I sat in tears at a friend’s home. Finally confessing to the state of my apartment. I said ‘Have you seen that TV show ‘Hoarders’ well that’s me!’ I don’t think they really believed me. On the outside I was always so well-groomed and professionally dressed, but inside I was an emotional mess.

My friends offered to come around and help me ‘ tidy up’. But they had no idea as to the extent of the problem. I was so ashamed. Too ashamed to let them see how bad things were. My lovely two-bedroom apartment had become a one-bedroom disaster zone, where I needed to navigate every step just to get into bed. I felt so overwhelmed I seriously just wanted to hire some men with a skip and throw EVERYTHING out of the house.

And I mean everything: everything heaped in cupboards; everything stuffed and spilling out of drawers; everything askew in kitchen cupboards and benchtops; everything littering the floor – clothes, clothes and more clothes, bags of craft supplies, mounds of books, broken electricals, old computers; everything hanging over chairs and door frames; every mountain of “stuff”; even the furniture.

Getting rid of every thing. Just leaving me with walls and carpet and empty space. Luckily a friend was a bit more level headed and investigated some other options for me. I took one week off work and with the help of a professional company, we decluttered – room by room, bit by bit.

I donated or recycled 30 packing boxes of all sorts of things and gave away bags of clothing, a couch, a sofa bed, an outdated computer and an old TV. Everything that remained was given a dedicated place. Clothing hanging in order in the built in cupboards – summer in one closet, winter in another, necessary daily items packed in see- through boxes or allocated drawers, rarely used or specialty items vacuum packed and neatly labelled, even necklaces hanging on a rack in the closet with matching earrings and bracelets neatly beside, ready to go.

What a sense of freedom!

I could then start fresh and create a home to be proud of – some minor renovations : new internal doors; new light fittings; new bathroom vanity; new lounges; new rug; and ‘voila’ a place to feel good about coming home to.

I had my first visitors dropping in for a cup of tea or a simple dinner or drinks with nibbles. Opening my home for the first time in over 2 years. What a celebration.

I hope the before and after photos below will encourage you.

If I can do it, feeling broken and overwhelmed, the ultimate hoarder, you can too.

Have courage. Nothing is impossible!!

From Colleen: I would like to thank our fellow 365er for sharing her story of hope and success in this post for us today. For obvious reasons she would prefer to remain anonymous but her contribution could possibly be a great help to someone out there in the same position she was in. So if you feel that your clutter has gotten our of control please follow this example of how you can find your way out with one simple step of getting professional help be that physical help like our reader or psychological help if you are having trouble letting go.

Today’s Mini Mission

Declutter papers and the necessities for storing them ~ If you can be realistic about what papers you really need to keep or are even still relevant not only can you get rid of a lot of aspirational and sentimental clutter you can also reduce the space and containers in which they were stored.

Today’s Declutter Item

I bought this binding machine for $6 in a thrift store in America years ago. I thought at the time that it would be so useful for both crafting and for my children’s school projects. I have used it many times over the year but not enough to justify the space it was taking up in my craft room. I was comforted in the fact that both my son and I were of the opinion that if we wanted something bound we could just get it done at our local office supply store.

Binding Machine

Something I Am Grateful For Today

Feeling like I had a productive day yesterday and not suffering physically in the evening for the effort.

“In daily life we must see that it is not happiness that makes us grateful, but gratefulness that makes us happy.” Brother David Steindl-Rast

It matters not how fast I go, I hurry faster when I’m slow

Cindy’s Weekly Wisdom

Cindy

While we have plenty of old pros here at 365 Less Things, we have plenty of drop-by readers and lurkers, some of whom are probably in denial about their need to declutter. So here’s my checklist, roughly arranged from the most obvious to the most subtle clues that you should use if you think that maybe you don’t really need to declutter.

• You rent a storage unit.
• Your garage, basement, or attic looks like a storage unit.
• You have a whole room devoted to storage.
• You have a door in your home that you cannot open.
• You have a door in your home that you cannot open safely or without throwing your body in front of the opening as you pull on the door.
• You wish you had a room that you could devote to storage.
• Or worse, you are considering moving or adding on to your home, just for storage.
• You sometimes wish that your house would just burn down so you wouldn’t have to deal with it any more.
• Your friends offer to come over and help you get organized.
• You are surrounded by possessions that you do not like or enjoy.
• You are surrounded by possessions that were given to you by someone who is dead, and you do not like and enjoy them.
• You believe that more storage is the solution to your problems.
• You do not have friends or family over.
• When friends and family do come over, you need at least a week’s notice, and it’s a stressful week.
• You cannot use the furniture as it is intended to be used because it is used as storage.
• You have make-shift storage (i.e. overflowing baskets, laundry baskets, a bunch of stuff bundled up into a table cloth and hidden in the garage, etc.)
• You got remarried, moved in with parents, etc., and now you have two (at least!) of everything.
• Anyone has ever said the words “fire hazard” while looking around you home.
• Anyone has ever said the words “estate sale” while looking around your home.
• Your closets are so full that you have to use your body as a wedge to get something in or out.
• You shop and hide the evidence.
• You shop for non-consumables more than once a month.
• Shopping is your favorite hobby – or one of them.
• You buy things because they are a bargain.
• You buy things because you “might” need it and aren’t sure if you already own one.
• You buy duplicates because you don’t know what you have or where it is.
• You buy for a current hobby at a rate that outpaces your ability to do that hobby.  (You buy dozens of books at a time, dozens of yarns skeins , dozens of patterns, hundreds of Legos, etc.)
• You don’t overbuy on yourself, but on your children or grandchildren…well that’s another matter.
• Your living room looks like a preschool classroom.
• Your children don’t play with half their toys. They don’t even know what half their toys are!
• You pulled a bunch of stuff out of a closet to organize it, and it’s been sitting outside the closet for more than two weeks, with no progress being made.
• The phrases “I might need it some day” “I’ve never used/opened that” “But I spent so much money on it” and “I intend to do XX project with that some day” have come of out your mouth sometime in the past 6 months.
• You don’t know what’s in the boxes in your attic, basement, garage, storage unit, etc.
• If the IRS (or your country’s taxing agency) called you for an audit, you could not lay your hands on the proper paperwork in less than 5 minutes.
• You pay bills late because you don’t know where they are.
• Your pantry looks like it is the store.
• You regularly throw foods away because they’re expired, you bought too much, or you do not like what you purchased.
• You have supplies for crafts or hobbies that you no longer do/enjoy.
• You cannot find everything in your house in less than 5 minutes.
• You have ever uttered the phrase “It’s in one of five places.”
• You own duplicates of useful items, but you really only need one.
• In the past year, you have not given away, sold, or donated any goods to charity.
• You have to step around anything on your floors, except furniture.
• You love to save little goodies from your travels, but you never look back on them.
• You take dozens of pictures at every conceivable event.
• You never delete an email.
• You save articles on decluttering and organization, but that’s as far as it goes.
• You have a sofa or bed side table that’s actually a stack of reading material.
• You have clothes in more than two sizes.
• You think that if you just had a $1000 gift card to The Container Store, everything would be all right.

Today’s Mini Mission

Declutter under the bed ~ One young reader (not mentioning any names) was decluttering under her bed last week due to Moni’s blog post. I don’t need to tell you how much easier it is to keep this area dust and lint free when there is nothing to clean around or move.

Today’s Declutter Item

Here is something that was being stored in a drawer under the end of my bed until they were sold on ebay recently.

Bib and Brace Ski Pants

Something to be grateful for today

I have been making progress on our household inventory. It has been a good opportunity to do some declutter fine tuning in the kitchen. It should be plain sailing after the kitchen is out of the way because that is where most of the small individual items are.

“In daily life we must see that it is not happiness that makes us grateful, but gratefulness that makes us happy.” Brother David Steindl-Rast

It matters not how fast I go, I hurry faster when I’m slow

In this modern age we are spoiled for choice and with modern conveniences. We have also been conned by clever marketing to believe we need these things. Hence why our homes are crammed with clutter,  credit cards are often  maxed to the limit and our homes are bigger than they need be.

As a child growing up I lived in a four bedroom home that had a kitchen/meals room, one living area, a small front reception area and one bathroom. I know people who think that is cramped living conditions for a two adult two child family. Well let me tell you I grew up in a two adult five child family and that was plenty of space for all of us. Granted the children all shared rooms, me with my sister, the three boys in another and of course my parents together in their’s and there was still one bedroom left over for my mum’s home dressmaking business. My father did build a rumpus room underneath later on but that was a sheer luxury.

Now many parents think their children need their own rooms and sometimes even their own bathrooms. When did we become so spoiled? I know I was happy to share a bedroom and our one bathroom as a child, I didn’t really think anything of it because that was normal then. And the same goes for modern conveniences. As a child I remember my mother having a wad a plastic bags that the next door bakery owner had given her. These were a luxury and they lasted for years because we only found the need to use them occasionally. Now people waste plastic like it’s going out of fashion. We also have every gadget going that is supposed to save us time meanwhile both parents go out to work to afford to pay for all these luxuries ~ can someone please explain to me where the time saving comes into play in this equation.

Clever marketing has us thinking…

• we have to give a gift at every occasion going, cluttering up other people’s homes who then feel obliged to keep them (Obligation Clutter).
• a vacation has to be remembered with some sort of kitschy souvenir that we don’t need (Sentimental Clutter).
• exercise requires expensive equipment ~ be that anything from a treadmill to a ski boat. (Aspirational Clutter) ~ went really a walk in the park or a swim at the beach would suffice.
• our children aren’t loved unless we buy them whatever the latest and greatest  thing is that going at the time. (Guilt Clutter). And the list could go on.

One of the things I enjoy about my declutter mission is having learned not to fall prey to this sort or marketing. This lesson is driven home with every little thing ~ I thought I needed ~ that leaves my home. And for every little thing I see in the market place that I now find so easy to resist acquiring I get a certain amount of satisfaction from leaving on the shelf.

So if seeing the stuff leave your home isn’t giving you satisfaction enough why not add that little bit of extra satisfaction of know that you are going against convention and setting your own norm. Be a trend setter.

Today’s Mini Mission

Declutter a corner kitchen cupboards if you have one ~ these cupboards can be so hard to access. If you can manage to declutter enough stuff out of your kitchen to empty these it would make your life that little bit easier.

Today’s Declutter Item

Somethings are just poorly made and this is one of them. I just seemed to spread the mess because the fibres in the wiping surface were too synthetic. Needless to say it was one things that went in the bin rather than being unleashed on some poor unsuspecting person at the thrift store.

Whiteboard Eraser

Something I Am Grateful For Today

Sitting on my patio enjoying the beautiful sunny day while writing my blog post. The washing drying on the line, birds singing and a dog barking in the distance. Life is good!

“In daily life we must see that it is not happiness that makes us grateful, but gratefulness that makes us happy.” Brother David Steindl-Rast

It matters not how fast I go, I hurry faster when I’m slow

Mini Mission Monday is about finding ten minutes a day to declutter. To make it easy for you, each Monday I set seven declutter missions, one for each day of the week for you to follow. It takes the guess work out of decluttering and makes it easy and “fun” for you to achieve some quick decluttering.

This weeks mini missions are made up of items or areas of the home that my readers tell me they have been decluttering lately. See if you have any of these items or areas that need attention. As usual follow my suggestions below if you can and if not make up your own mission for the day.

Monday – Large appliances ~ Like the extra fridge that is wasting electricity, causing you unnecessary expense and taking up precious space Does the average family really need to store that much food that they need two refrigerators or two freezers? I think not.

Tuesday – Corner kitchen cupboards ~ These cupboards can be so hard to access. If you can manage to declutter enough stuff out of your kitchen to empty these it would make your life that little bit easier.

Wednesday – Under the bed ~ One young reader (not mentioning any names) was decluttering under her bed last week due to Moni’s blog post. I don’t need to tell you how much easier it is to keep this area dust and lint free when there is nothing to clean around or move.

Thursday – Papers and the necessities for storing them ~ If you can be realistic about what papers you really need to keep or are even still relevant not only can you get rid of a lot of aspirational and sentimental clutter you can also reduce the space and containers in which they were stored.

Friday – Books ~ I know I mention this one often but it was bought to my attention again this week when I received an email from one of my readers that has been with me form way back. She has managed to declutter one third of her sizeable book collection over the last twelve months. Rachel has been slowing decluttering in preparation for a downsize move. She has finally made the move and is now decluttering more as she settles in to her new home.

Saturday – Kitchen gadgets ~ Moni had an amusing story about possibly decluttering a couple of these last week. My advice is that if you have gadgets that aren’t being use just get rid of them. Nine times out of ten the same task can be performed with a more versatile item in your house should you find the need.

Sunday – Gift wrapping supplies ~ one reader mentioned that they are decluttering the last of their gift wrapping supplies while another was saying how ~ due to 365 example ~ she was now only giving non-cluttering gifts to her friends and family. I had saved a token supply of gift bags when I decluttered the bulk of them two years ago. I have discovered the ones I saved don’t seem to have diminished since then so it is time to declutter them also.

Good luck and happy decluttering

Today’s Declutter Item

Here is a kitchen gadget that isn’y being used in my house. I actually purchased it for craft purposes but either way it isn’t getting used so out it goes. I am sure it will sell quickly at the thrift store.

Pasta Machine

Something I Am Grateful For Today

Just hubby and I left in the house for a week. That should sure making cooking and cleaning several degrees easier than usual.

It matters not how fast I go, I hurry faster when I’m slow

The title of today’s post may have you thinking that I am going to give you some user reviews on washing machines but in fact it is your opinions that I am seeking. I would really appreciate your assistance in this matter to help my mother chose between a front or a top loading washing machine. What she is really trying to decide, at her age of 73 years young, is which machine would be easier for her to load and unload.

We understand that one can acquire a platform to mount a front loader on bringing it high off the ground. The one opinion we have on this is not encouraging though due to it becoming unstable during fast spin cycles.

I would be happy for you to give use your entire experience with the models you use right now.  Feel free to include the brand name and model of your machine but it isn’t necessary. Include information such as how well powder detergents dissolve in your machine, whether you can access the machine during the cycle, what sort of cycles options it has and how long the cycles are in general. Any other information that comes to mind would also be helpful.

I suppose when it all boils down to it what I really want to know  is how difficult do you all find loading and unloading either style of machine. I feel the top loader would probably be the easiest for her but both machines require some sort of bending, leaning or possibly squatting in the case of the front loader. My laundry has a toilet that directly faces my front loader so I can actually shut the lid on the toilet and sit on it to load and unload my machine. A short stool could suffice to perform the same function making a front loader easier to work with.

Anyway enough information from me now please let me know your opinion.

The Weekend’s Mini Missions

Saturday - Declutter something that you are keeping “just in case” you finally might get around to reading it.

Sunday - Declutter something that you are keeping “just in case” you fall on hard times and can’t afford to replace it. There is no end of items that you really won’t actually ever NEED ~ find a use for yes, but need NO!

On Fridays at 365 Less Things I share with you my favourite comments from my wonderful readers and my favourite web finds of the week. I hope you will enjoy them as much as I did.

Due to the fact that we missed last weeks favourites I have included a few extras this week.

Favourite Comments. Enjoy!

I had a good laugh reading this comment from Jean & Wendy. What fun ladies they would be to spend two years on Norfolk Island with.

I loved this comment from Sanna, where she has come to the realisation that once a home is decluttered properly there need never be any more Spring cleaning.

We have a new reader MelD who left this comment, among others, this week. She sure has learned to minimise  what she carries with her on a daily basis and when travelling.

I think Ideealistin gives some good advice about saving toys in this comment.

This comment from Deb J says it all about how we end up cluttered in the first place. I am so glad she has seen the error of her ways.

We got some great comments on the Pick Your Battles… post on Tuesday which deserve repeating in case they were missed. I love how the comments really bring home the point of a post especially when they are generated from genuine experience of the issue. Here are some of those great comments ~ From Katharine and Wendy B and Spendwisemom.

Here is some great advice from Wendy to Moni on what to do with rarely used small kitchen appliances. She said exactly what came to mind when I ready Moni’s comment. Doing a shift at the thrift shop once a week gives me the confidence to declutter items like this because they are very easily replace secondhand and cheaply like Wendy suggests.

Favourite Web Finds. Happy reading!

Both Clare and Laura sent this link to share with her fellow 365ers. I loved the connection made between the amount of general clutter in one’s home to the number of magnets on one’s fridge.

This post from The Change Blog has a few helpful suggestion on how to make small incremental improvements to your lifestyle.

This post has nothing to do with clutter but it holds some interesting tips about clothes washing that may save you a dollar or two.

I have bought this web site to your attention before but it is worth mentioning again and again. I have linked directly to the about page but please explore other areas of the site. People are even branching out to implement dog sitting collaboratives where pet owners can reach each other through a web site to take care of each other’s pets when they are away, saving them the cost of boarding them in expensive kennels.

Here is a great web article Cindy sent me the link to about textile recycling. Thanks Cindy.

Here is a short but straight to the point article about consumption from The Minimalists.

Today’s Mini Mission

Declutter something that you are keeping “just in case” the person who gave it to you notices it missing.

Today’s Declutter Item

Here is another craft bargain that was too good to resist at the time. I bought these for next to nothing on clearance thinking that I would use the beads for a future project. I am sure I could find a use for them eventually but the object of my craft room declutter was to fit all I was keeping into a certain space. These were just one of those things that didn’t make to cut while attempting to achieve that goal. They were donated to the thrift store.

“Bargain” Beads

Something I Am Grateful For Today

 A little alone time.

It matters not how fast I go, I hurry faster when I’m slow

As a child I was quietly confident that if there was actually a bogey man, he definitely couldn’t live under my bed or in my wardrobe. My mum liked a tidy house, but any storage space that could be kept from eyesight was fair game. So my wardrobe had boxes stacked from the floor up until the hems of my clothes hit them, and up each side of the wardrobe and in the storage area above the hanging rack. Under my bed was tightly packed with yet more boxes containing goodness knew what but it wasn’t anything that belonged to me personally. I even have memories of boxes being jammed so tightly that my dad had to physically lift the bed on one occasion to get something out. When I consider that houses were smaller then and that storage generally wasn’t built into houses, there was probably some logic to this arrangement, but my parents were raised by parents who’d lived thru the Depression and World War 2 and hanging on to things was almost the 11th Commandment, so I imagine most of it wasn’t necessary.

In recent times Colleen added some links to her daily post and one took me to a site by Sue Rasmussen and I have to admit I was feeling a little smug reading thru her recommendations for the bedroom, as my hubby and I had prior to this eliminated the TV, knick knacks and both chests of drawers from our bedroom leaving only our bed and a small bedside table each. We had de-cluttered our clothes to the point where all our clothes fit easily in our walk in wardrobe and we are very pleased with this arrangement. So here I was feeling clever that I had all of Sue Rasmussen’s recommendations sewn up in advance, when I tripped at the finish line. She said to “Remove everything from under the bed; from a Feng Shui perspective, things stored under the bed restrict the flow of energy and abundance in your life”.

 Obviously my childhood had instilled an ‘out of sight, out of mind’ philosophy to under bed storage as I had not included these areas in my War Against Clutter. A quick reconnaissance of the household discovered that underneath bed areas ranged from not too bad to oh my goodness. The War Against Clutter had obviously overlooked a whole cluster of insurgents. Or maybe it was The Lost Tribes of Jumble huddled beneath the slats. However I describe it, I obviously still have work to do. One daughter had so much stuff neatly packed and stacked with no space to spare, it was like looking under my childhood bed again. I have had to promise the kids I wouldn’t supply a full inventory to 365 but one daughter agreed to share that she had kept all her retired ballet pointe shoes in a box under the bed as she didn’t know what else to do with them, when in reality the preferred option would have been to bin them and my other daughter had a box of clothes she didn’t like but had forgotten about, so are going directly to goodwill, without the parental complaints of wastefulness that she had been expecting.

 So I am glad I read an article that I thought I didn’t need – it may have generated me an unscheduled project – but it will be nice to know that space is clear, and how much easier under bed vacuuming will now be.

And if clearing out under the bed provides us with better energy and abundance – though hopefully not the possessions type abundance – then that will be even better!

So what’s under your bed that needs de-cluttering?

Today’s Mini Mission

Declutter something that you are keeping “just in case” it fits you again some day.

Today’s Declutter Item

No these ropes weren’t hiding under by bed but they were hiding unused in the garage for quite a while.

Rope

Something I Am Grateful For Today

Today my daughter, her boyfriend, my husband and I were all grateful the the pilot in the fighter jet made it down safely after hearing over the two way radio at the Fighter World museum that he was having a problem with his landing gear.

“In daily life we must see that it is not happiness that makes us grateful, but gratefulness that makes us happy.” Brother David Steindl-Rast

It matters not how fast I go, I hurry faster when I’m slow

Cindy’s Weekly Wisdom

Cindy

Last month the family and I went to a monthly event, The City-Wide Garage Sale. Ever since one of my staff members bought a really cool old stove at the sale, I’d been curious. (And since that was literally more than 15 years ago, it seemed like it was about time.)

Wow! Was that eye opening! The garage sale is really an indoor flea market, and you could buy just about anything there – the smaller it was, the more likely they were to have it. The sellers are pickers and traders who endlessly loop throughout the country attending these events. Nothing’s terribly expensive; I don’t know how they actually make money doing this. One friend even suggested that it was just a socially acceptable form of hoarding: The vendors just keep buying and accumulating, selling and accumulating.

Here are some photos I took that day

I was struck by the fact that the vendors didn’t have one of something; they had 100. All alike. One woman had a huge display case of Bakelite bangle bracelets – a whole row of red, a whole row of yellow, a whole row of green, etc. Another man had several hundred little skulls. A pair of sellers must have had four hundred silver native American-style bracelets with a chunk of turquoise in them. The volume was just eye popping. The photos above are all things that people might save for sentimental reasons or to sell in the future. There were dozens of brass letters, hundreds of watches and cufflinks, thousands of baseball cards complete with bubble gum (just $1.50 to $3.50 per pack).

What I took away from this day was this message: Your stuff is a lot less precious and a lot less rare than you think it is. There is virtually nothing that can’t be replaced a dozen times over. Especially if it’s not of a deeply sentimental nature, you don’t need it. And if you do need it again later, it’s out there. In triplicate…or more.

Today’s Mini Mission

Declutter something that you are keeping “just in case” you eventually find a use for it.

Today’s Declutter Item

This declutter item is related to another I got rid of a little while back. Remember the candle with the pink design on it, it rested on these stones in a glass bowl. I still have the glass bowl but the rocks can go. I barely walked into the thrift store with them when one of the other volunteers said “I’ll have those!”. So as usual one man’s clutter is another man’s clutter, I mean treasure.

Aquarium Stones

“In daily life we must see that it is not happiness that makes us grateful, but gratefulness that makes us happy.” Brother David Steindl-Rast

It matters not how fast I go, I hurry faster when I’m slow

I often get emails and comment from readers who are having issues getting other members of their households to conform with their newfound decluttering ideals. I can certainly understand their frustrations because they are trying so hard to bring order to their home while others are just not cooperating. So what can you do about this I am sure you are wondering. And the answer is continue to set a good example, gently communicate your wishes and be patient. And that sounds a lot easier that it is in practice.

Set a good example

This is the easy part because you are already doing this by continuing on with the decluttering you do have control over. For the time being just enjoy the difference you are making with your efforts. So long as there is clutter to be controlled that you have free rein over then you are making progress. Hopefully the benefits of that progress will start to be noticed by others and they will begin to come around to your way of thinking and start dealing with their own contribution to the clutter.

Gently communicate your wishes

You will notice that I say “gently communicate” not make demands. There is nothing like demanding for making the opposition dig their heals in. They will just get on the defensive and justify their mess, both to you and to themselves and this will only make the situation worse. Nagging or badgering is just a prolonged form of demanding and will only make you look like the bad guy. What you need to do is just let the others in the household know how important it is to you to make your home a serene place to be for everyone and how much of a drain on your emotions it has been living among the clutter for so long. Let the other members of the family know how pleased you are with the outcome of your efforts so far and why you feel it is important to continue on this journey. Try to find the words to explain simply and without judgment why you find the clutter to no longer  needed and what a burdensome weight it has become for you.

Be patient

I am not going to suggest for one minute that this is going to be easy but it is essential. You can’t change other people, only they have the power to do that. But you can be persuasive by your actions and your suggestions. Part of being patient may require learning ways to see the clutter but not let it affect how you see the clutterer.  It is so easy to equate the person with the mess and this can cause resentment and negative actions and responses. Remember that they most likely don’t see it as a problem.

Pick your battles and plan your campaign

By pick you battles I mean

• Only try to implement changes on one thing at a time. You will receive more resistance if you demand too much change all at once. People often don’t notice little changes here and there but a sudden assault on all that they think they hold near and dear will surely put them on the defensive.
• Like I suggest for any of your own decluttering, choose areas of change that you know aren’t to difficult to tackle. Leave the harder areas until you can detect a definite inclimation to conform readily in the other person.

Plan your campaign

First pave the way. As you are decluttering your own possessions be verbal about your thought processes so others begin to see the intent rather than just hear demands.

Discuss with your partner your wish to make your living environment more light and airy or cozy or whatever words describe your hoped for result.  You should also discuss your wish for a home easier to care for, etc.  If a partner knows you are looking for a particular result rather than thinking you are just “getting rid of things” you will have a better response.

Look for ways to get your partner’s cooperation without attacking them.  Ask them to be willing to help you with decisions but promise to only take a preset amount of time at preset intervals.  If they know they don’t have to “hear this over and over and spend ALL their time helping” they will be more cooperative.

There may be times when you need to actually show your partner how things should look. Devise and suggest solutions to the clutter areas of the home that you are most concerned about that are not within your control rather than demanding that the perpetrator cleans up their act. This may mean just asking if they are willing to let something go and taking care of the declutter method yourself. For example ~

• Your partner has a habit of reading the newspaper everyday and then stacking them beside their lounge chair until recycling day. If you would prefer them to be gone after they are read perhaps you could just ask if it would be OK if you removed yesterdays paper when the new one arrives. One you establish the fact that the papers have only been stacked up out of laziness the next lesson might be to try to coerce your partner into becoming responsible for decluttering it themselves each day. This may seem a little pathetic but one step at a time is often a more successful approach.
• Your partner has a basement full of “I might need it someday” items and you know that someday is unlikely if ever going to arrive. Instead of insisting that they get of their backside and deal with the “mess in the basement” try bringing one item up out of there each week and gently persuading them to let it go. Start with the item least likely to be of any use and work your way up until the basement is beginning to look more acceptable. Once they see the difference you have made perhaps they will join in the effort and begin decluttering independently.
• You have a living room cluttered with pictures on the wall, “collectibles” on shelves, and various other “nic nacs” scattered around.  Rather than talking about decluttering the room, talk about taking everything out of the room so it can be rearranged.  Suggest that it doesn’t seem to be as conducive to the end result you are aiming for.  Then remove all the clutter, put back what you think “brings together” the result you want, and go through the decluttered items with your partner talking about why you don’t think it works and whether it should go elsewhere or should be sold/thrifted/discarded.

Today’s Mini Mission

Declutter something that you are keeping “just in case” you have grandchildren some day.

Today’s Declutter Item

Here is an example of clutter that I had no control over. As you may well have notice there have been baseball souvenirs and collectables vacating our home on a regular basis since my mission began. It was up to my husband to make the decisions on these and I have been happy to sit back and allow him the space and time to do this at his own pace.  With a little nudging here and there of course.

Albums of Baseball Cards

Something I Am Grateful For Today

Deb J who helped me put this post together. As I consider her the guru on this subject. She has gently guided her mother through the declutter process at least as long as I have been blogging and the change has been nothing short of miraculous.

“In daily life we must see that it is not happiness that makes us grateful, but gratefulness that makes us happy.” Brother David Steindl-Rast

It matters not how fast I go, I hurry faster when I’m slow

Mini Mission Monday is about finding ten minutes a day to declutter. To make it easy for you, each Monday I set seven declutter missions, one for each day of the week for you to follow. It takes the guess work out of decluttering and makes it easy and “fun” for you to achieve some quick decluttering.

This week for our mini missions lets concentrate on “Just in case” clutter. There are several different clutter scenarios where “Just in case” comes in to play. I have come up with seven for this weeks missions. Let’s see if you can come up with seven matching items to declutter.

Monday – Declutter something that your are keeping “just in case” it becomes valuable some day.

Tuesday - Declutter something that you are keeping “just in case” you have grandchildren some day.

Wednesday - Declutter something that you are keeping “just in case” you eventually find a use for it.

Thursday - Declutter something that you are keeping “just in case” it fits you again some day.

Friday - Declutter something that you are keeping “just in case” the person who gave it to you notices it missing.

Saturday - Declutter something that you are keeping “just in case” you finally might get around to reading it.

Sunday - Declutter something that you are keeping “just in case” you fall on hard times and can’t afford to replace it. There is no end of items that you really won’t actually ever NEED ~ find a use for yes, but need NO!

Good luck and happy decluttering

Today’s Declutter Item

Yet another craft item that I bought at a very low clearance price that I thought would be good to have “just in case” I might find a use for it one day. Ahhh, one day can be a very elusive thing.

Another Scrapbook Album

Something I Am Grateful For Today

Having my little girl home for a visit and the opportunity to meet her boyfriend.

It matters not how fast I go, I hurry faster when I’m slow