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.

There are always those declutter items that are a little trickier to move along than others. Sometimes we might need someone else’s cooperation for this, sometimes we aren’t sure how to declutter items responsibly, while other times we are just avoiding the selling process, and the reasons go on. This week we will work on dealing with some of these avoided tasks. Perhaps there will be a task or two that won’t be so mini but just appreciate the nudge to do something about them. I am sure you will feel better for finally acting upon your desire to rid yourself of these items.

Monday – Put something into use this week that you don’t utilise much. If you don’t find the item all that appealing maybe it’s time to declutter it. This could be anything from an item of clothing to a kitchen item.

Tuesday - Declutter something you have been considering for removal for some time.

Wednesday – Take action on something that you want to declutter but aren’t sure how best to rehouse it. Maybe it’s time you investigated this situation.

Thursday – Gather up a group of similar items, decide which ones you really do need and declutter the excess. Kitchen items are usually a good target for this type of decluttering.

Friday – Do a small section of a larger decluttering task that you’d rather avoid~ like my photo decluttering task. If you attack this task in small doses it will be eventually be completed without being such a drag.

Saturday – If you have offered something to a friend but they haven’t dropped by to pick it up, take it to them yourself. Better to just have it out of there.

Sunday - Ask another household member if you can declutter something that belongs to them. You may have no luck but I guarantee you won’t know the answer if you don’t ask the question.

Good luck and happy decluttering

Today’s Declutter Item

One way to cut back on spending so much time watching television is to limit the possibilities of where and when you can watch it. This was one step towards that goal in our home.

TV Connection for PC

Eco Tip for the Day

Carpool with friends when attending social events. Consider the possibility that you could compromise on when you need to arrive and/or depart. Sometimes we are a little too spoiled when it come to having things completely our way.

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

Who would like to get together in  for a chat and a cuppa with me

I have chosen a tentative date for our Newcastle get together of

Wednesday 17th October 2012

 From 10am to whenever

As yet I have not chosen the venue but I will be sure to make it within easy reach of public transport in case that is the option for some people.

Sydney readers are also welcome. The train to Newcastle from most Sydney suburbs only costs about $11.40 return off peak (after 9am) return or $16.40 return, peak times.

Anyone wishing to attend please leave a comment below. 

I have been on a mission to declutter a bookcase filled with books, CDs, photos and anything else that could be stuffed in there plus a Balinese dresser full of DVD’s

Early September things took an unexpected turn, as a new tv entered the house. It wasn’t planned but not entirely unexpected either. Our small lounge housed an older type tv that has been with us for years and was a favorite perching spot for our cat. Unfortunately the countdown to the final digital changeover meant that we either needed to invest in a digital box and a different aerial because of our area, or consider an upgrade. My husband and I wandered into the department store to look at a smallish flat screen and left with a rather large flatscreen for more or less the same price of the small one. Go figure.

So what did a new tv mean for my mission? Well, my husband decided that he wanted the new tv in the formal lounge and the Balinese dresser out straight away, so the tv could be centred along the wall and the speakers set up properly which meant he also wanted lamp table in the corner out that night too. The original flat screen moved into our small lounge off the kitchen (known as the kid’s lounge) and the bookcase needed to be relocated, turning my mission topsy turvey.

The Balinese dresser has temporarily shifted into our dinning area and after a delay of two weeks we listed it on Trademe, by time this is read, the auction will be over.

The bookcase was relocated to the garage to a spot where a kid size bookcase sat with a small stereo on top of it and a pin board on the wall above it.

Dumped onto the middle of the garage floor are boxes of dvd’s, the displaced kid size bookcase, the lamp table, a box of ornaments which sat on the Balinese dresser and lamp table and our old tv and cabinet. And for some reason chaos attracts chaos and one of my daughters decided to deliver a box of stuff she wants to get rid of.

Straight away I felt like my garage had been invaded by an army of clutter and I felt strangely emotional about this. My garage used to be chock full of stuff with no possibility of the car ever seeing the inside. It took months and months to clear as I worked on the ceiling storage space above at the same time and I have been quite defensive of this hard-won territory.

By the next morning I realised something about myself. I had been so determined to keep the garage floor clear, it had actually been holding up my decluttering in general and indirectly this mammoth mission as well. While the garage was work-in-progress from January to June, I’d used the garage as my declutter-depot but since it had been cleared I didn’t want anything even temporarily located on my beautiful clear space but hadn’t come up with a replacement system for outgoing stuff. So I have told myself that sometimes you have to lose the battle to win the war and have set up four boxes for my favourite charities such as Goodwill and the local Lionesses Club and as I fill the box I can drop it off.

If I’m going to have a clutter free clear zone, doesn’t it make more sense that it should be in our living areas rather than our garage? And since it continues to irritate me to see my garage with boxes of stuff in it again, shouldn’t I use that irritation to fuel action?

So the mammoth mission is still very much on, its just got a little out of order. The furniture items were to be the last things to leave in an orderly manner at the completion of controlled decluttering of items one at a time. The lamp table, kid size bookcase and the pinboard quickly left on freecycle. The TV and cabinet also went on freecycle to a guy who wanted a PS3/Xbox station for his kids in their rumpus room. I still have yet to re-house the ornaments but will address that next week.

Moni didn’t take a before shot but got one of her family to drawer this mock up for you all. Even though it isn’t a photo I think you will be able to appreciate the difference in the after photo below.

So 365’ers – has anyone else found themselves in a similar situation, where they suddenly found themselves with excess furniture or had a time limit to clear stuff out cut short?

Has anyone else found themselves defensive of space they have re-claimed from clutter?

I have talked about my declutter-depot where stuff goes to wait its transport from the house, does anyone else have a similar system? And if not, how do you run your outgoing goods?

The Weekend’s Mini Missions

Saturday – Declutter something used for nourishing.

Sunday – Declutter something used as a covering.

“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

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.

Favourite Comments. Enjoy!

Grace from Brazil tells us about some of her unusual and sometimes unplanned ways to declutter her stuff in this comment.

Deb J has made an impression on more that just her mother if this comment is anything to go by.

I also wanted to share with you two more success stories on readers influencing others around them. They were both in response to Deb Js post about her mom. Lynn’s comment & Juhli’s comment.

I loved this comment from Anita. It is nice to know my eco tips are having an influence. Here’s hoping Anita has her way with getting rid of that second fridge.

Favourite Web Finds. Happy reading!

The latest Ted Talk featuring Rachel Botsman on Collaborative Consumption.

It’s that time again Buy Nothing New Month this coming November. Consider a pledge to buy nothing new or better still nothing unnecessary at all.

If you live with a minimalist wardrobe shrinking things in the dryer would be a bit of a tragedy right. Well here is a link that can undo those dryer booboo.

Here is a reminder for my NSW Australia environmentally friendly readers who wardrobes either need decluttering or revising the no guilt way. Raid My Wardrobe is on again soon in Newcastle with dates to be announced for Sydney and the Hunter Valley.

For those of you who think they still have way too much stuff check out this post on how the other half live. Mind you even these folks may have too much for the limited space they live in.

Today’s Mini Mission

Declutter something used for cleaning.

Today’s Declutter Item

With every computer related gadget you buy comes another set of cables that you already have an abundant supply of. These two found their way out of hiding somehow and were immediately decluttered. Who knows how long that phone cable has been hanging around clearly unused because it is still in its packaging.

Cables

Eco Tip for the Day

Any plastic bag that you do acquire can be reused. I use food packaging, such as bread bags, cereal box liners etc, to bag up meat scraps which I then keep in the freezer until bin day so I only have to empty my kitchen bin once a week.

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

My mother, Leona, is the oldest of three girls. She was 84 her last birthday. Growing up, I thought nothing of all the stuff we had because it was put away neatly, displayed neatly and everyone seemed to have all that kind of stuff. My parents were neat freaks so it wasn’t surprising I grew up to be one too. It wasn’t until I moved out on my own that I learned that we didn’t need to have all of that stuff. As I grew older I became even more aware of what we didn’t NEED. I had the 12 place setting of china, numerous pots & pans, and plenty more kitchen gadgets as well as nic nacs for the walls and shelves throughout the house. It was in my late 30’s that I realized that I had all of this stuff that I never used. I think my china had been used 2-3 times, my expensive knife set had a couple of the knives used a couple of times, I had serving pieces and decorations that I never used. Ack! What was I doing with all of this? In the meantime, Mom was accumulating more and more. She now had 2-12 place settings of china plus her everyday dishes. She had a serving platter or bowl or dish for everything you could imagine, a 30 cup coffee maker, a 12 cup coffee maker, and a 4 cup coffee maker. You name it and she seemed to have it.

In 1993 my father died and suddenly she not only didn’t have the income to continue to live in their 3600 square feet of house but she didn’t want to stay in that town. She wanted to move around with me. That was fine but what to do with all of that stuff. We sure couldn’t afford a place big enough for all of it and didn’t need it if we could. So before she followed me to Colorado Springs we had a huge sale. We sold over $3000 worth of furniture, tools (my father had every tool there was and sometimes 2-3 of them), china, and gadgets galore. I also made trip after trip to the dump with things my father had help onto. Things like 2-3 maps of every state in the US because he was always doing trip routing for friends going on vacation. Every brochure for every vehicle made by Ford, Mercury or Lincoln since 1950. The paperwork for every tax return since 1950. And on and on. I shredded what needed it and then took it all to the dump. We sold 3 cars and bought one new one. I thought we had done pretty good until the movers came to move us. Ugh. Box after box after box. The pile was over my head and took up over half of the 26 foot long living room.

Since Dad’s death we have moved to Colorado Springs, Nampa Idaho, Indianapolis Indiana and finally here to the Phoenix area. In every move we sold or gave away more things. My mother was a crafter and had a room full of craft supplies. We keep getting rid of furniture and craft supplies and kitchen items and anything else I could talk her into getting rid of. But we still have plenty we could dispense with. Over most of this time anything that was decluttered went after much discussion and lots of heel dragging at first. Mom has this belief that if you spend money for it you should keep it until it wears out. If you do get rid of it then you should sell it for close to what you bought it for. It’s not realistic but that’s the way she is. I don’t think it helped that my father was just as bad.

When I started following Colleen’s blog I began a campaign to declutter even more. I didn’t know how I was going to get Mom to go along with me but I knew we needed to do something. I decided to be more talkative about why I was getting rid of things that were mine. Now mind you, my mother has a hard time with me getting rid of things even if I paid for them or someone gave them to me. I’ve known her to dig things out of the trash because she might be able to use them. But I decided that maybe if I talked about why I was getting rid of something and why I was or was not selling it she would begin to start thinking the same way. Well, it worked. She has gone from “I’m not getting rid of anything more” to “Deb, what do you think about getting rid of this?” She still has a ways to go but it’s been amazing to see the difference. One other thing that I think has helped is that she has really learned how much energy it takes to have all this stuff. Even if it is shut away in a box somewhere, it is there and you know it. The other day she made the comment, “You know, I’m glad that when I die you won’t have so much to get rid of as before. Can you imagine having to make all those decisions when you are already dealing with my death?” Yippee!! She’s finally getting it. What really blew me away was the other day when she was talking to my aunt. This aunt has barrels of stuff in her garage attic that she has not opened since they moved to their present house 35 years ago. She’s sentimental and hangs onto EVERYTHING. They have 2 of their 3 sons still living. They are in their 50’s. Do you think their sons want to go through all that stuff when their parents die? Well, Mom was talking to my aunt and all their stuff came up in the conversation. Mom says to her, “Well, if you could afford to fly us there, Deb & I would be glad to help you get rid of all of that now before you have to do it in a hurry.” I was so proud of her. More and more she is beginning to get tired of things or finds them to feel like clutter. She’s slowly working on areas like her closet, her bathroom, and her dresser. When the weather gets cooler she says she wants to, “Get in that shed and get rid of most of that junk.” So now you know that people really can change. No person is a hopeless cause. You may have that decluttered house yet.

Today’s Mini Mission

Declutter something intended for pampering.

Today’s Declutter Item

These don’t fit with the mini mission for the day but they sure are things that have a use that has never been utilised. Hopefully someone will buy them at the thrift shop.

Eco Tip of the Day

 Save a tree ~Stop junk mail. It mostly contains advertisements for stuff you don’t need anyway. In Australia this is as easy as putting a No Junk Mail sticker on your mailbox.

“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

Don’t worry everyone, Cindy is fine she was just insanely busy this week. Instead our good friend Moni has stepped in with a guest post. 

I was recently asked what my Bus Factor was. If you are like me and not up to speed with the business world’s buzz words, you would have needed to be told that Bus Factor is a measure for just how indispencible you are to your organisation/business/family and just how much disruption and disarray it would cause if you were to be hit by a bus.

So what is my Bus Factor rating? Married with three teenagers, there are four other people capable of cooking a meal even if it was basic, two other people with full drivers licenses and my older daughter is a naturally organised person. Sounds good on the surface.

But add into the equation that I work for my husband’s small business and that he is out of his depth with internet banking, he doesn’t know any of our passwords and has actively avoided going to the bank to get a PIN number on his debit card for four years now. He a vague knowledge of the office work end of our business and he wouldn’t begin to know where our insurance policies are kept or or how to contact our broker. He wouldn’t know who our Wills and Power of Attorney’s are filed with, quite possibly he doesn’t even remember we have a Power of Attorney filed. Don’t get me wrong, he is an intelligent guy but he has been very happy to leave such matters to me. Delighted even.

So it would be safe to say that my Bus Factor to my family would be quite high. Oh I’m sure they’d eventually muddle their way through, no one would starve and with a fair bit of stress and help from the right people they would get on top of matters. But a lot of working knowledge walks around with me in my head and to suddenly not have access to that would certainly send them into a bit of a tailspin and that is the last thing my loved ones would need to deal with in a crisis.

So what does this have to do with 365 Less Things? This post isn’t about having an accummulation of stuff to be sorted and distributed, this is about pre-empting a “hit by a bus” situation and about what I call “loose-end” clutter. All those messy financial, household and personal matters that we keep meaning to do something about and in the event of ending up incapacitated or worse, would be left to our loves ones to unravel.

So today I’m going to start a notebook called my “Bus Book” to hold all the important information, contact details, account numbers, payment arrangements and resources that can be called on in a crisis. I’m going list which bills arrive by e-mail and to what address and I am going note which bank statements I have opted for a ‘no paper statement’ option. Naturally I won’t include passwords to internet banking but I will include our banker’s contact details.

I’m also going to make a list of loose ends that need tying up. I am going to look at how many bank accounts we have as a joint couple, individuals and business. I am going to book my hubby an appointment with our banker to learn internet banking under his own login and I am going to document how I run our paperless office system.

I asked some friends who work in the legal, accounting and medical fields what loose ends they encounter in ‘hit by the bus’ situations:

• Not wearing a medical alert bracelet.
• Not updating organ donor status (either way) and keeping releatives aware.
• Not staying up to date with tax obligations
• Not reviewing insurance policies annually
• Not reviewing credit history.
• Not removing guarantorship from bank/finance once loan completed (some countries it does not happen automatically and takes up to 7 years from the request to do so).
• Not updating wills after major life changes.
• Not updating Power of Attorneys after major life changes.
• Not updating guardianship arrangements for dependants.

Since I started looking for loose-end clutter in my life, I discovered that when my daughter legally changed her middle name earlier this year, we informed everyone except our lawyer (re: wills), her bank account and our medical insurers.

I realised that a finance company we no longer use had not released their interest on the securities register on the item in question.

I realised by doing a free credit report on myself that a person who I have a ‘cross identity’ with (exact same birthdays and the same first, second and last names) has returned to using her maiden name and some of her information has been filed mistakedly against my details.

So what is your bus factor? And what loose end clutter do you need to tie up?

Today’s Mini Mission

Declutter something used as an adornment.

Today’s Declutter Item

Just when you thought you had seen the last of the Snoopy items this one pops out of the woodwork. Well actually it was housing some art equipment which my son decluttered an artist friend last week. He no longer needed not wanted this lunchbox so it is off to the thrift shop today.

Snoopy Lunchbox

Eco Tip for the Day

Avoid using plastic straws. Even tiny little bits of plastic like that add up to lots of waste. The less demand we put on supply the less of these insidious little things add to the pollution of our planet.

“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 have had a couple of conversations lately with people who are struggling to gain momentum with their decluttering. They are making fitful starts here and there but get frustrated. I have discovered through these conversations that the main underlining theme behind their difficulty is that, once chosen, they don’t have a plan in place as to how to get rid of the clutter. As a result all they end up doing is moving it around the house.

Most of my regular readers have this situation well and truly in hand. So much so, that they can also easily investigate and discover an outlet even for those odd items that don’t fit with their usual system. This comes with practice and experience of course. For those starting out though it is better to keep it simple and grow from there.

With a little forethought, a few phone calls and maybe a little leg work anyone can set themselves up to be successful declutterers from the start. The fact is, that knowing how to get rid of the stuff is equally as important as being willing to let it go in the first place.

So here are my suggestions for what to do to get yourself set up for declutter success…

• Keep it simple. Choose a few methods for getting rid of your stuff that will make it easy to achieve success. You can always get more imaginative with your disposal methods later when you have worked out how to really flex your decluttering muscle.
• Let your fingers do the walking. Use google or your local phone directory (online or off) to find where the thrift stores are in your area. Phone them and enquire what items they are willing to receive. Many such organisations have web sites these days that give all the information you will need. Choose the one that receives the widest range of items because that will make it easier for you to get rid of lots of things at once and will save you a lot of running around. Better still, choose one that will come to you if that is an option.
• Make freecycle.org your new best friend. Listing stuff to give away on freecycle is a great way to offload things that are still good but not accepted by your local thrift stores.
• See if curb-side decluttering will work for you. Just put something out with a FREE sign on it and see if it is taken. Please don’t leave things out overnight though.
• If you are feeling adventurous and think you may want to sell some things through online selling sites like ebay, Trademe or Craigslist etc, investigate how that works and do a trial run with an item you have chosen to send on its way. Talk to a friend or family member who has used these sites for advice on how to go about selling and what strategies have worked best for them. My suggestion is to keep it simple to begin with; don’t worry what day or time your auctions begin, just get them up there. Limiting yourself with best times can have the effect of slowing you down. I find it makes no difference as to how my auctions perform so long as the auction ends at a reasonable hour of the day.
• Consider having a garage/yard sale. This way you can put the stuff aside for a while until you have enough items for the sale. What isn’t sold at the sale can then be donated.

Once you have yourself set for success that is exactly what will ensue.

Today’s Mini Mission

Declutter something used for food preparation.

Today’s Declutter Item

I have a timer on my oven, a timer on my microwave and a stopwatch on my cell phone so why do I need this old fashioned egg timer. I don’t! So out it goes. I can’t imagine how I have missed decluttering this for so long.

Old Fashioned Egg Timer

Eco  Tip for the Day

 Avoid using throw-away items where possible. Eg. paper napkins, batteries, paper cups etc. Instead, replace these with reusable items to reduce on waste.

“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.

Every piece of clutter we own has a function or at least used to before we stopped using them. This week’s mini missions are centred around the intended use of an object. I’ll name the function and you can use your imagination to choose something to declutter that suits that category. Have fun and happy decluttering.

Monday – Declutter something intended for entertainment.

Tuesday - Declutter something used for food preparation.

Wednesday - Declutter something used as an adornment.

Thursday - Declutter something intended for pampering.

Friday - Declutter something used for cleaning.

Saturday - Declutter something used for nourishing.

Sunday - Declutter something used as a covering.

Today’s Declutter Item

I had kept these trains in the top of my son’s closet because they were one of his favourite toys when he was little. He asked me a little while back, “Why haven’t you gotten rid of those Thomas toys yet? I don’t want them.” That was all it took to convince me to let them go. He was glad to have the money from their sale.

Thomas the Tank Engine Train Set

Eco Tip for the Day

Eliminate the need for your second fridge. Often used only to keep beer and fizzy drinks cold, second fridges are such a waste of energy.

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