On Fridays at 365 Less Things I share with you my five favourite comments from my wonderful readers and my five favourite web finds of the week. I hope you will enjoy them as much as I did.
Fave Five Comments.
Enjoy Amy in NY did a great tips round up in this comment of all the points from many of the comments on my post What are you leaving to your family. It is never too soon to get all your ducks in a row and be ready for the inevitable.
This comment from Becky @ Decluttering Diva says it all about how much better a decluttered, simpler Christmas can be. It may not be for everyone, some people don’t find Christmas stressful but for it it sounded perfect.
Here is a comment/request from Raesha regarding keepsakes clutter and family history. Perhaps more readers could give her their opinions, that way she will have a balanced view.
Annabelle came to her own correct conclusion at the end of this comment. Please anyone who is willing back her up on her decision. Cheap clutter is still clutter.
I loved Ideealistin’s way to get rid of awkward stuff in this comment and make sure you read on to her followup on what she managed to get rid of on Freecycle.
Fave Five Web Finds. Happy reading!
This website has some good little articles on going green ~ secondact.com including ~ Five ways to eliminate plastic from your life  How many other ways can you think of and instigate in your home.
This one can be a little confronting but then it is designed to get you thinking about doing the right thing ~ The Story of Stuff
Here is a little more advice on decluttering and organizing your keepsakes from Organize Me ~ Just clutter or a keepsake collection?
WARNING WARNING:  “This is what you should not do so let that be a lesson to you!” ~ Dr Suess. While googling clutter to find some good items to share with you today I found this absurdity. Please read and absorb until you get to the part where it says ~  The most obvious solution to this problem is finding more space to put stuff – purchasing a cheap self storage at Merthyr selfstorage.co.uk ~ Solve your clutter problem the benefits of cheap self storage.
Unitasker Wednesday over at unclutterer.com is always good for a laugh. The thing is, it is only funny until you start thinking about all the resources that go into making these next to useless objects.
Today’s Declutter Item
Here is some more greeting cards declutterd, this time from my 21st birthday. Oh the freedom I am feeling as the keepsake clutter disappears. 20+ years those things have been taking up space in my home waiting for the day I die so someone else has to sort through them and possibly feel guilty about throwing them away. Well I have solved that problem.
More Keepsake Clutter Eliminated
Something I Am Grateful For Today
My mother-in-law came through her operation this week and was feeling good yesterday. It has been quite a difficult twelve months for her. Hopefully the next twelve months will be good to her and she can take it easy for a while.
I keep forgetting to tell you how much I enjoy your Friday’s Favorite Five posts! There are always great “tidbits” in there as well as a reminder to go back and read some of the great comments on the week’s postings that we may have missed!
That’s why I started the Five in the first place Amy. I am glad you are enjoying it.
The third unitasker down, the iPhone attachment, made a laugh out loud – long and hard. In fact, I’m laughing again just thinking about it.
In fact, it made me laugh so much I put it on my Facebook page.
Hi Cindy, I am glad to be of service to give you a good laugh today. i love a good laugh. That rice ball maker or whatever it was looked like something designed to house a sample of plutonium, what a lot of fuss for nothing.
Hi Colleen,
as you apparently enjoyed my plunge into freecycle … (only that I used a local section of ebay that is not auctions that is free of charge and you can decide if you want to sell, trade or give away. It’s like a bulletin board and pretty frequented round here. freecycle is kind of smallish here) I may as well share the rest of the story and my conclusions.
-Yes, some people are weird and stole my time. Next time I’ll ask for the people to either phone me (the e-mail adress stays anonymous over the system I used but I gave my mobile number for contact) or send me a landline number so I can call them. I assume that would keep the people who don’t even want to spent a couple of cents for calling away. And also: I have to trust them so much that they get my adress and my name (though I don’t let them in but give them the stuff in front of my door) so if they are so unwilling to give me their number I might as well chose that I find that fishy and not give them my information.
– next time I won’t give it to the first one but wait a little and give it to the one who sounds trusty in the mail (or who sounds nice on the phone) as both the first ones gave me troubles (one needed about 5 mails to sort things out, the other one who “100% wanted it” needed 5 mails and “more details” to then not react anymore). After all it is up to me – and they will never know anyway.
– I was succesful with kind of seasonal stuff (doll dresses, bear making material) and unsuccessful with out of season stuff (parasol). (Note to myself: Get rid of wintery and indoor stuff now!)
– I had a little success with attaching a paragraph to the description that the item was free but if someone had the following at home and did not need it any more I’d be glad to receive it (I listed some crafting items and one inexpensive household item that broke last week). One didn’t bring me anything (no anger here – though the slightest sign of a smile on her face for receiving something she wanted for free would have been appreciated) the other one packed a little surprise bag with some of her surplus knitting and crocheting needles, a skein of white fuzzy yarn that looks like a rabbit – I like – and (drumroll!) a vintage craft book that explains all kinds of techniques. I happen to collect those! (sorry for making you gasp again after my confession of being a shoe addict, I know it is a little too much for one week 😉 She also printed out half a page of information about naalbinding (“one needle knitting” though it is more weaving than knitting) as she is really into that at the moment and thought I might enjoy it. I had never heard of it and might check it out in the future. It looks stunning. We chatted a few minutes about my old hobby (teddy bear making) and her new one, I could pass on some information as she had messed up her first try and off she went, very happy, and I was about 10 kg of aspiration clutter lighter. (okay, you may add 500 g back for what she brought me but that actually felt like a present. I can absolutely recommend asking for something in return IF the taker happens to have it. She was probably even happy to give away the book and needles she did not need anymore. Win-win ;-))
Hi Ideealistin,
we have a similar thing to your ebay offshoot called Gumtree.com which I have looked at but didn’t like the way the sign up was configured. They asked for details I wasn’t prepared to give if I remember correctly. Now that ebay have 30 free listings per month I am happy to try to sell the stuff and if I am unsuccessful I then list it on Freecycle. Our Freecycle is really quite active here and yet out Craigslist is a bust.
Hi Colleen! It is a appalling link! “Let’s not declutter, let’s find more and more space for stuff!”. Really bad. Still it is good to see it so we can be more conscious. As usual great favourite five!
Hi Andréia,
I assume you mean the link to the storage unit place. If so I was appalled myself but I found something even more bazaar today. A place where you can get your memorabilia items bronzed. Their examples were a hard hat and a gumboot. Keeping them would be bad enough, paying to have them bronzed would be over the top. How much harder would that be to declutter when you finally came to your senses. 😆
It used to be fairly common here to bronze your baby’s first shoes.
So here’s a funny story. When I was a girl, we lived next to the Grants and the Williams, and the missus were best friends. Mr. Williams had this awful pair of cut offs that embarassed Mrs. Williams to no end. As a “gift” the two women stole Mr. Williams’ shorts, and Mrs. Grant dipped them in plaster – preserving them with their ratty holes and dangling strings – then she spray painted them to look like they’d been bronzed. I have no idea what words were said in the Williams’ household (I was in junior high), but the image of those “bronzed” shorts has stuck with me all these years.
Hi Cindy,
I also have heard of people bronzing baby shoes but full sized gumboots and hard hats that was new to me and not something I would want in display in my home.
Funny story about the bronze shorts I bet they ended up hidden in a basement or in the trash eventually.
It was even more than I described. They actually mounted the bronzed shorts on a broom handle and sunk the handle in the bucket of plaster. The whole thing was spray painted bronze. It was bronzed shorts statue. I’d guess it lived in the house for a week or two, then the garage for a while, and lastly the trash.
Oh well Cindy, at least it was amusing for a while but they saw sense in the end.
We have those here too! And I am ashamed to say that I considered doing this to one of my boys shoes. Fortunately it is kind of expensive so I decided to let the idea (and the shoes) go. :-D. Imagine my face had I done it…
Gosh, bronzing baby shoes made it to Germany, too. The globalization of clutter has reached pretty far, I’m afraid. Would be fun to see which clutter has not made it round the world, wouldn’t it?Has the barbie doll with a crotcheted dress that hides a roll of toilet paper made it round the world? I hope not! Fortunately they are a species soon to be extinct here but people sometimes even used to have them in their car. Isn’t that embarassing?
Yeah, we had those here in the US, hard to believe people actually liked those things. Never did understand why you had to hide toilet paper. Those crocheted gizmos never fooled anyone anyway!
Perhaps I should have a tacky clutter mini mission monday.
Oh Goodness yes the Barbie toilet roll cover certainly made it to Australia. Actually I think there were a couple at the thrift store the week before last. I didn’t see them last week, I wonder if some crazy loon bought them.
I stopped by the office of the insurance agent down the hall last week before Halloween. On the receptionist’s desk was clearly a roll of toilet paper covered in orange tissue paper with a brown cardboard stem coming out the top – a toilet paper, pre-school made, pumpkin. I had to laugh. More useful, though, than lots and lots of other pre-school crafts.
Ideealistin, we sure do have those toilet paper hiding Barbies around here–have had for many years now. I never had one, but I know a lot of people who did.