Decluttering thread 4 - progress rather than perfection

[Pigtailsandall]

Thread 3 got filled up so decided to start a new one - hope everyone can find it!!

One more book out today, hoping to make a better dent tomorrow.

As I started counting late I've just had a look at what I sold on eBay between late jan and end of Feb. 169 items!

So far that's 169 items plus 74 in March sold and 2 freecycled. I've just bagged up a third bag of clothing to recycle so that's at least another 50 items out.

So that's 295/2023. My DP hasn't been counting but he's taken a few loads to the tip so far this year, but I'll keep my count just to what I get rid of so it feels like a real achievement.

40 bits of trash gone from the craft supplies. Total is 436

Another 3 pairs of jeans on vinted. Woop woop!

In =5
Out = 38

Into the charity bag...
2 hats
1 purse
1 pair of high heeled knee high boots which realistically will never zip up again😥DDs laughed when they found out I used to be able to dance in them.... I'm rather clumsy!!

My teeth whitening gels were fine so keeping those to use up , DH listed the spare plastic containers on Olio and they were already collected too ! I unpacked all the parcels from the deliveries and 3 things are going back . Have found a few more items to get rid of today and am earmarking DD snow boots to go after our impending trip ,they’ll be too small next winter for sure . There’ll be at least one or two coats / jackets too but I’ll list them later when I know how many . DH needs to clean his old sailing boat and fix / get it fixed before he can sell it . Hopefully he can get on with it this spring . Haven’t done the laundry folding yet but have been washing lots more .
More outs :
-2 fabric shoe bags to rag bank
-2 beauty samples
-5 DD small sports crop tops rag bank
-1 damaged garden chair earmarked to go once we get a replacement
-DD snow boots earmarked to go after our next trip
-DD small ski trousers to charity

I just stumbled upon your thread. I see the recommendation for a steady approach, but i thought this might be a place where i could perhaps debrief briefly!? I'm currently quite isolated looking after my sick mum in her home. So i have a lot of time on my hands. Seeing the state her home has got to after decades of being very house proud was heartbreaking, so over the last 3 or 4 weeks I've done

Two general whole house cleans

with near daily laundry,

repaired three broken pieces of furniture,

I've removed a window dressing in poor condition that was hiding a beautiful old window with intricate wood work that needed cleaning,

Taken out so much rubbish,

Gone through her bookshelves resulting in a car full of books to charity/tip, r

Removed several car fulls of clothing and kitchen stuff to the charity/tip,

and am in the middle of deep cleaning the kitchen and emptying out the top cupboards she can't reach anyway.

Two large closets were filled to the rafters and they've been emptied, sorted through and organised.

we did her drawers

I've cleaned dusty old fans

writing this out helps me really see why I'm so tired. It makes me feel good to be giving her back her home as she would like it, and it is a beautiful little home with lovely woodwork, but i have very limited ability to do this for her so I'm going all out at the moment doing something everyday. I'm exhausted. After the kitchen, which i should finish tomorrow, I've got an old office to clean and some smaller tasks of things in dire need of being organised... then I've arranged for a cleaner to start weekly from next week once I've got it ask to a maintainable basic standard.

I should add, Mum was brilliant, sat in her chair and responded to each item, i never made a decision, she made all the calls - rubbish, charity, keep. I was impressed by her ability to let go! She said herself that she knows a key to keeping a clean home is decluttering and she was ready to do it!

I don't know why I'm posting, it's been a very full on month and it's coming to an end and i think i needed a place to think about what I've been doing. Sorry to barge in!

Maybe you'll get the decluttering bug and start doing your own home dudsville

I finished reorganising the craft supplies yesterday but there wasn't anything more to get rid of. I might go through regularly now and any scraps that haven't been used up in 6 months can go. I have a tendency to keep all scraps forever thinking they'll come in useful at some point, now I'm not so sure. This thread is inspiring me. I love reading all your progress posts. I actively look for things to declutter now

I'm not making much progress which is frustrating, I did take my too-small coat to the clothing bin at the end of the road. But DS2 has been home sick all week and is driving me nuts. I did notice that the clothing bin says it's for all old textiles, so I might actually shove some of the bedding and cushions in there too that are annoying me hanging around the hallway.

We finished off DS1's room. The state of the corner under his desk was ridiculous. Most stuff in his room has gone in the bin it was so rank, but I did save a couple of pencil cases to put in the donate bag. However I tried to put a bug screen on his window and messed up the placement and have taken half the varnish off. FFS. The windows at the back are all uPVC but the ones at the front are wooden.

I recently swapped our large king size duvet that I struggled to change into 2x wide single ones, but I don't know what to do with the old one. It's a really nice duvet in perfectly good condition, so I don't want to give it to an animal shelter etc. The only thing wrong with it is that it doesn't fit into our washing machine and I can't easily change the cover myself so it needs a good wash, which obviously puts me off donating it!

I've arranged the rehoming of a 80% full bottle of Malibu. Before 7am...

Brilliant!

@dudsville that's really nice of you to help your mum. And what champ she is for letting go of stuff! I had to do something similar with my grandparents and it was so hard because they had dementia by then. And sooooo much stuff.

After my moans about Vinted, another dress sold yesterday and I immediately sent it off (pats her own back). I also recycled an old paint chart thingy, and gave a way some baby foods we were never going to use.

Total at 454 now

dudsville what an amazing job you’ve done, you probably learnt loads about your mum just going through her stuff with her.

My decluttering has slowed down a bit as I’ve done so much that I’m doing the jobs I put off like making Lego sets, final bits of paper.

Now my paperwork’s decluttered and organised I’ve been tracking down pensions, and doing a financial fact sheet of my assets. Not that I have many - but it would be a nightmare to track this down and as part of the process I’ve been documenting all my direct debits and utility bills which is a huge number when you start to include things like RAC, Dropbox (where I store photos), apple (iCloud for more photos), Microsoft (dc storage schoolwork on a Microsoft cloud), insurances, utilities.

So my aim is to have a calendar (in reality about 12 bulletpoints on my financial factsheet) that says which month every payment is due so that, when I renew insurance, phones etc I have time to get cheaper quotes. And if I die our computer files will still be accessible. I do think a lot about when I die not least because dc have learning needs. I have also written them a financial factsheet as they now have bank accounts and pensions so I want them to start organised to hopefully live independently.

I’m up to 432 bits out. I have also advertised Lego and playmobil but so far no one is interested.

Well done dudsville. What a lovely thing to do for your mum x I keep on thinking that I need to make sure I have a massive declutter when the kids grow up and leave home. We threw so much out in the week in the weeks after my dad died searching for a will. But I guess it was cathartic. There was no will, at least we never found it!

I had a lunch time clearout today and actually took a bag to the charity shop (they also take textile recycling)

13 items to textile recycling
4 DH things to charity shop
Plastic casing for the boiler in the bin (I don't know why I hold on to such things)
4 gift bags recycled
a bag of plastic folders donated on freecycle
2 big shopping bags to charity shop
expired tub of metanium binned

Pretty decent for a lunchtime dash. Was hoping to get to 500 items before the quarter was done to keep on track but alas, I have 480. If I feel energetic tonight I'll see if I can reach my quarter target

Going today is 6 bottles, 2 packets and 2 other items of pet supplies. Total is 446.

When I think of the money I wasted buying this stuff while it was on special offer "to save money" at a time when I was struggling financially, now here I am getting rid of a year's worth that I'll never use because the pets are long gone and I've got no plans for getting more. All this decluttering is definitely making me think about my spending habits.

1 parcel was collected so DH still needs to drop off two clothing returns hopefully tomorrow . I’ve dealt with more deliveries ( Easter , DD birthday , our trip and a school residential all coming up so some ins recently ) right away and the packaging’s going mainly to recycling . I’ve folded all the so far dry laundry and started packing a few bits , washing a lot of laundry too. I normally try to empty everyone’s laundry baskets before trips and some of the clothes still unwashed we are taking with us as well . A bunch going to ragbank from the clean laundry . DS current school shoes seem to destroy socks at least DH same kind of ones are fine . Gathered a few other bits and pieces . Need to go through DS T- shirt pile hopefully in the weekend since I’ve gotten him some new ones recently and there’s too many so worn out ones can go .

Out today :
-1 pen without a lid
-1 tooth whitening kit that’s useless, my dentist one works better so not keeping this
-1 little reading light that’s no good, I have a better one
-1 foot cream sample used up
-1 finished book of mine to charity
-1 DD tank top to charity
-1 DD tights
-1 DD stained school shirt
-1 DD small T-shirt
-1 DD small crop top
-12 pairs of DS destroys school and sports socks all to ragbank

And good work all around everyone !

out
2 mouldy backpacks and a black bin bag load of rubbish from older 2's rooms
in
pair of zoggs goggles

In - a third hand half sized totally useless washing machine (borrowed from fil as ours has been broken for 10 days)

out- all my patience; a frizbee; two dresses; a pair of shoes

also out bag of clothes to NDN

Went through a drawer of summer clothes today, tried everything on and inspected it. Out went three stained/bobbled dresses and two pairs of trousers that don't fit. Total is 451

I sold 3 more maternity things on Vinted (for peanuts, but still). Feeling quite chuffed. Also binned a pair of holey socks, used a skincare sample and recycled a chipped glass plate.

486 now

We tried on ski things for the Finland trip tonight since the ski places are still open even in the south . there was quite a bit of recent snow near my family and it’s still minus degrees at night , it’s not not raining or anything in the day so kids might get lucky like last April and get to go skiing . Especially DS would be happy since he didn’t get to go skiing abroad unlike DD on her school trip this year . Last year he learned to snowboard in 2-3 d but he does wakeboard and skateboard so that helped .
Out a few items from the ski bag too so that was a plus ! Otherwise I’ve been out today so no more decluttering . A feb in coming for DD ; she won her shooting competition today so there’ll be a certificate / medal /some sort of prize later .

Out today :
-2 DD too small same hand ski gloves ( this is a bit of a mystery but I seem to remember the other 2 odd ones went out earlier and I was mystified where their pages were back then )
-1 pair DS too small ski trousers
-1 pair oddly thin too big ski trousers both to charity
-9 remaining pods of awful nut flavoured coffee I tried , every sip it just made me think of cigarettes 🤢bizarre I like the caramel and vanilla they do and generally like nutty things but these are just wrong …
-earmarking an old dress of DDs

And the two remaining clothing returns went today , tomorrow is the dumps turn …

I've managed to sort through some stuff. The following is on its way out:

Approx 40 books
A quilted throw/blanket
A huge mirror
1 bin liner of clothes
6 Jars for recycling
2 table lamps
Wicker basket
Yogurt maker
4 chipped cups/plates
4 cardboard boxes torn up and composted

There's another recycling centre/charity shop trip happening next week, so they will go then.