November Declutter Challenge

[Hetyanni]

I'm sure there was a thread on this for October but I can't find it now!

I am planning on decluttering 1 item on the 1st November, 2 on the 2nd, 3 on the 3rd and so on for all of November. If I bring anything new into the house, I declutter an extra thing that day so things aren't just being replaced. I am planning on keeping a box in the porch for this purpose so it can be collected together and donated each time there is enough.

Would anyone like to join me?

Baby socks might be the world’s most infuriating item. What kind of monster designs footless winter clothes for an under-1 anyway?

Ahem. Here’s Day 10:

• old mirror
• Feliway plug-in from house move
• pile of paperwork loitering on study shelves
• out of date jar of cocoa powder
• 3x out of date packs of loose leaf tea
• pile of cards from baby’s arrival
• random toy taken back to nursery
• pile of plastic takeaway boxes from Tupperware drawer

I totally forgot to do any decluttering today! I'm ahead of myself numbers-wise anyway so not worried. Back to it tomorrow.

Day 11 from the laundry pile :

• 10 pairs of old socks
• 1 old fabric mask

Reading with interest

We have soooooo much stuff I said to DP last night it would be quite tempting to just hire a skip and throw the lot it's soooo time consuming but a lot of the old clothes and toys can be passed on to others.

It's the time thing for me but I've set myself a challenge of 20 items a day between now and Christmas to try to clear the decks a bit for the Christmas stuff coming out!

I have found some brand new pyjamas now too small I bought in a sale (total over buying!) and will be donating to this charity

www.childrenshospitalpyjamas.co.uk

no decluttering so far today as I've reboxed some baby clothes & grobags I'm keeping (and spent 2 hours cleaning out the hot tub) but I have 1 mystery box and 1 old school uniform box to sort through after dinner

I just found out that Marie Kondo wrote a children’s book about a hoarding squirrel. I’m going to put a reserve on it on library website. Nows the time to get ds on board with being tidy.

Went into the garage and grabbed two boxes at random that haven’t been touched in 3+ years with random sketch books and glitter and old glue sticks and chucked it ALL!

@BeefSupreme

I just found out that Marie Kondo wrote a children’s book about a hoarding squirrel. I’m going to put a reserve on it on library website. Nows the time to get ds on board with being tidy.

@BeefSupreme

I want to know where it is on the reasonable v bonkers scale.
Does the squirrel kiss his nuts thank you?

I want to know where it is on the reasonable v bonkers scale.
Does the squirrel kiss his nuts thank you?

his nuts have served him a great purpose. The least he can do is kiss them and thank them

🤣
yup

these are the last of the boxes from the loft, full of clothes. not started on them yet.

cut up or thrown away:
2 gloves
11 t-shirts
1 dress
1 vest
1 baby grow
1 lunch box
1 pair of baby shoes. they were DS1's 20 years ago❤

Day 12:

• 4 DS too small pants
• 7 DS too small pyjama tops
• 1 pair of DH ripped

pyjama bottoms

Not even noon and I'm sweating buckets - DH has bought down another 11 of those boxes that were in kids' bedrooms😱

if anyone needs 349754 pieces of boys' clothing just shout🤣

cut up or binned today:
1x: shoe insole, goggles, broken cable, gift bag, Santa mask, shorts, biscuit tin, dressing gown belt, toy, floor puzzle piece, drawstring bag, bib, curtain tie

2x: belts, card board boxes, white board sheets, plastic box wheels, pairs of socks, shopping bags

4x: school work books, t-shirts
30x: single socks

Just gave away a duvet, pillow and duvet cover set - why we still have too many I don’t know!
Also a pile of DS’ clothes. Tackling DD’s tomorrow

We’ve had a large decluttering over the last couple of months, so much nicer now. Only room left is DH’s study & he’s resisting. Will tackle it over Xmas hols before new year!

gone through several boxes, cut up or threw away:

1x: jumper, tracksuit bottoms, tie, school jumper, baby tights, vest
2x: leggjngs, boxers
4×: single socks, pyjama trousers
5x: single gloves, t-shirts
8x: polo t-shirts

I also gave 149 various pieces of clothing to a friend to sort through. she'll back in 2 weeks time so she'll bring back what they don't need and by then I'll have a few boxes full of clothes ready for her youngest (I ran out of time to sort those too).

Tomorrow we have the pg friend coming; I have 148 pieces of clothes for her daughter to choose from and 77 pieces of baby clothes as well.
Let's hope they take everything!

Day 13:

• 3 large kids books to charity
• 1 Frozen colouring book as well
• 2 pairs of baby shoes
• 7 assorted too small kids clothes

We managed to take 2 big storage boxes of kids clothes and 1 smaller box of other stuff to charity shop on our way to flu shots today and they were very thankful for them . also took the sacks of small coins collected over the years to the bank finally and there were about 120£ worth of them ! They were super heavy bags and taking up space needlessly so glad they’re gone . Took out DS to movies which was a nice remainder of old normality and today were off to try a new pizza restaurant in the evening . A couple of more pieces of furniture arrived recently so house is continue to get there . Today I’ll try to organise or unpack something , fold more laundry , do admin , online shopping for Christmas and otherwise plus prepare for our Finland trip and dog’s boarding . DH has a bunch of garden and other house related jobs too ,there’s never enough time for anything ! I went to bed early for me 10 pm and this happens every time , I wake up in the early hours . Will try to go back to bed in a bit while it’s still dark and quiet …

56 pieces of clothing in bags to go to the clothing bank tomorrow.

That's the 9th, 10th, 11th, 12th, 13th (=55), plus a broken plant pot binned to make up the last item for the 13th.

Now off to the garage to do today's.

Day 14 :

• 9 packets of wet dog food our dog now officially hates to food bank
• 1 small pile of newspapers and magazines to recycling
• 1 little ball DD won’t miss
• 1 more finished book to charity
• 1 pair of DD too small worn out trainers
• 1 phone case for my new phone that I didn’t like the colour of to charity

Happy to report that pg friend took 81 pieces of baby & girl's clothing, 2 breastfeeding tops and a baby float thingy.
Result!

Today's cut up or thrown away items are:
1x: drawstring bag, baby car seat cover, single sock, school shorts, school jumper, tracksuit bottoms, school cardi, vest
2x: school baseball caps, school trousers, boxers
3x: pyjama bottoms
4x: t-shirts

I'm getting quite bored with it all, but there's still so much to go through😫

oh, I also binned 2 old book bags.

I really love this thread - keeps me motivated! Wish I was better at numbering items but feeling good about getting rid of at least something every day

GIVEN

• bag of DS clothes
• colour in place mats
• 3 boxes of baby food samples sent to us by mistake (5 months ago!)
• 2 brand new but never used Christmas stocking (no idea why we even have them)

BINNED:

• odds and ends leftover from DD craft project
• kitchen countertop samples that have been sat on the side for 8 months

@KobaniDaughters

You don't have count/itemise what you get rid of at all!

I find counting items very taxing (I can't focus) so I only do it because when I add it up in the end it will be quite unbelievable.
I guess being able to say "I threw away a lot of books" is just not the same as "I got rid of 650 books!" 🤣

I have a list that I update during the day as I go along, then I post it here, probably more for my own amusement than anything else!
And I guess it helps me focus on what to do next: empty boxes in craft room, sort through all of DS5 & DS6 's clothes (the ones stored in the loft fit in 11x 54l boxes plus what's in wardrobes), sort through PE shorts & trousers, black uniform trousers, white shirts then DD's clothes.

So far I have 6 x 54l totally empty 😱😱