I wish I took pictures

I made a deal with my youngest boy this weekend... if he could help with some of MY chores, I would clean his room. After short negotiations as to what chores he'd have to do, he went for it.

So I spent a good part of Sunday tearing into the plethora of bins and containers in his room. It looked waaaaaay worse before it started looking better, but now there is some logic to the containers (all the playmobil in one place, hotwheels in another, for example).

Thanks to all the practice I've had in my own spaces lately, I had great success consolidating and streamlining his storage bins! I put SIX high quality empty bins in the crawlspace (I know I should just donate them, but I will give them some time to prove useless before that). There was a small amount of trash (toy packages) and only a small amount of damaged toys, so I didn't really remove a whole lot of volume. It was just the miss-filed items that were taking up so much extra space. And that accident has been fixed now.

He came home from an outing with dad to a better looking and better functioning space. Oh ya and it was cleaner too. With everything torn out, I could vacuum and dust in the chronically blocked corners... small mountains of dust and pet hair lurked there (ewwww). With less bins now, theoretically it should be easier to clean these corners more often. It's now Wednesday and it's still very nice in there. :)

In other news: 2 weeks ago I gave 4 very large, quality, hinged plastic bins to my sister to help her rotate toys in her kids' playroom.... she has seen my decluttering successes and thought she'd try cutting down the immediate choices for her kids so they could find it easier to put things away and easier to find something to play with. By rotating the toys, old will be new again in a few months, and clean up time should go faster.

It's funny how there is a certain point where too much choice is annoying instead of fun - that's where her playroom had gone to. Nobody wanted to play in there. Now that 4 large totes worth are out of sight, and several more bags were donated or tossed, and even a large piece of furniture was removed, her kids suddenly love their playroom again!

No I didn't pest my sister to do it, she just saw with her own eyes that I have been happier with less, and recognized that it could solve her playroom frustrations to have less too. And I just happened to have a bunch of empty bins (!)

Align Life with Priorities

I found "extraorganized.com" recently and thought I'd give some of the concepts a real effort.
(My comments are in the CAPS)

"Align your life with your priorities"

What is important to you, at this moment in your life? Over the next twelve months, aim to gradually bring the way you spend your time into alignment with these things. To help identify your core priorities, think about the following questions:

• What are your top five priorities?
FAMILY - HOME - CREATIVITY - MONEY MANAGEMENT - HEALTH

• From a friend’s perspective, what would they say your top five priorities are?
THAT'S A GOOD QUESTION. ANY FRIENDS WANT TO WEIGH IN ON THAT IN THE COMMENTS?

• Does the way you spend your time reflect either list?
WELL, I WORK FROM HOME SO I CAN BE CLOSER TO FAMILY, AND THAT FORCES ME TO MANAGE MY MONEY CLOSELY, AND MY WORK IS CREATIVE... ALL BUT THE HEALTH THING ARE COVERED THERE. I EAT HOME COOKED MEALS MOST OF THE TIME AND PAY ATTENTION TO MY FOOD, BUT EXERCISE COULD BE TAKEN MORE SERIOUSLY FOR SURE :)

• Is there anything getting in the way of your priorities? Is it worth it?
SOMETIMES THE PRIORITIES CONFLICT: MESSY HOME THANKS TO CREATIVE ENDEAVOURS, OR LESS FUN TIME WITH FAMILY THANKS TO RESPONSIBLE MONEY MANAGEMENT. OTHERWISE MY REALITY IS INLINE WITH MY PRIORITES MOST OF THE TIME.

BUT IF I COULD ADD ONE MORE PRIORITY IT WOULD BE A SOCIAL LIFE OUTSIDE OF HOME/FAMILY. MY PRIORITIES (AS THEY ARE) HAVE LEFT LITTLE ROOM FOR ANYTHING ELSE. I SUPPOSE CREATIVITY AND SOCIAL EXPANSION COULD BE INTERTWINED IF I WENT FARTHER AFIELD FOR MY CREATIVE OUTLET BEYOND MT CAMERA LENS OR COMPUTER SCREEN...

GOAL #36 - Entryway/laundryroom

Not a lot going on in the entryway (there is no room to hide bins anyways!) but I do have an excess of reusable grocery bags in the coat closet. I think the eco thing to do is use these extra bags as my donation containers for a while.

The laundryroom is a whole other story. Stacks of bins for shoes, cleaning supplies and other bits and bobs. Here is the starting point....

 

The goal is to to clear off the horizontal surfaces and limit the busy-clutter.

Away for Good, Away for Now

I put an audio book on and got packing today.

SO FAR...
Away forever - one box of stuff is going away forever
Away for now - going to the crawlspace with "expiry dates" written on them - 1 large box of DVDs and 1 box of books

 

(small sampling of stuff going away so far)

Reality is a mean mistress

I look at all these things around, and am anguishing over how to FIX the lingering piles that are plaguing me.

I want a pretty, clean space. I know that means getting rid of everything that doesn't fit the vision.

I know it, but I have such a hard time DOING it. Cutting the fat as it were is tougher than it sounds as I look at the kid's art and the lego model, the costume sparkly necklace and my yoda figurine on my desk. They are so cute and fun on their own, but all together on my desk it looks messy.

The vision is worth the temporary pain, right?

Once these cute things are put away I will forget about them quickly, right?

It's time

I've been saying for a couple years now that I want to own less and be happy with less so I will feel less smothered/overwhelmed by all the stuff.

In the old days, all my stuff was a comfy blanket to keep me warm in uncertain times. Sparse homes made me feel cold and uncomfortable even for a short visit! How things have changed. Now a cluttered home suffocates me and so much of my own things seem to just harbour mess and stress.

That photo of my office area that I posted a while back is a prime example. What's that all about? My blog is "Happy Shiny Me" and that image is neither "happy" nor "shiny", but it is "me" in that place at that time.

That's how I know it is time.  It's GOTTA GO. All the books I don't read, papers I don't look at, tools I don't use, treasures that don't mean anything anymore. Movies that I keep rewatching (don't I have better things to do with my time?) I've held onto so much for so long, it won't be easy... I have to be strong, with a clear vision of my end goal - SPACE TO BREATHE -  and space to bring new experiences into my life.

So that I don't have any immediate regrets, I will be utilizing the vast empty space under my house as a purgatory for my stuff. Taking a tip from other declutterers I will have boxes taped up with the current date written clearly. If I do not break the seal looking to retrieve something from the box in one year, I am sure I can safely get rid of it. An added bonus of keeping the boxes in the crawlspace is that I will likely try to "make do" without this item instead of going looking for it. And if I can make do without it once, then I can likely permanently live without this theoretical item, right?

GOAL #35 Kitchen and Dining

To remove the excess in order to reveal the right amount! That is the goal here. To make the important things stand out and not me smothered by the extraneous materials.

“I saw the angel in the marble and carved until I set him free.”
― Michelangelo

No place is it more important to me than the kitchen!
Since this is a container challenge that I am going for right now, I won't be tearing into every cupboard and drawer this week. Just the containers that are lurking within. I have baskets that contain mixes, baskets that contain baking supplies, baskets that have "treats".

The dining room is very simple because I don't have too much extra stuff in there.... but I'll do it too.

This mission is to remove the outdated, expired, broken and unloved that don't belong here anymore. (And hopefully to remove a few containers and streamline while I'm at it.)

Progress:
These items I no longer use/want in my kitchen:

Any items removed is good news!