Decluttering one item a day thread number 19 – running out of ideas for original titles

[stealthninjamum]

Another ‘one a day’ thread. We’re still here.

This is a group of mumsnetters who are slowly decluttering our spaces and organising our lives, chatting as we go.

We all want to live in a nicer, emptier, clearer more relaxing environment and this is our space to talk and moan about our husbands and children who often do not share our desire for such a peaceful, decluttered haven!

We only aim to get rid of one item a day, when we have time, although often we manage more. Newbies are always welcome to join us.

Previous thread here.
www.mumsnet.com/Talk/housekeeping/4259830-Decluttering-one-item-a-day-thread-number-18-quickly-stashing-our-clutter-in-charity-shops-now-we-can-let-people-back-inside-our-houses?pg=1

londonmummy I would just advertise the rulers on facebook or freecycle for free and you might get a preschool or school teacher showing an interest.

annasgirl that sort of thing upsets me, how stupid to take the insides out.

Yesterday I put the dozen books from the day before in the car for the charity shop and had a parking incident. I could leave my drive but two cheeky fuckers had partially obstructed my drive, one on each side, making it difficult. I called the council who ticketed them straight away and then waited aroudn curtain twitching waiting for the drivers to come back. I nearly created a thread on mumsnet but as I wasn't actually blocked in I didn't! Today I'm intending to take those books to the charity shop.

I'm struggling with the weather and haven't been getting on with hubby lately so you can imagine frame of mind. I just did a quick declutter in a carrier bag yesterday and felt good. I seriously feel guilty about wasting clothes and had this thing where I'd make my kids wear clothes till they're worn out or have a holes etc. But it's too much stress. They wear their clothes more than 30 times....so I don't know why I feel guilt. Clothes bring me joy and if they don't then I should get rid.

For me there's no point keeping faded socks etc for home use because I end up putting them on my kids when we've got somewhere important to go to.

Trying to find a scout scarf has meant tidying in Ds1’s room and in the hallway. Scarf still awol.

Out:
Broken Halloween scythe (!)
Broken hallway hooks
Old pair of school shoes into recycling
Lots of sweet wrappers in the bin
Freebie sunglasses into charity bag
Most uncomfortable ballet flats into charity bag

Back to scarf hunting after lunch!

Still no sign of scarf. Some parts of the house are looking tidier though, maybe I should get DS to hide something important on purpose in future 😂

Out:
Another freebie pair of sunglasses
Old sheet with a hole in
Too small football boots
Some random sainsburys collecting cards
A homemade mask that’s too small for everyone
More sweet wrappers 🧐

Also moved some hand me down hiking boots and football boots into circulation as they now fit someone. My pile of ‘too big’ shoes is shrinking so that will eventually take up less space in the spare room cupboard.

Not much today but something - toiletries I don't use. every little helps.

Just checking in. No decluttering here, really, and I could scream or cry with frustration at how little time I have to get anything done, even normal household stuff, between my work hours and DH wfh most days (childcare/ logistics/ house layout issues).

Today I had 30 minutes free between DH finishing work and me starting dinner, which was spent putting away laundry, sorting another load, tidying random things - all stuff that needed to be done.

I feel so frustrated that I can’t even manage one thing a day!

Oh I'm with you all on the lack if time.

How is it that when you start to declutter you often end up with more clutter? DH wanted to reuse all the storage boxes (yes, good idea) but he has left them all in the hall. I can't go up into the attic this week as I hurt my back (I know, this sounds like a typical MN excuse, even as I write it I'm rolling my eyes at myself ), but I am beginning to panic as I am having a party for teen DD at the weekend - and I realise I have only 2 days left to get the house in order!!!!

annasgirl I can relate to that. These days I tend to deliberately not put things away until they can have a proper place so sometimes they sit on the floor for weeks.

Yesterday I put aside another ten of dd1s books. Some were big usborne books so that's a big space cleared on her bookcase, although it's still pretty full.

I have also got rid of the dregs of dd2s socks. I've been getting rid of a few at a time for about a month now but the last 7 or 8 are in my rags bag. I have bought her a pack of 7 new ones but compared to the 20 she had before that's a big improvement. I have also thrown away 7 school tights and replaced with 5.

Don’t think anything has left today, but did move some hidden presents upstairs to get the bag out of the way.

And ordered a new uncluttered kitchen!
(How long will I manage to keep it that way….?)

I can relate to making more clutter as we declutter Annasgirl we have a set of pans and 1970s teaser, a croaking frog biscuit barrel and a box of books in the study ready for the charity shop! I did manage to throw away some kitchen items past their best today.

I appreciate frustration with lack of time and DH's who add to the pandemonium. I didn't get any thing done yesterday and didn't have much time to spare today. I did manage to go through the opened toiletries in my bathroom and bin the ones I don't use and bag up the ones belonging to DCs that have migrated from their bathroom. That bag is now adorning the stairs to the top floor along with a pile of other stuff they have managed to walk past without noticing for weeks.....I have taken the view that decluttering stops at the foot of those stairs and they can live in mess if they want to as I don't have to go up there that often.

I also went through two kitchen cupboards and decanted endless half packets of herbal tea into one big storage jar, reorganised all the rest of the storage jars in those cupboards and labelled them all beautifully with some chalk labels I found in poundland yesterday - sometimes it is worth bringing things into the house. The result of the kitchen tidy up is that there is now another bag of things to go to the charity shop but it was too late this afternoon so they will have to wait until tomorrow.

I’m loving the idea of chalk labels and jars. I’ve been saving jars for a while and decanted some stuff into them but no labels.

Forgot someone was coming to collect a branded tshirt I’d listed on Feb marketplace. So one thing left, yey!

The labels are cute (and only £1 a packet...) - even DH has expressed admiration which is unusual - especially as he is the master of never putting anything into a storage jar - hence endless packets of small amounts of stuff rather than one jar full.

I’ll keep an eye out next time I’m near Poundland for some, they sound perfect.

Not a lot out today but went through old sewing box.

Out:
Random ends of balls of weird wool
Loads of small plastic bags that came with buttons
Random strips of material
Odd bits of unknown crap that’s lived in the box for decades 😂

Textile recycling went today as rubbish day, need to start a new one for another old sheet I found with a hole in.

Starting to clear the tv room ahead of building works in there so also out:
DDs collection of sainsburys cards
Random other artwork

She has said I can get rid of all the dvds…after I’d boxed them up. Will probably try to get rid of some before rehoming them when they come out of the box.

Building site - if you do then you may find them with the kitchen stuff rather than stationery...

Quite a productive day today

Sorted through a set of drawers in the girl's room and threw out a load of broken toys, also found a load of baby clothes (the shame when your youngest is 17.....) so listed the nicest on ebay and put the rest aside for the charity shop
Filled a bag for the charity shop but it was chucking it down so that is still in the hall
A local music teacher came and collected DDs spare viola and took a pile of music books as well

Went through 4 huge piles of music and binned all the random photocopies of orchestral parts which neither DC ever bothers to bin.

I am still neglecting the corner of doom though - perhaps I can delegate it to DH?

cleared some general bits of paper/few magazines off the table, recycling out of kitchen and a charity /textile recycling bag has appeared so those bits from the other day can go in it

Blowing a gale here.
Dh is about to go empty the loft. Dd asked if he'd been up there yet and he said no, but he expected it to take all day!
Wish us luck!😁

rowgtfc72 good luck with the loft!

I had a good day yesterday. My main achievement is I did washing and PUT IT AWAY!

Declutteringwise I chucked out two broken toys. One upset me, it was the Silly Sausage game where he tells you 'poke me', 'shake me', 'pull me' and you have to go for as long as you can. This was the best Christmas present about four or five years ago and there was so much laughter in the house. Anyway he almost works, most actions work but there's one 'poke me' you poke him and the button just doesn't work. Every few months I change the batteries or test him to see if he works and I now conclude that he doesn't work! I am not one for being sentimental but there isn't much laughter in the house. One dd has asd and terrible communication skills and the teen is on the waiting list for asd diagnosis so we just don't communicate normally! When we used to have a big xmas with exh's family it felt 'normal' and a good laugh.

Anyway that's enough of the emotional stuff. Back to the housework.

Just checking in feel like I’ve ground to a halt a bit again. Reading the book from a slob comes clean again as well as the thread to try and get my mojo back. Recycling, post and the rag bag all ticking over well. Opened the bathroom drawers but soon closed them again as nothing much to go. Just look full again because of all spares of gel etc now in there rather than elsewhere in house. May do kitchen open storage shelves this week. Would be useful to find some good size boxes to stack tins etc more securely - any suggestions??

About 20 bin bags, 8 airbeds, numerous boxes, cases. Buggy, kids toys and the huge memory box that weighs about 6st!
Camping crap, broken electrical items and car parts.
Hadn't quite anticipated how much stuff was up there

22 more things cleared out today! 21 items of my clothes and a small side table gone! 🙌🙌 only 18 left to go!! DH has said it's going to do his clothes (I'll believe it when I see it!) after he's watched this football match, and DS has got far too many pairs of trousers so I'm gonna go through those and see if u can find those 18 items today!

@Mommabear20 - well done, you’re nearly at your target!

@Rowgtfc72 - how much is going back into the loft vs how much is going? Good luck with it, sounds like a massive job.

I’ve got a cold and feeling rubbish today so have spent most of today in bed. (Negative covid tests so far).
Am going to get up in a bit and see if the dc will go through the dvds with me to make me feel like I’ve achieved something today.

Done!!! Haven't touched DS Trousers yet so will go over my target but we decided to redo the toy box as from what people have said they've got the kids for Christmas, we're gonna be over run with toys soon!! Don't think DD has even noticed she's only got 1/4 of what she has this morning! (Just to say we haven't got rid of 3/4 but put some away so can rotate them to keep her interest).

Well done! 👏

DS has approved about 10 dvds to go, thought it might be more but he does struggle with letting go.
Have to run them by the other two but he’s the trickiest one so I’m hopeful.

Well done Momabear

Sending laughs to Stealth as well as hugs.

Not the most productive day today but I did sort out all the various stashes of paracetamol etc into the first aid box. Realised we have industrial quantities of Immodium (DH must be addicted to it as no one else uses it) and NO plasters. So tomorrow will be a trip to Superdrug. Huge numbers of empty pill packets in the recycling.
I also tidied up one of the kitchen cupboards - I'd decluttered it a couple of weeks ago but not got round to reorganising it - and went through all the pastry cutters - most tied up in sets for the charity shop but one set of letters and numbers offered to a local mums group and one pristine set of Christmas cutters on ebay.

Also went through the DDs rash vests and have offered those too small to local mums - hoping someone will want them.

DH also took the bag of stuff that has been sitting in the hall to the chairty shop so I's getting there (slowly).