bed, bath and beyond...

[nattiecake]

downstairs is relatively tidy, i can keep pretty much on top of that...

upstairs is the problem

the problems are...
BED (THE FLOORDROBE) - in my bedroom. all the clothes that we wear regularly are in a nice heap
BATH - the bathroom is okay, not sparkling but not bogging, it just needs to be thoroughly cleaned regularly as my other half has a VERY dirty job (oily,dusty dirt that sticks to everything). which is rather time consuming...
BEYOND - now this is the worst bit. since we moved in, all the random crap has been piled into the back bedroom. we moved in 18 months ago. This includes a HELL of a lot of clothes! it needs to be sorted, which i do keep starting, but just gets worse again.

we both work full time, long hours and seriously struggle to find the time to do it all. i seriously think it will be okay once we're on top of it, as we keep downstairs clean enough, but its just getting there thats the problem

i need a plan of action, or maybe just a kick up the bum... either way, we're ttc and our potential baby will need the room eventually!!

I've just have a very cathartic clothes clear out. My aim is to get rid of about a third of our belongings as we're real clutter merchants and don't have the space.

I found, once I got started, that I was able to get rid of almost half my wardrobe, drawers and under-the-bed-in-bags with no pain at all.

It feels absolutely great and if you've had piles of clothes dumped in the back bedroom for 18 months then you can probably get rid of all of them for a start!

If you can't bear to get rid of all your back bedroom clothes then fold them up, put them into black bags and stack neatly somewhere. In another year's time when you've not opened the bags then you can get rid of them.

(That's what happened with all the bags under my bed. Was my attempt at rotating my wardrobe seasonally but I forgot all about them )

Hey Nattiecake!

We were exactly like you and spent 2 years ditching all our junk (clothes, furniture, broken stuff, spare stuff, things we'd need one day) in the 'spare' bedroom and I was sooooo worried that the baby was going to end up sleeping with junk piled round them!

But I found the idea of the baby a great motivator, Just before we were going to ttc I decided I wanted to decorate the room, so I took a week's holiday and shifted all the junk one way and painted that wall, then repeated for all the other walls - it was a neutral but bit sparkly cream, so clean and fresh.

The decorating meant I had more idea of what was in there and it began to feel more like the baby's room and there was more of an impetus to tidy it up. Once I got pregnant (I think it was about 3 weeks after finishing decorating) there was then a real reason to get organised and I spent weekends clearing stuff out. All the Uni work I'd cherished but never looked at for 2 years went in the recycling, lots went to charity shops and a few bits went in the attic.

Then we got some good storage (IKEA - Pax tall narrow wardrobe frame, with shelves and cubby holes) so all of the baby stuff could go into there and be organised rather than just becoming more clutter!

Oh and Ed was in our room for 6 months, so wouldn't have minded if 'his' room was cluttered but once he started crawling and pulling himself up then there was no choice but to keep stuff relatively clean and tidy so don't stress if you don't get it all done before baby arrives!

I hope that helps!

Ps love the 'FLOORDROBE' might have to use that one! we have 2 chairs to put 'worn regularly' clothes on - looks a bit more organised than them being on floor.

love all the ideas!

off on hols mon-sat this week, but im actually off work til the wednesday after that. so whether oh likes it or not, we're gonna make a serious dent in that room!!
for a start, the attic is empty, so i can chuck all my skinny clothes up there for now... like shonas idea of bagging it up and chucking it if its still not been used say next xmas

I used to have a Floordrobe
I had a weird aversion to hanging up or putting away once worn but ok for another wear clothes so I left them out. Then the cats slept on them and I never did wear them again ( again)

I made a really easy fix of clearing a cupboard shelf and putting the once worn clothes there and it solved the florrdrobe almost overnight
Hurrah

Oh and totally do Flylady- I am on the Fledging flyers thread tis great and we rock and all that. cheesy