Sell or Give Away?

Summer has been a mixed bag of decluttering. Some weeks I'm motivated and get a lot done, other times I accomplish very little. Part of the hesitation is my struggle to earn money for all the items we are shedding.  I spent money on all this stuff, it makes sense to try to make money on it.

But there are limitations, the first being I can't stand having garage sales. That option is completely out. Been there, done that, never want to again. So that leaves resell shops in town for clothes and decor items. Or selling stuff to my friends online (or strangers, too). Thus far, I have only utilized the decor resale shop. It's been mildly profitable for me.  I also read a blog last week that helped me feel better about donating so much stuff rather than selling it.  That blogger maintained that if something is not worth at least $10 don't bother trying to sell it. Just donate it.  Honestly, that's what we have done with the vast majority of items we have shed.  Girls clothes have gone to other friends; books to my book club; toys to small children; and a whole lot of stuff to the local Christian resale shop. They put recovering addicts to work and provide an important service to our community so I can feel good about donating to them.

Here's the updated tally:

Holiday items: 52
Clothing: 75
Stuff from daughter's room: 100
Misc: 13
Purses/Totes/Bookbags: 14
Plastic hangers: 34
Kitchen items: 7
Cosmetics/perfume: 8
Toys: 6
DVD player
Household linens, decor items: 74
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Total to date:        1405

The Big Slow Down

It's been a month since I've recorded any progress. That is mostly because it has been slow. At least the last couple of weeks have been slow. I guess it's the non-stop cold weather. I just don't feel motivated.  And it doesn't help that the kitchen I decluttered is getting cramped again. What has helped is following minimalist blogs/posts and re-reading the original story that got  me started (Stockpiling Treasures in my Junk Closet)

Still, there has been progress. Here is what we have removed from the house in the last month:

36 books
26 cookbooks
25 cooking magazines and booklets
1 CD Player/case
10 decor items
175 markers and pens
25 school supplies
6 pair of shoes
99 items of clothing
15 Misc. items
418 items

which puts our current total at 1131

I guess that's not too bad after all. We are not finished with the first quarter of the year, but we are more than halfway to our goal of 2015 items!

Making Progress

So far I am thrilled with the progress we have made in decluttering our home. Last weekend I tackled the living room and foyer closet, and this weekend, the kitchen. Not quite finished with the desk area of the kitchen, but  the room in general is a whole light lighter on 'stuff.'

Here is what I've purged in the last couple of weeks:

36 music CDs
12 lanyards
1 camera
1 camera case
6 pair of eyeglasses/sunglasses
13 movies
9 skeins of yarn
5 tote bags
1 pair snow boots
4 hats
12 candles/scent items
49 dishes/cookware
64 utensils (measuring spoons/cups, whisks, knives, scoops, etc)
27 plastic lids
2 vases
15 cloth napkins
18 napkin rings
10 place mats
2 aprons
3 pot holders
10 tea towels
7 tablecloths
4 chair covers
44 miscellaneous items
355


Total so far: 713

This does not include the approx. 50 items I've thrown away (almost half were bread ties!)

To keep motivated I've been continued to read blogs on minimalism/decluttering; and I was especially glad to run across one that is faith based:  Christian Faith and Minimalism.

Short update!

Our early efforts to get rid of Christmas-themed items paid off to the tune of $18.50. These were holiday decorations we sold at my neighbor's resale shop.  Not a huge amount of money, but better than nothing.  I also brought home a few items that she did not sell. Not sure how I'll handle the tally of items that are returned to me, but I suspect we will just donate to get them out of the house.

We have also set up a schedule to help us keep on track over the next several months.

Last night I cleaned out our winter gear and will give away:

12 scarves
10 hats
7 gloves/mittens
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Total so far:  358

One step forward, two steps back

Maybe I should have known better than to start such a big challenge in December. 
The first set back we had was the busy pace of the season. There is no way we could get rid of 1000 items in one month (my amended goal after a discussion with my husband).  If we had time to declutter that might have happened, but we definitely did not have time. 

The second setback was my plan not to buy any decorations during post Christmas sales. Our outside decor was showing its age. We live on a tiny cul de sac and I noticed our neighbor had pretty silver and gold decorations (do you hear Burl Ives in your head?) My old ones were blue and white; our lights were so bad we had two strands of colored, and one strand of white--of which only half lit up.  I came up with the idea of buying silver and gold oversized ornaments to color coordinate with the neighbors and energy saving LED C-9 lights.  

Thankfully, the post-Christmas sales were pretty deep; I bought about two dozen ornaments, but the average price was only about $2. We also bought two reels of lights for about $12--a huge discount for large LEDs. The upside is we should not have to spend as much for electricity as the old style lights.

The step forward was that we did manage to do some cleaning and got rid of several items including five boxes of books.

Goodbye books!

We said goodbye to:
13 Christmas items
4 stuffed animals
27 items of clothing & shoes
5 soup plates (but I bought new ones to replace them)
3 purses/totes
17 household decor items
160 books!
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229 items

total items removed so far: 329

So to recap: I didn't get rid of 1000 items in December, but I did get rid of over 300. And I bought new Christmas decor.  

2015 is now here and I'm ready to start decluttering again!

It's a start...

Our new goal to minimize started out strong with sorting through our Christmas closet. I was able to reduce our stuff by two full totes, which I considered pretty good. I wanted to do the Christmas first because much of if will make money at a resell shop if I can get it there quickly.

One challenge I did  notice right away is the tendency to get distracted--such as while cooking, I found excess spoons. I had to remind myself not to stop and deal with them as we are taking it one room at a time.

I can also foresee a big temptation--post Christmas sales. That's when I buy extra cute ornaments and fun items. I'm nixing that practice this year.

Here's what we reduced from our Christmas stash:

50 ornaments
1 craft kit
8 decorative items
14 tea cups (I collected items for a tea time tree, which I never put up)
1 tea pot
6 saucers
11 Children's Thanksgiving books
9 misc. items

Total Stuff Reduction :  100

Total to date:  100

Learning minimalism

Although it is late November, I have settled firmly on my New Year's resolution, and my husband is enthusiastically onboard.  It was prompted, as these things sometimes are, by reading a story. This story in Christianity Today on the practical and spiritual value in decreasing clutter. 

Quite on my own, in October, I voluntarily decluttered by stash of fall/Halloween decor items (with an October birthday, I receive a lot of fall-themed items).  As much as I enjoyed these gifts, I was bursting out of storage totes and needed decluttering. My goal was to reduce the Halloween and Thanksgiving items to one (very) large tote each.  This paid off to the tune of thirty-some-odd dollars from my neighbor's home resale shop. The items I couldn't sell were donated.

Then this morning I read that story. And it opened my eyes to the sheer mass of stuff that we have in our home.  So. much. stuff.  And the truth is every season we donate stuff; yet we never seem to run out of stuff (we do, however, run out of storage space). 

After I read this story I was convicted to strive for a much more minimalist life--not extreme minimalism, but a lot less than we currently have.  

I made a list of some starting points:

• Give away or sell 1,000 items next year--that's about 83 a month.
• Stop buying books (this is the hardest one of all for me) For 2015 I will only borrow books from the library or friends.
• Stop buying craft supplies.
• Stop buying holiday decor items.
• Stop shopping as a leisure activity, to fill time, or relieve boredom.

That was my starting list. I put it aside and went on to the major event of our day: My family's Thanksgiving celebration. The meal was planned, but the second aspect of our family gathering was for my siblings and I help our elderly parents decorate their small home for Christmas.

I had no idea that my morning contemplation on clutter would be emphasized so clearly in sorting through my parents' stuff. Tote after tote pulled out of a storage closet that was overflowing with so much stuff that much of it was forgotten. If anything illustrated the effect of a lifetime of clutter this was it. 

I came home with a renewed determination to free our home, and lives, of excess stuff.  I discussed the idea with my husband and he surprised me by saying he had read a story on minimalism a few years ago, but didn't think I'd ever agree with it. 

So this is our starting point. We are not going for complete minimalism. We are in the midst of renovating our basement family room and plan to buy furniture, lighting and decor items. But we are going for less, a lot less. As in bookshelves where I can actually see the shelves. And a Saturday that doesn't require me organizing and finding more storage space in our home. The good news is that even though we have a lot of extra items, they are organized. It is true that I have several hundred markers, crayons and colored pencils, but at least they are neatly stored in their own containers. I have that going for me, but decluttering needs to happen all the same.  

As far as our goal, my husband says if we count each book as one item, we'll be able to give away a whole lot more than 1000 items.  So we've set a tentative goal of 1000 items to start with, and then 85 items a month for the following year. That would get us to 2,000 items. 

Here we go....