helping rachel Great start! Kudos for getting the job done in one fell swoop! Thanks for the visual. It is always great to see anyone's triumph over clutter. What's your next challenge?

silverbirch Wow great job at your uncle's and your mom's. Love that you listed every little thing, especially the tin can. Somehow that tickled me. It is important to account for all of it. You mention so many things that I think of as British: a kettle, a greenhouse, the car boot and "the tip". Is the tip the dump, or the junkyard? Kudos. Hope you are continuing to move ahead!

VermontMom Bu-bye van! Hello $150 bucks! Great job! Have you begun the closet adventure?

Lexxiss I was a little envious when I read you had laid vinyl flooring! That surprised me. I am wishing I had a place of my own to work on. I DO have a place of my own to work on though. Just not that kind of work. I do admire all your home improvement knowledge. I am sure it is hard won. Kudos! What's next on the room re-do at your other place?

Thanks also for your words about clothing. I feel that I can let go of several things now I couldn't before. I have come to some kind of self acceptance lately so I am glad I am facing this now while my intention is clear.

Pattience Are you a market vendor? I'm a market vendor too but may be taking a break this year. I have to decide in the next few days. But even if you are not a vendor, have you made progress on your dress? How's it going?

BillBlueEyes DH saves boxes as does BIL. I've come to think of it as a male thing, except that I have had an overflow of boxes myself and wow they take a lot of effort on my part to break them down so I recognize your accomplishment as one that is not-so-small. Kudos.

Electro How are you doing with getting the boxes out of your place? Great job getting stuff into the boxes btw. And kudos for figuring out an inbetween step to help deal with the anxiety of "what if I get rid of something I need". That's great. Thanks for this thought: I think this is really wise and I think the idea of my old self, the one that existed for less than one year, has been haunting me. It's like you can't go back in other areas of your life, why would you even think you could go back in this one? I think it is holding me back. Thanks for that.

OnebyOne:

I like the idea of putting the laundry basket under the other one. I tend to want to collect containers instead of reduce clutter. Just say'in. I bag my winter scarves and mittens all together put them with coats. I just want to say I am so happy that you can bag them up as maybe winter is really over. It was a long hard winter in the midwest. I am always surprised when the tulips come forth.

I like your method of Give Away, Throw Away and Put Away. With that being said, off to finish my 4th load of laundry.

Good luck with you next basket.

My next project is the general area of the basement. I have separated pictures and they are in labeled boxes. But the boxes are everywhere.

Hi Declutterers!

Yesterday I was rewarded for previous efforts in decluttering/organizing. I'm working outside now and wanted to edge the sidewalk. I haven't gotten around to it for several years. DH is gone and I was able to walk right down to the basement to find the attachment with all it's parts and head back upstairs and locate the manual telling me how to assemble it. Yay! While I was outside the first hummingbird hovered over. I went right back to the basement and got the hummingbird feeder (WHICH WAS CLEAN!) and had it hanging in the yard in minutes. Credit!

This morning, I had an email reminded of an important report which needs to be filed by month's end. (Whew! Thank goodness for reminders) It reminded me I had two other mandatory paperwork tasks, too. I moved the paperwork up to #1 priority. It's all done now. While I was doing the 1st Qtr tax report I remembered that last year I would do the next quarter at the same time. I decided I had time to do all 4 qtrs. and they are done....sitting in a file. All I have to do for the rest of the year is print and sign. Credit.

My daily life is so much easier when I take care of what I have, make a concerted effort not to acquire more and plan ahead so I can save every precious moment I have for things I enjoy.

I'm going back out to the yard today but have already done my 3 Essentials: dishes, laundry, make bed.

PS: the lawn got edged which was great exercise and as I was going in the house after putting my tools away for the evening the hummingbird was at the feeder! Decluttering and organizing has made it possible for me to find joy in the simple beauties of life.

Yay for progress everyone!

PS talking about the old thin me really resonated with me, too. I'm sure it's why the majority of the clothes I held onto just didn't feel right when I finally got to that size. I am a different person now and I'm glad all that old stuff is gone!

Debbie:

What beautiful rewards of your decluttering efforts. Ease and Joy. That is something to work for. Thanks for sharing……love it when life is easier.

I read in a book last night that chaos is layer upon layer of pattern. It made me think of beck and why it is so important to have a plan and template to follow. It reduces chaos and feeling out of control. Instead you get to connect to what you want to be about and then take action to make it happen.

Happy Decluttering and Cleaning to all of you. May you feel space in your heart, mind and home today.

I read this at a little after 8 this morning...and made myself get up from my comfy chair, go upstairs and do it!! 2 hours later, I have one large bag of trash outside to go in the bin; and 3 large boxes of items to go to Re-Use Center! thank you for the unintended but definitely needed prompt!

awesome! NOw onto the basement, right?

THERE it is..proof that these efforts can make such a difference! I applaud you Lexxiss for that concrete evidence Wow you did ALOT that day! May I ask, regarding your uncle's home, is it because you have to clear it out completely for a sale or move? or you were able to convince him that 'these things need to go NOW'. Just nosey I guess I also do not know what 'the lid' is

Hope I did not exclude anyone!

I am kinda embarrassed that you regulars only see me in the spring, and in the late fall..those are the 2 times of the year I have multiple weeks off, and I'm either enterting my spring awakening/energy, or still riding the high of summer before sliding into my winter grayness. Boy that sounded depressing

I see in my kitchen that there is large box of tools/household repair stuff that could go out of sight in the back..I think DH and DS probably think 'shoot, something's gonna break soon enough so leave the darn box easy to get to' but now items are piling up on top of that darn box so I'm going to take care of that.

New projects? a huge project would be DH's bureau, he does NOT care about the items/clutter/thick dust on it, and it looks HORRIBLE. And the bureau itself is 1960's ugly that would mean cleaning off the bureau, cleaning it OUT of old clothes, cleaning that section of the room; getting it out of the house and in teh car; and bringing up a spare bureau that is lurking somewhere on the back porch. Eh, I 'll think about this one

EVERYONE, kudos on our battles!

onebyone, thanks for pointing out the British English in my post which I don't notice at all, of course! The tip is sometimes called the dump. It's run by the local council and you take large things there to get rid of them: you tip them out there. (N.B. If you dump some rubbish on a piece of waste land, say, it's called "fly-tipping" because you do it "on the fly", that is secretly and illegally. Think the meaning is slightly different in NAm.)

Holly, my uncle's memory is patchy and he sometimes doesn't know how to do things. He also finds it very hard to learn new things. He lives on his own. Although my mother and another uncle support him, they're both in their 80s. When I'm there (I live 300 miles away) I do as much as I can. I'm his executor (of his will) but I interpret that to include as much support before his death as I can give.

Lots more since I last posted. Garage mostly clear, new lightweight cleaner bought, well-rotted horse manure dug into greenhouse soil for tomatoes and courgettes (zucchini), very much loose change (small coins) bagged up and exchanged at bank. (Tried to give this £ to my uncle but he told me I should keep it for my trouble. Just like the old, old days when I was little.)

Now on the way home. I must try to keep up the good work there.

Great work, everyone! Even one or two things removed every day all add up. And if we don't remove them they also add up - but in a bad way!

I see, well it is wonderful that you do so much, when you are there!

Oh, that made me smile, that was sweet And thank you for using British idioms, and then translating I have never seen the word 'courgette' before...do you call eggplants 'aubergine'? Yes indeed 'on the fly' here means doing something in a hurry, but not necessarily illegally.

This year my husband asked me to focus on organization instead of weight loss so this board is absolutely great. I have not read the Beck Diet Solution but have requested it at my local library. This month (only 6 days left) I am going to finish sorting the piles of paper that are in my collections/craft room and put all old paperwork in the garage. It's just a baby step but my craft/collection room is the biggest challenge and I can only get one thing done at a time. My husband's "collections" aren't mine to pare down so start where I can.

Hi everyone, wow, a lot of progress from everyone and a lot of entries to read through since my last drop in. So many boxes of clothes, paperwork done, hummingbirds fed etc! I am impressed and also motivated.

Two large bags of clothes ready for drop off at the recycle centre. One old trundle bed base on the verandah ready for collection and a box of papers sorted and ready for shredding this weekend.

That will give me walking through space in my spare bedroom which is nice.

This will allow me to do another round of 'shuffling' where I go into a room and remove everything that does not belong there, I clear cupboards, benches, boxes etc I take it to the room it does belong to and leave it in a pile there. I then go through the pile in the target room and put all away. One room done and stuff close to where it needs to be.

Each time I do a round of this there is less to shuffle as I will have removed stuff that is rubbish or broken and thrown it away. I also find that I have duplicates of things that i have brought because I couldn't find the original. I make the decision to keep the multiples or not. I have four tape measures, the retractable type, ????

It's making it easier to find things and to finally sort out then lack of storage that was the start of the problem (my nature caused that small problem to snowball). I love when when someone asks to borrow something and I can not only find it but am able to give them a spare to keep if they want. Sometimes they do and bingo, happy me, happy them.

My aim is to have logical places for things I need and for it easy to be able to out things back n those places when I am finished with them.

I'm Australian so I understand both Englishisms and Americanisms! We will have to see if any 'Okerisms' slip into my posts.

Hello Everyone

Today I am home but struggling to even make a to-do list. So, after reading all the activity going on and reported in, I'm heading down the hall to my clothing pile. Here's my clothing pile to do list. I will report back later. I will work until DH gets home for work maximum.

1. sort through clothes on the floor YES
2. sort through clothes in laundry basket(s) YES
3. sort through items that are in the small suitcase that's in one of the laundry baskets (yep) Not Yet
4. put a wash on with the clothes that are to keep or to give away YES
5. look and see what else is on the ground and sort/relocate it if need be Not Yet

Technically I have fulfilled my challenge to 1) get my clothes off the floor 2) be able to open my dresser and 3) sort them out of the baskets. Yay! Credit. More to do with looking to see what's inside the other stuff I found.
The other objects with stuff in them were uncovered. Oh I did another thing: two loads of laundry once I took stuff out of the baskets. *creditx2*

Oh how I understand this! but as you say, we have to start where we can. congrats on your baby steps!

Electro - congrats on your progress! And how revealing it is to find multiples because the originals couldn't be found..yay to you for lending items and making the items stay with their new owners

congrats on your progress also onebyone!

This morning, out of the blue I just marched upstairs and started working on DH's side of room..end result, one large bag of trash; SIX large boxes of clothing and household stuff OUT and given away at the Re-Use center; vacuumed thoroughly. He said 'nice job'...I guess he's a master of understatement

Back home. Washing machine on. I'll do something (just one little thing or so) tomorrow.

'Nice job', everyone!

Quick check-in.

Washed and hung out (and brought in) three loads of washing. One broken glass measuring jug to recycling, one plastic measuring jug to painting things, new glass measuring jug installed (hand-me-down from sister's husband's grandfather's house). Washed up once. Everyone has unpacked and put away their cases. Mowed lawn. Cut back a little more of a rose and ivy hedge. Moved old clippings to a compost bin. Lots of stuff waiting by door to go down to the car.

Phew. I hadn't realised I'd done so much. Thanks, onebyone, this thread is really helping me to just get moving.

Me again! How are you all getting on? I'm on a roll, it seems.

One old rucksack from the early 80s has bitten the dust, another child’s one is heading for Oxfam, a third new one has been put away. Paper recycled and front of car tidied up a bit after being on tour.

Most shopping done for week.

Two or three hours in garden. Pruned back honeysuckle and ivy. Took out a bay tree (with assistance of the DB) in order to build a raised bed. Lots of squatting and reaching to clear up twigs and leaves.