All I Want for Christmas is a tidy house - Decluttering thread 9

[Pigtailsandall]

New thread!
Hope you all find this! It's not letting me tag people..

When it;s recycling day I will put my Christmas magazines in ( the freebie ones you get from Sainsbury/Waitrose/Tesco type ) . I might keep the Good Housekeeping a while , it's the only one I buy now .

I started with the aim of one item out a day not including the usual rubbish amd recycling.
We have quite a bit of Christmas food to declutter! Today's out was finishing a box of crackers we bought 2 years ago. DD has some thank yous to write to some elderly relatives and I worked out we have the exact amount of notecards.
DD tidied her room yesterday and got rid of some bits of random crap.
Also today, I binned some old plastic Ikea cutlery. My starting place once Christmas amd New Year have passed is the kitchen.

I’ve been going through some papers in the room of doom and dining room. I find dd2s school work hard to throw away because she has always struggled and I felt I needed a record. I managed to throw away some cards of hers, bits of art, a year one spelling test book. She used to do really well so that was hard to get rid of. I have taken her out of school because she is broken by the whole system and I wish I could throw it all away. As ‘maintenance decluttering’ I also chucked out various iterations of ehcp paperwork that aren’t needed as I have electronic copies, and I shredded recent tickets for panto and cinema. From 2023 I found a Marks voucher for £30 obviously given to one of dc but there was no name on it. So I bought dd1 a leather belt as she’s been asking for one.

I’m currently living in some kind of apocalyptic scene of desolation. It turns out that I still have a lot of opportunities for decluttering, especially post Christmas!

70 my magazine pile is huge. Currently reading one from 2017 🤦 At least I haven't bought any more for ages.

299 I get overwhelmed too. Tell myself that as long as I keep going I'll eventually get there.

"Apocalyptic scene of desolation" resonates RealFastFoodie.

Worn out bra into recycling and finished another shampoo. Total is 3053

@stealthninjamum are you home educating? I am on the cusp of telling my LA to cease my dd ehcp. It's caused more harm than good. I have recently had £900 from them for issuing both lids ehcps late but they actually need to pay me way more. Its hideously stressful.

I'd declutter the kids SEN if I could.

3 massively out of date essential oils that smelled weird
Ancient nail polish
Used up a conditioner

Total: 40

Stuff to do:
Hang one picture
Donate one picture
Put up a hook rack in utility (partner needs to retrieve.from his hoard so may take a while)
Put hanging rail up under shelf

1 x gloopy nail polish

1 x stained baby shoes

1 x baby hat

1 x baby trousers
1 x baby top

Total is 3058

Bathroom is finished. Have cleared out and tidied all cupboards.

Bookcase was done yesterday so the sitting room is now finished.

I have to put up some new blinds.

Kitchen, junk cupboard and bedroom to go.

Little tidy/sort of the downstairs loo. Two old tubes of toothpaste for the bin, and a handful of bits for donation (which I won’t count until they leave the house). Trying to revisit the Dana K White method. 5 steps, containers etc. Improvement not perfection. Little loo looks better, so that’s good enough.

Have made a start on one kitchen cupboard. It's absolutely rammed with stuff I forgot I had.

Got rid of a kids plastic coat hanger I found in the coat cupboard, dd's reading record from where I've also taken her out of the school system and a blown up metallic Christmas headband from holiday club, which she didn't wear at all.

I've started putting all the Christmas toys into drawers and homes in the house, so the living room can feel somewhat normal again (not that it feels realistic right now looking at it 😂).

I'm liking this little and often approach. I've been using it to approach my wobbly post partum hypermobility joints with small exercises and I'm feeling a lot better this week.

Now I'm tired though as been tidying up the kitchen as well from Christmas mess. But it's definitely a more positive time!

Total 42. Not bad for the post Christmas lull.

I’ve put a big box of soft toys out of dd playroom but won’t count them on my total until they actually get out the house.

pair of old wellingtons sold another vinted parcel gone and some art work and plastic tat from her playroom binned.

total out - 15

Kitchen cupboard is done!

Have made a start on two other kitchen cupboards. 😫

I have finally re-looked at the stuff I have brought home from my previous job and started to list things on Olio/free groups on Facebook. I have started more bags for the charity shop so hope to get rid of those by the end of the week. Little and often is a good thing to be reminded of. Thank you @Christmasandallthetrimmings

Any advice on how .any long sleeve tshirts a tween boy needs? Ds12 has outgrown them all and has tendency to go about in shorts in tshirts in deep winter ( ASD so a combination of bad choices and not really intoned to feeling hot or cold).

Maybe I could not replace any of them and see how we go?

3? Can get a pack of three on Amazon for not much money.

Yes definitely don't think I need more than 4 if I do buy more. Its only weekends and half term he will wear them now. I think he is about to shoot up as well. I have stopped buying long sleeve tshirts for dd as she never wears hers but the older two live in them.

A contractor knocked at the door to look at some cracks in the walls in the top floor bedroom. This is where I've been keeping all my stuff which needs sorting through for unpacking or decluttering since moving a couple of months ago. He was quite a jolly sort and walked in and went 'chaos!'. Which I laughed about, but my gosh it's made me notice EVERYTHING which I had been blocking out!

I'm working my way through the kitchen cupboards. Wasn't sure what to do with my spices. They're pretty old.

Should finish up today. Then I'll start on the junk cupboard tomorrow.

Was wondering if anyone would be up for a bit of a virtual decluttering-athon at some point? Maybe like a thirty minute zoom chat after kids are in bed where we declutter together for company. Maybe options could be silently, with music, or chatting. Might need someone to set up the zoom and lead the group in chat and decluttering support etc (I don't think I'd feel confident enough to, but I like my own idea haha).

My advice is to taste and smell the spices, if they are no longer wonderfully aromatic, you are ruining your cooking with them.

I’ve decided to really go for it with cooking from scratch and using things up. I don’t have mounds of cupboard stuff but I could definitely do more imaginative cooking if I thought about it.

Okay in the bin today...2 paper kids' masks, 1 broken ceramic pot (don't know why I kept it, maybe I was hoping to fix it or didn't have the newspaper to wrap it up in before), 1 bottle of iodine supplements from when I thought I had thyroid issues but turned out to be something else (kept asking hoping to donate but they've probably gone off now), 1 ethernet cable, 1 bunch of glitter glue pens that had dried up where I never used them (so many craft projects I've been saving for the future 😂), 1 completed activity book (recycling), 1 magazine DD will never look through, 1 broken usb cable, 2 dried up glue sticks, 1 strand of ribbon, 1 water obby shape never looked at again, 1 small metal hair slide where the bow had fallen off, 1 finger painting book which I think is lovely but DD said was for babies.

I've also listed one thing on free local FB group, and have made a pile of stuff for charity shop which I'll add to the total when it goes or when I book a collection.

Going to carry on until midnight and see the new year in 🎊.. Really want my attic room sorted so it can be a craft, home school and play space for me and DD to share.

That's fifteen for today. So my total is.....

57!