Decluttering Club thread 2 2022 - trying to reduce stuff a little at a time.

[londonmummy1966]

New thread for those wanting to declutter

Old thread here

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/housekeeping/4441273-decluttering-club-thread-20-22?pg=1

thanks @Nordicmom I've ended up dropping things to people more than twice....

Weirdly someone took the nipple shields almost straight away, and they were collected on Saturday morning. No takers for the baby bottles, and the children have now rediscovered them and are using them for their toy babies, so it might be futile to try and get rid of them🙄

I put two t-shirts and a jacket into a bag in the car to go to a charity shop. Not much but every item counts. Busy weekend so may get a bit more done during the next week hopefully.

Dd has a school clothes bag collection so I'm going to fill two bags up for that this week and start again on getting things out of the house.

I'm also gathering toiletries to use up. Sorting out all of my sewing and fabric tomorrow as well.

I’ve been feeling nauseous and tired today so didn’t do my daily cleaning and tidying of the two first floors today , DH did downstairs and washed several loads of laundry and vacuumed when he got back . DD minded the dog all day which was helpful and DH did the walks as usual. I did managed to change all towels , we changed 2 beds and I folded the 6 baskets of clean laundry . There were some outs to the rag bank from it and a nice DD dress to charity shop too . We had a bunch of deliveries and the duvets were returned . Turns out we’d given DS a summer one at some point already ,i think he must have gotten blood on it something . Now I just ordered two new summer ones for the boys when told there weren’t any on the attic so I think I’ll declutter that old one and will check my duvet boxes and make sure there’s no other extras except for the guest ones and two 10,5 I’m keeping incase boiler breaks in the winter or something which has happened before several times . Tomorrow DH is taking DD on a surfing day trip so I’ll be alone all day with the dog. I’ll try to wash through rest of DD laundry bin and start on DS one (plus the towels and sheets ). He’s coming back the next day with a suitcase full of dirty washing to add to my mountains . I will clean and do admin I guess then in the evening DH can do dinner , dog walk , food delivery and DD bedtime etc . I’m nauseous because of my adrenal insufficiency causes that when I’m fighting an illness or something . I’ve been getting it daily now despite topping up on my steroid but luckily not for the whole day . It’s awful though I don’t want to move when I feel like it . We have a few more plans this week so I hope I’ll soon feel better with it . All I have otherwise is the scratchy / sore throat a bit thankfully . DH and DD tried on some wetsuits that MIL brought with her and DH had ordered a new one for himself . He’ll throw away his own old one and 3/4 kids old ones since I had last summer replaced DD ones and DS had grown out of his ones . Dont quite know why there were so many old ones left . We kept one new looking DS one for DD . As I said we had a few deliveries I don’t mind new necessary stuff coming in it’s the old useless crap I want out !

Todays outs :
-1 DH old long wetsuit to dump
-3/4 kids old wetsuits dump
-a few newspapers to recycling
-more cardboard boxes to recycling
-1 DD summer dress to charity
-1 pair of DS stained swimming trunks to rags
-7 pairs of DS old pants to rags
-1 old duvet
-15 pairs of old socks to rags
-sheet mask used up from my stash

well after I relisted the pop up crib it went yesterday night, I could allow myself to be sentimental about it that was the last time we went out of British isles and marriage fell apart since had a big argument with STBXH then felt 💩 got a brownies cream tea later, luckily got enough brownies uniform for both because I stored it well from older daughter

Sentimental items are hard to get rid of. And sometimes items that aren’t sentimental themselves but link to emotions are tough too.

DD has given up piano lessons so listed her keyboard - for free as a cat knocked it over and broke a key 🙄
and a very excited man came to collect today, he’s looked up how to fix it and was very happy. I was just happy he came and it went!

248+1=249

Out today: huge pile of clothes that no longer fit DD, a broken makeup compact and some soap that really dries out my skin.

Today I’ve cleaned and done laundry only no active decluttering but I’ve come across and decluttered
-3 mini lipsticks I never use to bin
-1 DD too small swimming costume to rag bank and am looking for the second one I know we have
-a stack of DD last birthday cards to recycling, kept just a few in my card box

I’ve told DD to find me 2-3 books to declutter since she’s gotten 2 from school book fare recently . She claims she doesn’t have any more books she’s read and that I’ve already made her give away all of them. I understand that she’s waiting to read through a whole series before donating them all at once but she has the most books in the house and I know she won’t read them all so I want more going out than coming in !
Also going today is old food from the fridge since the new food delivery just arrived .
Tomorrow we’ve got a medical appointment in the afternoon, and DS is coming back but I’m hoping to go up to the attic one day this week to continue there .
I need to check if there’s some more plastic shoeboxes that are cracked like the one I found , same with plastic storage boxes. Also want to see how many spare home edit containers I have and if some of those should be oliod .
Today also spotted a possible useful service used by the neighbours “ Clearabee” that removes rubbish . We made the removal company take away our old furniture and mattresses we sometimes have sent of with the company that brings the new one but this man and van or skip etc company is good to know !

We got a letter from the Cancer Research Charity shop saying they’d made over 900£ from our donations ( last y I think ) which is really great 😊!!! We were taking a lot of nice nearly unused kids designer clothes added to the usual books and games and puzzles etc there while decluttering before moving to this new house . This news makes me very happy ! Cancer Research and the British Heart Foundation ones are close to our hearts because of our family members although I’m happy to donate to any and our newest find is a Children’s Hospice one that was last time glad to have all our stuff so hopefully also in the future. I just want to think that someone else is making good use of what we don’t need anymore and a charity is getting money for a good cause at the same time .

@Nordicmom thats a great amount!

Outs - new baby books for big siblings and a baby mat.

My DH mentioned the other night about having a third baby and my reaction was but I've already starting decluttering! He also thinks we shouldn't so it's not happening (no space / no money / no time!)

@LivingInaBuildingSite I miss my hopeful lighthearted self

I did open a tin of misc as I call it, because I needed the tin and immediately threw out a promotional lip balm coz I knew it's been there for years. spoke to solicitor yesterday so that's another £100 out too

@Nordicmom thats amazing I thought done well with around £250 earned at my gift aid charity shop! It is a good feeling thinking someone has something useful and that the charity benefits too. Have sorted through the shelf of things for holidays/swimming and decluttered some sun cream and after sun that are well past their best. Did find some euros though so that was a bonus! Youngest has outgrown swimming costume so that has gone into charity bag along with a hooded beach towel.

I haven’t been on for ages and you ladies have chatted for pages and pages. I hope that means you’re all doing lots of decluttering.

I’ve been busy with dds so didn’t meet my target to get 2022 items out before half term. But I have done well. I’m up to 1871 - although that did include about 200 digital photos. (And not all of the items have left the house - many are in a pile).

Anyway I have just taken four big bags of clothes, toys and books to the charity shop. We’ve gone through our winter accessories and got rid of gloves and scarves, we’ve gone through shoes, the playroom is ongoing and dd2 has decluttered her wardrobe.

Im going to catch up with the thread now.

I just counted my running total and it seems to be around 1522 after the last month of last years minimalism challenge ended in December ,and I haven’t counted every single pencil when I’ve decluttered DD manky school pencil case with its contents or something .
Today just a quick clean in the first two floors before DS and MIL came back from their trip and I took DD to her hospital app . Also lots of laundry washed as usual . DS bin was actually empty for a moment before he emptied his suitcase into it …
-2 pairs of old pants decluttered today

I took a load of toys to a charity. They had a family there looking for things. A little boy's eyes lit up when I carried in DDs workbench and tools. I tested up seeing his wee face when I put the hard hat on his head. I'm so glad that another child will love it as much as DD did.
Last week it was a car load to the charity. 3 black bags of clothes to friend with younger children and a heap to be recycled and 4 black bags to the tip.
I feel I'm on a roll now.

I cleared the car out and got 1 bag of rubbish 1 bag of recycling and 1 bag of stuff back into the house. then I got my hair done. hopefully STBXH can get the bike into the car and I can drop it to the Olio lady

5 bags of clothes to the charity bins today and I’ve got a man coming to pick up a single bed and mattress tomorrow. Our seller has left the new house in awful condition- there’s even food in the fridge and freezer to get rid of so now I’ve got to get rid of someone else’s crap as well as my own!

Today we went out to DD musical and a lunch out before it . DH and kids caught the jubilee flyby as well in Central London . Not much housework but I went over all the rooms quickly before we left and we’ve washed laundry , vacuumed , done the kitchen etc as always . DS has unpacked his suitcase from the trip too so that’ll go away into the attic after we give it a wipe . Decluttering DD stained hoodie and I have decided the older version of a board game can go once we will try the new slightly different version in the weekend DD got for her birthday a while ago or if we want to keep both then some other game will go we have so many .
DH is trying to sort out his motorcycle to sell but it’s proving difficult so far ,and he’s planning to go to the dump with a carload tomorrow . Garage will look a lot emptier then . I think I’ll ask him to lift out some boxes of utility room stuff from the big garage cupboard to the kitchen counter for me so I can check if I need to keep it all . Hoping something can go !
Out today :
-a stained kids hoodie
-a board game
-a pile of magazines and newspapers
-a few rolls of no good dog poo bags
-a bag of old indoor plant soil we don’t need

One of DS TShirts ( fairly new but there's a seam that rubs him )
Some scarves that I know I;ll never wear
I have kept one pair of gloves and a matching scarf though I cannot remember the last time I wore gloves but maybe I will come winter
Jewellery , I'l clean it and recycle

I have to go through the Junk Room, there will be more
And I need to go through the kitchen, couple of things I've ear marked

And I will then also decide whether I’ll keep the wire storage basket I got for the previous house utility cupboards or is it more practical to just store things in plastic lidded storage boxes in this big cupboard like they are now . In that case I might Olio the wire baskets that are now in the attic taking you space .

Ooh and decluttering 2 pairs of too small DD jeggins finally she’s is now growing again rapidly …

I think I will also add

-2 pairs of designer sandals that are unused but too small to the to sell box
-1 pair of designer trainers that were only used once I think also to sell box ,all of these have just languished in my secondary wardrobe in DD room for no reason ,
-1 more pair I’ve never used don’t think that are beautiful but rub so are also practically unused as well and should go

Making significant progress, 3 big bags to textile recycling yesterday and 3 to charity.

We move in 8 weeks so need to get more done.

On the upside I’ve got a new job where we’re going and handed my notice in on my current job.