Beck De-Clutterers - NO CHOICE GET RID OF IT February Challenge
Hello Becksters.
I'm challenging those of us who wish to, to join in the NO CHOICE GET RID OF IT declutterers February challenge!
Spring cleaning comes early as we say NO CHOICE to getting our spaces in order and getting rid of excess stuff as we get rid of excess weight and excessive(ly) poor food habits to be replaced by good clear spaces, clear thinking, and easy to move around in homes, cars, offices, basements, garages and bodies.
Let's declutter in February 2010.
Please join in and report on your specific challenge and set yourself a goal for the end of the month. If you have a plan please commit it here so we can all share and learn from what we do/what worked/what didn't.
I got a call from the Cerebral Palsy Society people and they will be in my area to pick up used household items, clothing and books on Feb 8th. My goal is to have 10 things for them to take away, be it 10 boxes, 10 bags, 10 items, or a mix of these but 10 fair sized objects will be labelled "CP" at he door waiting for them 8 am Monday morning. I will pack my dishes into the CP boxes and get out the dishes from my grandmother's house that I took when my mother moved into her senior's residence. This was my plan then and I need to see it through for feb 8th so CP can cart away my extra cups, dishes and pots and pans, plus the cutlery I was gifted with that I hate using - poor design! Completely "handle heavy" and if given a chance they will fall on the floor. Awful.
The specific area I will focus on first after the dishes is the living room and the bookcase in the corner. I will remove and give away the books I don't love, the knick knacks I don't care for, and clear out the space in front of the bookcase. next I will clear off around the coffee table and along the opposite wall where there is a stack of boxes to be used in artwork. Garbage day is Thursday night so I'll have to get at some of this tomorrow night.
I also want to tackle my desk which I cannot use for all the clutter and the set of drawers which I bought to handle my clutter and has now disappeared within a sea of "temporary" surface clutter.
So in this order I will tackle the:
DISHES to give away
DISHES to keep
BOOKSHELF in LIVING ROOM + floor space in front
OPPOSITE LIVING ROOM WALL
COFFEE TABLE
DESKTOP
SET OF DRAWERS/SIDEBOARD TOP SURFACE
Immediate goals:
1) a few extra bags of garbage to be thrown away this week-Thursday
2) CP give aways ready for Monday = 10 significant items gone
Interesting that you included cars, onebyone. Since that is pretty much my office, it might be my biggest challenge. And the food I keep in there is so *not Beck. *laffin'.
For some of my issues, now is the time. I have lotza old paperwork that needs shredding or burning, and I can do a bit of that at a time in the furnace. Not good to burn too much paper, but I can do some.
Thanks for a great idea/challenge! Every little bit helps as long as I don't bring more in, and it is not that I am such a gatherer of "stuff". I just don't deal with the stuff that happens. Ain't that the truth?
My commitment tonight is to have a plan by this weekend for what I'll toss before the end of February.
What a great idea onebyone! [I think, LOL.]
Well, it looks as though we really are heading overseas, and much sooner than I thought it could happen, so I have got to take this seriously now or I'll be panic cleaning a few months down the road. I can't let that happen. Both DH and his trainer R have indicated to me that London is DH's destination and that it will probably be before the end of the year. DH tonight said maybe the summer I gotta get moving and I need help and encouragement to get this done ahead of time.
Interesting that you included cars, onebyone. Since that is pretty much my office, it might be my biggest challenge. And the food I keep in there is so *not Beck. *laffin'.
For some of my issues, now is the time. I have lotza old paperwork that needs shredding or burning, and I can do a bit of that at a time in the furnace. Not good to burn too much paper, but I can do some.
Thanks for a great idea/challenge! Every little bit helps as long as I don't bring more in, and it is not that I am such a gatherer of "stuff". I just don't deal with the stuff that happens. Ain't that the truth?
Thrilled to see you're going to give this a whirl too. I don't have a car but I know many people who use their cars for storage. When we have a rental car for a trip or something we clutter it up very quickly. Very easy to do that. I may need to put DE-CLUTTER MY PURSE/BACKPACK/POCKETS on this list too... hmmm. Not this month-I'm already committed. I'm 100% with you on the paper clutter. I will be facing some of that head on this month. Thanks for joining in
My committment is to empty the balcony off my study. It's got boxes there from when we moved three years ago! And it needs to be empty so that we can get a ventilation hood over our stove, a process that will include running stove pipe through the floor of the balcony and up to the roof.
I'm so in! Even though I'm moving into a bigger house and I did some decluttering before moving, I could still do more! I have way too many books, I am a bibliophile. One thing I have done is get a kindle, cuz it cuts down on storing these volatile objects called books--with their suseptibility to moisture and mold. But I will keep this goal in mind and keep you up to date. Right now I'm trying to restore old wood floors before the movers arrive. Note: One thing I will not part with is my frog collection, so don't even think about it!!!!!!
It appears that my de-cluttering effort will be much like my weight loss journey..not structured, no big gains(or losses, as it were), but slow, steady progress.
To say I will keep up my pledge to weekly filling my two paid -for pick up trash cans is a cop out. I will do that, because, *da** it, I pay for it! The trickier part, of course, is the recycling. I am filling up garbage bags of old clothes, and stuff to give to a friend for her spring garage sale, but the nasty part is recycling old electronics and hazardous waste...yuk! Not fun. No wonder I put it off. I am making progress, and if I keep doing it, little by little, it will be gone...hmmmmm.....if*I*keep*doing*it, *little*by*little*it*will*gone.
I am here to report that my grand plans for today's CP charity pickup are 10% what I pledged to do.
I have one bag of clothes waiting on the doorstep for them.
What happened I ask myself and I come up with this: I really don't want to part with stuff but I need to and will have to soon enough. I am hoping to do so voluntarily, thoughtfully, and not under the duress of "eek! we're moving!"
Also I've been out everyday with not a single day of being at home all day and I have to dig my way to my stuff in some rooms. I can't just walk up to my bookshelf inthe living room ; I have boxes at the base of the bookcase. Why I couldn't just push them aside is beyond me, and I guess at this point it is a bit beyond me. HOWEVER one bag of unloved clothes are leaving. Very happy to have done that. CP will be back around in two months. If I do a little at a time (a la Maryblu's strategy) I may have a pile of stuff for them next time. Maybe I'll have to go one box, one shelf, one drawer at a time.
Congratulations! Are these boxes from your balcony?! I have boxes I brought home from my mother's house when she moved in the fall that need to be unpacked. Maybe I'll start paying attention to them soon... !
I'm so in! Even though I'm moving into a bigger house and I did some decluttering before moving, I could still do more! I have way too many books, I am a bibliophile. One thing I have done is get a kindle, cuz it cuts down on storing these volatile objects called books--with their suseptibility to moisture and mold. But I will keep this goal in mind and keep you up to date. Right now I'm trying to restore old wood floors before the movers arrive. Note: One thing I will not part with is my frog collection, so don't even think about it!!!!!!
I have a big book collection as well and magazines! So many of those all waiting for an "art project/collage". Has your furniture arrived? It's exciting going into a new space and making it your own. Enjoy it.
Yep, I'm still goin', too. Part of it is the fact that I am having my cupboards redone and painting all over the house, so have to move stuff around anyway. I sure have alotta shtuff.
Beck De-Clutterers - NO CHOICE GET RID OF IT February Challenge
I commit to...
I gotta get moving and I need help and encouragement to get this done ahead of time. 
