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!
June  is new to 365 Less Things. Make her welcome.
Deb J‘s mom is thinking about doing some more decluttering. Yay!
Michelle has been decluttering and donating to her favourite charity.
Dymphy has found opportunity in the face of renovations. She also tells us, in this comment, about the progress she is making with her decluttering, how she can identify that and how she has used the mini missions and eco tips to same a pair of shoes from landfill for now. Good on you Dymphy. I also love that your name has no vowels, which proves that we don’t have to have things just because most people do.
Favourite Web Finds. Happy reading!
lifehacker.com ~ How-clutter-affects-your-brain-and-what-you-can-do-about-it
Don’t be deterred that this post from Open Shed is based on happenings in and around Sydney. Among the information there are some great eco ideas. Take a look.
Sanna suggested I include this Post from Gillie a fellow blogger and reader here at 365 Less things. onepairofshoesatatime.wordpress ~ read-or-dust
I am including this post (story) because I though it was both beautiful and inspiring. www.thechangeblog.com/personal-choice/
And here is a post suggested by Moni. ~ www.moneytalksnews.com ~what-happens-to-your-data-when-you-die/
Today’s Mini Mission
Deliver a load of decluttered but still useful items to a charity of your choice. Or if you have the option phone the charity to come and collect if from you.
Eco Tip For 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.
It matters not how fast I go, I hurry faster when I’m slow
Ah yes, Colleen, another week of good comments and good links. 1. The Life Hacker article was a good one. One paragraph reminded me of when I worked. My desk and office was always clutter free. Even when I was working on something it was all that was on my desk and it was cleaned up if I went to a meeting or left the area for more than a few minutes. People couldn’t understand how I could keep it clean and how I got so much done. 2. Open Shed–would love to see things like this in my area. What a great rundown of all that’s available in Sydney. 3. One Pair of Shoes At a Time — Gillie has a good article on books. Such a big area of potential clutter. 4. Change Blog–If someone had told me what some of our moves were going to mean we might not have made them yet I don’t regret any of them. It’s been a good run so far. 5. Money Talks News — when I recently redid all of our legal paperwork one of the things I did was create a password list for the executors of my will. A must do in my mind.
Hi Deb J, they were all good links. I especially liked the Open Shed article as it alerted me to some of the wonderful things that are going on in Sydney. I am going to read over it again and see if there are some event or organisations that I would like to go to or learn more about.
Yes, I think you would do well to check them all out. You may find there are similar things in Canberra. Wouldn’t that be nice?!
I think Embracing a Path of Personal Choice is lovely. Thanks for sharing that.
Not only was it a great story but it was so well written.
Thank you for the links, Colleen. I am just about making a major career change, so it was really encouraging to read the article on the path of personal choice.
Hi Sanna, it sure is good to hear encouragement like that when you are facing major change. Huddy and I feel like we have been on the precipice of major change for a long while. In the last six years we have moved countries, downsized, our children have left home, and some might think this is all major change but to us they are natural progression. I suppose change is relative. The big ones for use is whether to buy an apartment and when to semi-retire. The second being the biggest change of direction. As usual we will just make it up as we go along.
Thanks for the warm welcome, Colleen! Loved the “Read or Dust” blog post about books.
Thank you for mentioning my comments, Coleen! My name is actually Irish, and can be spelled as dimphy or dimfie as well. Luckily, I have the more elegant version. 😉 I also loved the links, especially the one about books. I’m thinking about decluttering my book case for a while now but had no idea how to tackle it.
As far as the shoes, I repaired them last Saturday, but unfortunatly, the soles came off last Wednesday. So, yesterday, I went shoe shopping on my running shoes. Now I have a pair of Dr. Martens 1460’s, so these are probably going to last for a while.
Luckily, I have other uses for the glue, so I keep using it. Repairing is addictive 🙂
Oh, and I hope to be done with my fine tooth comb by next Friday so I can deliver my unwanted goods all in one go at goodwill. Unfortunatly, I don’t have time before that, otherwise they would already been long gone…!
Hi Dymphy, well that is something we share in common, my name is Irish too. Colleen Bridget, that’s quite Irish don’t you think.
Too bad about the shoes but at least you tried. And yes the Docs should last a while. I was checking out a pair of those myself the other day because I need some boots for my upcoming trip to Britain. Unfortunately I don’t think my Mary-Jane style Keens are going to cover all weather possibilities for this trip. Too bad, they have travelled Europe three times, New Zealand and America. We racked up some miles together.
Good luck with your book decluttering.
Thank you Colleen. Yes I know that your both names are Irish. I know Bridget because she is a godess which was/is revered in kilkare, and I heard the name Colleen somewhere as well.
Dymphy – good luck with the book decluttering, it took me over a year and was a lot harder than I expected it to be. I look back now and wonder what the problem was. The key isn’t to look at the whole collection but rather individual books one by one. I do have a kobo now and much prefer that option for my “must re-reads” and my library has a small e-book selection but I’m sure it will grow.
Thank you Moni. For this time, my goal is to identify which books I both have digital and on paper form, and which I simply don’t like anymore. Surely, I think that a lot will go.
Thank you for the link. And thank you Sanna for recommending me. I’m so glad you liked it.
I love Embracing a Path of Personal Choice. Really insightful.
Dymphy, I was at school with a girl called Dymphna – are your names related?
Yes Gilie, the names are related. Dymphna was a saint (Dymphna van Feel) and from that, Dymphy is derived.
Oops, it’s supposed to be van Geel. My phone has a few issues with foreign languages.
My pleasure Gillie, and thank you for the advice on book. I don’t need it as I own very few and usually borrow from the library which is only two blocks from my house. But I have many avid readers here at 365 who, I am sure, appreciate any advice on this subject.
Good links – I did read this Friday morning but had a busy day both at work and during the evening that followed so didn’t have time to comment.
I especially enjoyed the lifehacker article, always interesting to hear the scientific explanation.
Today I have to make some headway with my housework as I didn’t stay up with it this week and I have a busy week ahead.
Do you remember the story of the 5kg bag of flour that I found in a box of curtains up in the ceiling storage? Still no idea of how it got there I assume the curtains got dumped on top of it by mistake and whisked away. Anyway, the storage bin was airtight and the bag looked uncompromised, but due to the unknown amount of time it may have been up there, I didn’t feel right about giving it away – I know food shelf lifes and expiry dates are a western luxury but I would hate there to be some problem. I don’t bake a lot and I still have a 1kg bag of flour unopened in my pantry right now bought in April, so what to do with 5kgs? In a moment of inspiration I have a friend who is a chef for a daycare centre and asked her if she’d like it to make playdough for the kids? They were delighted to receive it. Another thing out of my pantry!
Colleen,
More progress on releasing of ancient objects! Today I was finally able to let go of a pile of mixed music cassettes my ex made for me. What a relief! Now that they are gone, I can’t believe I held on to them for so many years. Thank you again for your encouragement. Reading your blog and all the positive comments from your readers have helped me make a breakthrough!
When we moved into our new house recently, my husband, who rarely reads the junk mail, peeled the no junk mail sticker off our box because he wants to be able to read it sometimes. Sigh.
We’d already received two lots of junk mail on the box prior to him removing the sticker. I’d at least been hoping the sticker would at least reduce what junk mail came into the house!
Many years ago, while I was a student, I delivered catalogues for extra cash. I was given a pile of catalogues based on how many houses were in the area. I don’t think it would have made a difference if every second house had put a no junk mail sticker up. I still would have been given my 400 catalogues to deliver.
Stuss, can you find the folders online? I know that it is possible here on the Netherlands.
Hi Stuss, let your husband know that store specials catalogues can often be found on line should he be in need of something. Reading specials flyers just for the fun of it usually leads to buying stuff one doesn’t need.
Your story about when you delivered catalogues is a worry. I sincerely hope that in this day where the issue of climate change is all over the media, that the distributers of these catalogues adjust their quantities to reflect the number of recipients. I would hate to think that my NO JUNK MAIL sign means squat.
I’ve been so busy lately with working I’ve missed tons of posts on 365 🙁 just dropping by today to catch up.
Whilst I’ve not been here reading and commenting I have been thinking about 365-y things, though I have recently switched my interest a little from decluttering to environmental issues (that’s Colleen’s good influence rubbing off on me now haha 🙂 ). I just wanted to share with you all the few changes I’ve decided to try make to my life to help the environment:
– I want to buy cotton handkerchiefs and some napkins to spare using so much tissue all the time, the benefit of these being they are so small they won’t take up much space when they need washing/drying and so it will be a big eco-win when I can get time to go shopping for those items. (Similarly I am trying to use a reusable cloth instead of disposable kitchen towel when cleaning up small messes in the kitchen).
– I’ve also been trying to commit to buying my fruit/vegetables without plastic (where possible) more and more, so this one is already in practise! I found a great website someone about a plastic free year which was a very interesting idea, I will have to find the link again.
– I am planning on taking a refillable bottle/cup to work soon, (not glass) so that I use fewer little plastic cups for water as I realised I can go through maybe 4-5 per shift.
Once I’ve got these few things in action I’ll evaluate some other areas and see what I can improve next 🙂
Looking forward to catching up properly on a day off, but until then have a good weekend everybody 🙂