Blogtober Day 19: 7 Things to remember before starting to declutter...

 Hi Honeys, 

Are you decluttering or trying to bring order to your home right now?  If you are, well, join the gang, there are so many of us working on this same problem right now and if your home is like ours you'll know how overwhelming it can be.  I actually can't remember when we started working on our home, but I do know we're nowhere near to finishing it 😔  

There have been gains along the way, we have a growing pile of empty bins and baskets to remind us of the volume of belongings we've parted with, but in our over thirty years together we have simply collected too much stuff for it to be solved by any kind of a quick fix.  

We're both pack rats dear ones, although Hubby slightly less than me I think, but the fact remains, we've spent our years together filling cupboards, drawers and our loft/attic with stuff.  I really do believe that it's possible to become oblivious to clutter and that this is how it accumulates.  We get used to passing that box that's always in the hallway or the stack of books in the corner.  Clutter blindness is real.  

So, all that having been said dear ones, and for what it's worth, here's what the last few years of trying to tackle our stuff mountain have taught me (so far...)

7 Things To Remember Before Starting To Declutter...

1. Give yourself a break.  

Seriously, stop with the self criticism.  The world does enough judging without our judging ourselves harshly too! We live in a world where everyday we're encouraged to buy the latest wot-nots and over time our space fills up with all of these possibly no longer needed or wanted, space consuming possessions.  

It is what it is honeys.  We start where we are.  You've made a decision to clear the clutter and carve out a new space for yourself. Celebrate that. That change in mindset alone is a victory in itself and will carry you through when you want to give up.  Picture your home the way you want it to look.  Fill in all the details in your minds eye, now memorise that image and work towards it.   

2. Make plans.  

Every general needs a master plan for the battle ahead.  You're the general of your household, the clutter that's making you unhappy is the enemy and setting up systems that work will mean, overtime, you'll create order and will win the war.  You've got this 💖  

3. Recruit help if you can. 

This can be a partner, a family member or a friend.  Whoever is helping should be non judgemental, a sympathetic person who will understand if you have problems parting with certain things (and will never force you to.)  

Your helper should want to help but know the final decision on your possessions should always be yours.  It can be fun sorting through and organising a space and you might find that you'll get done faster with help. 

The best help to recruit, of course, is always the person/people you share your space with.  A beautifully organised space won't stay that way if one person is doing all the work.  You'd be surprised though how easily systems become habits for everyone.  When items have a home it will become second nature to return put these items away.   

4. Baby steps. 

Small victories, all of them, every, single, one of them, all add up.  Today the "junk drawer" in the kitchen, tomorrow (or whenever you get to it) those boxes in the loft that you haven't opened since two house moves ago   Baby steps will get you there. 

5. When you get tired, stop!  

Yes, I know there's a school of thought that says "power through, keep going!" well hooey to all that! Do you know what happens (certainly to me) when you run out of steam but you still force yourself to keep going anyway? You'll begin to regret having even started, in fact you might end up hating the whole process so much that you never start working on it again.  

Most important of all, you'll lose focus and will achieve so much less than if you were rested and in the right "let's do this!" frame of mind. This simply can't be allowed, because it will make you dread ever starting again.  Our brain files away upsets and bad feelings and will then try to protect us from them by avoiding repeating the actions that caused them in the first place. 

There's always tomorrow dear ones and anything you've done today is banked. Did you finish a drawer? A cupboard? Make new homes for anything, a place they can be taken to when found elsewhere?  Then you did well honey.  Systems work. Any system you set up, and turn into a habit, will work and can always be tweaked down the road if needs be.  

If you can recover enough to keep going after stopping for something to eat and maybe a cuppa, that's fabulous! Do that, and kudos to you. I'm approaching this from the view point of someone who has a chronic illness and I know how easily the body can just become completely drained.  Rest if you need to honeys, just do what you can, when you can.  You'll get there.    

6 Celebrate the wins. 

Take the time to appreciate every milestone you reach, every system you set up that works.  Don't rush out and celebrate by buying new clutter as a way of celebrating though. Sometimes a high five or a phone call to a friend to share your success can give you the same glow.  Treat yourself to an experience, something to make you feel good, that you'll remember and want to repeat. What about a movie night in, in your newly organised and fabulous living/family room?   

7. It's never completely finished.  

We don't declutter once and then it's done.  Just as you made plans to tackle the clutter, make another battle plan to maintain your fabulous clutter-free space. The systems you've set up, keep checking on them.  Is everybody sticking to them?  Don't let it fall backwards again.  Why not schedule a regular sweep around your home for any clutter piles that might be starting to grow?   

All of those perfect, minimalist homes we see on Pinterest didn't start out that way and you can be sure their owners are mindful of what gains entry to their homes and stays there. 

Having an organised home doesn't mean it has to be stripped bare of all of your possessions honeys.  I know that neither Hubby nor I will ever be minimalists.  What we want to achieve though is to reach a level where we own what we need and, just as importantly, we need what we own... but with, you know... happy sprinkles 😊  Happy sprinkles are the things we keep because they make us happy. 

That stack of paperbacks I'm currently working my way through will go on their way when I'm finished reading them but the adorable, 3 foot tall soft toy hound dog that my beloved Mother-in-law brought for me over 20 years ago all the way from the south of England, on two trains (even changing stations in London) well, he's not going anywhere 💖  Happy sprinkles 💕   

Are you decluttering honeys?  What are your happy sprinkles?   Till next time dear ones, hugs always xx

How To Avoid Adding Clutter To Your Home When Shopping!

Hi Honeys,
I hope you're having a fabulous, smile filled week :)  Hubby & I are using our week off work to plough ahead with decluttering and organizing our home but I thought before we started today's project, our upstairs hallway which is home to our mini library of books and CDs, I'd have a cuppa and share with you my tips on how I stopped buying unnecessary stuff and keep (potentially new) clutter outside our home where it belongs :)

Seriously honeys, Hubby & I are working our way through a backlog of many (many) years worth of collected odds and ends AKA clutter so the last thing we need is to keep adding to the already considerable task at hand :/

Something had to change and it did!  I can honestly say, with hand on heart that we neither of us buy anything anymore without asking ourselves the following questions...

6 Never Fail Decluttering Tips!

Hi Honeys
I hope you're having a great start to the new week, I can't believe we're a third of the way through the year already! Time is flying past again, just like last year :)

Hubby has taken this week off work, as have I, and we're using this week to have another mammoth clear out session.  Eventually we'll manage to make our home look the way we want it to but it's a process and I feel so lucky to have Hubby on board and helping.  

I thought today I'd share a few rules we're using to help us unload our mountains of no longer relevant and definitely no longer loved or wanted stuff...

The Secret To Effective De-Cluttering!

Hi Honeys
I seem to have had some kind of an epiphany with regards to our home organization project dear ones. I'm not sure if I can explain it properly, but I'll give it a try.  We've been trying desperately to de-clutter our home, in one shape or another, for what feels like forever and while we'd get things done it never felt like we were getting anywhere. Whatever we did, it never seemed to make any real difference to how our home looked or felt.

Just the middle of last week I started to become aware of a change.  It was very subtle. I wasn't even sure if it was real or if I was imagining it, but I mentioned it to Hubby and he agreed. Our home was starting to feel... well, different.  It feels like it's taken such a long time, and so much work to reach this point, but I think we've "turned a corner" and even better, I think I might have figured out what's made the difference :)

It wasn't that we worked much harder on our home, although it has been work that's for sure, it's that we started to work smarter on it.  Before we started work on our kitchen makeover recently, we sat down and used pen & paper, we planned what we were going to do before we did it. One task just seemed to lead onto another quite seamlessly because .... and here it is! Here's what made the difference honeys, we stopped trying to de-clutter our whole house and started working on one room at a time!

That's it honeys, that's what made it all click. Concentrate on one room, start from the middle or pick a corner and start from there if you prefer.  Whatever you do though, plan it out and don't be tempted to start another project until that room is done.  Why not cut the task down into bullet points on a sheet of paper? Then tick off each one as they're done?

Focus is key.  It's that simple and I can't believe it's taken as long as it has for that particular penny to drop!  Creating homes for things as you go along is enormously helpful.  Then as you carry on in that room, or even after that room is done & dusted, things will have a designated space.  If, for instance, in the next room we tackle (when we eventually finish our master bedroom) I find, say a wandering hair clip or hand bag, I now have places set up to immediately take that item to and put it away. 

Honestly honeys, I feel a little like I've been muddling along in the dark and someone's just switched on a light.  It strikes me while writing this that this must be incredibly obvious and maybe I'm just a bit dense, in a "can't see the wood for the trees" kinda way,  not to have cottoned on before now :)  Still, I wanted to share my little "oh..... right...." moment with you in the hopes that it might help if anyone has been struggling along as I have been for ages, feeling a bit like they're wading through treacle.  I know that feeling all too well :)

Not any more though honeys :) We know exactly what we have left to do in our master bedroom (not much now yaaaay!) and have already planned out what needs done in our guest room.  This is the room I was planning on turning into a craft room & dressing room. Now that all of my clothes, shoes and accessories have been rounded up, purged & organized into our bedroom, the guest room will now only have to double as a craft room. The single bed in the guest room, (when it's not home to a guest :) and with the help of lots of cushions, has already become our little book nook.  I'll share our progress as we go honeys, promise.

For now though, enough of my waffling :) Till next time dear ones, keep smiling & hugging, it makes the world a brighter, sunnier place no matter what the weather :) Heaps of hugs always xx

A Little Catch Up & Closet Update.....

Hi honeys
Well this has been quite a week and a half, that's for sure :) When last we spoke I'd said that Hubby had booked this week off from work and that we'd be spending the week finishing off our spare room AKA my little oasis of calm. You might remember Hubby was changing our guest room into a craft room/dressing room for me?  Well, funny thing about that......

I know I've been waffling on and on about my new girly closet for a while now, apologies honeys, I've just been so excited :) The guest room has a two door, reach in cupboard/closet.  You might remember that it looked like this......

What To Do With Unwanted VHS tapes

Hello honeys,
I'm so sorry I've been missing for a few days. Hubby has had a weeks hols from work and we've been de-cluttering our home. We've been working on the back bedroom, and since it doesn't get used very often it had become a "catch-all" for clutter.

This room is our guest room and so we've made it a project to make it far more functional than just being a room with a bed in it. This room has a decent sized cupboard in it. It's not a walk in closet by any means but it's a two door cupboard (closet) that is the depth of a wardrobe? This wonderful cupboard was though unfortunately full of boxes. We had no idea what was stored in them since they'd been there since our last house move!

What we found was... VHS tapes! Lots & lots of VHS tapes. Well, who uses VHS in our modern age? The answer surprised me :)

Decluttering: What to do with old or broken electrical items

Hello honeys!
I hope everyone's well & having a great start to the week.  As I said (very) late last night, as much fun as the Blogtember Challenge has been, and it really has, I've been keeping up at the expense of my own "Rosie" posts I'm afraid.  So I thought today I'd write an organizing post.

Apologies though, because this should have been published yesterday, but I had a "flarey" day with awful spine & shoulder pain, so today I'm determined to at least try to catch up.
 

I wondered if anyone else has ever wondered what on earth to do with their old or broken electrical appliances?  I know that I certainly have.  Of course we have two very different categories of items, but there are many ways to de-clutter both old & broken things.