a jacket of DH's to the charity shop (I found one taking donations!), and some shower gel used up as bath bubbles for the DC.

However, also some ins as it has been DH's birthday (new speaker cable, amongst other things) and I bought a new broom for upstairs because I know I am using having to run downstairs for it as an excuse not to do the bathroom floors.

Stealth your landing sounds lovely, freshly painted. We are stalled at needing to finish off ceilings (DH's chosen job) before I can paper things (my job).

Green willow, yes I'm Medwaymumoffour. I have four kids the middle two are in SEN schools. My youngest has ASD and the eldest was found to be borderline on a ADOS. The youngest and eldest are HFA what ever high functioning means ( they can totally fake NT but like a meltdown or two i think 😂)

I changed names because I have just finished therapy for my mums abuse as a child. How did you guess it was me? Good job my mums not on MN / never pays attention 😉

My son boards one day a week at his SEN school and comes home with shredded joggers. Next term I'm sending him with four pairs. He is very efficient at not creating hand me downs.

It looks as though you can post stuff to CEX by printing a label or use Collect + @bizzey. So you'd still need to get out to the post office or pick up point, although that might be more manageable depending on where you are. Some places like Music Magpie and Zifffit will collect from your house.

Incessant sounds like you are making amazing progress! I also have problems with having a stash of clothes to grow into that I forget. We get hand me downs from older cousins, but they are a couple of years older so they have to be stored for ages. I found a bag I had totally forgotten the other day!

Well done on the car ememem. I removed a banana skin and some random pieces of paper from mine. It needs a lot more!

Incessant I only spotted you because our DC match quite closely in age and SEN profile and I remembered your DD being the youngest. Fear not, you didn't give yourself away.

I too have struggled with forgetting hand me down clothes, but I think I've come to the end of them now. DS3 is 11 and went shopping under the bed for the last time last month. There's nothing left!

Today we are winding up to getting DS1's stuff out to his flat and hoping to get DS3 to sort out more boxes from his old room to his new room.

Oh, and DH tidied the car on Friday and appears to have taken my umbrella to the tip 🤦

No new decluttering yesterday, but I did take a carrier bag of books (that I’d already counted as decluttered) to the charity shop, so they are out of the house

I have bought a new bath mat, so I’ll be adding the old one to the textile recycling bag, which is mainly old sheets and towels. I need to contact a few local charity shops to see if anyone will take the stuff for recycling.

I did a big sweep of dd clothes yesterday and put a bag together of maybe 30things in 4-5. She is 7 in the summer but a tiny dink.

I have put her 5-6 tshirts on her radiator on hangers in the hope she will wear them so I can judge the size. I'm remarking the tatty ones to go on holiday in August and not return.

I had bad feedback on Vinted yesterday for two things that was only worn once or twice both for 10% of what I bought them for. It's made me wash all the outgrown bits before they go. But also that selling is much more painful than donating. I have too much stuff to sell and I'm normally very happy to get £50 over a few months as it buys the little two new school Clark's from the outlet shop.

But I dont need the cash so not sure if I will list much more. I might keep the best for a huge Ebay bundle or maybe not.

Anyway knowing that people pay very little for bearly worn things and still complain makes me realise it's just all useless crap anyway so it can go 😂

Had DD party yesterday ,it went well in good weather . Kids party no 20😳now done . That’s quite a lot !!! Not too many ins only 7 guests and all gave nice presents only one duplicate luckily for something she had already .
Today jobs in the house (and DH finished tidying old house garden as well so that’s off my list) , cleaning , admin and DD homework . Ticking things off the list but only a few things out since Tue DD clothes sorting out . That generated a large amount though more than enough for one week so happy with that .

Other things going :

• another ripped dog toy
• old socks to rag bank from the clean laundry pile
• the second table lamp from livingroom since the new one arrived
• kids shin pads DD has several pairs
• a dress up costume

Earmarked to go back to Mil or dump ,if DH agrees ,an old Dyson fan we have several newer ones

Well done Nordic. I have made a really nice dent on dd room. Far from perfect yet and still more clothes than she will ever be able to wear but.... bar about ten things I have hanging on her radiator to see if she will wear them, it's all put away. I'm quite happy now. All shirts, long sleeve tops, leggings and jumpers are in their own little baskets in the draws.

Some things are listed to sell. I'm going to try the rest as massive cheap bundles if Ebay do another 80% day. If not I'm feeling more ready to just donate it. Madness not to just donate it anyway really but I think it's a process I need to sort out in my head this week. Maybe after a few days just donating will make more sense.

I'm also realising that even by doing nothing but getting rid of only out grown clothes and buying nothing I would be in whole better place in six months. Why is this so hard? I have my 70 out a week target for this month anyway so that's going to force my hand at some point.

17 things gone to the clothes recycling bin tonight. 3 school uniform bits ready to donate as well

Emptied my laptop bag today. Ick. So many odd bits of paper and fluff.

Had some time this afternoon while DH took DD to the park. Spent most of it doing housework, but I did go through the bag of empty files / folders (the source of all those GCSE & A Level notes I got rid of last month!). 7 folders went into the recycling as they were really tatty; another few went to DH for filing his paperwork as he works through his bags and boxes; some of the ring binders went on a FB freecycle group, and the rest are to be binned or recycled if possible.

I had drawn and written on the folders, so I took photos before they went in the recycling. It was all song lyrics and Deeply Meaningful Quotes Amongst the things I’d done, there were some things that had been drawn/ written by friends. It was strange to see their handwriting again!

Hoping to join you all! We have too much stuff here, my fault not my husband's. I find it hard to let go of things as it might be useful/ was a gift etc but have steadily been trying recently and done a few charity shop trips.
Aiming to get rid of something each day. Recent outs - a clock which looked nice but kept bad time, and a game which was a gift but we will never play.

Welcome Pineapple that's a brilliant start!

I finished off DS3's room yesterday and have a box of things for the tip / other people / redistribution but DH and I are out today so that will have to wait until this evening.

Progress here yesterday. Found some books that I’d put aside to get rid of, but they are too tatty to sell, so can be recycled. Also sorted a lot of random crap and filled a bin bag and got some recycling from it, lots rehomed too.

sing I still need to send you those books….