I have spoken about this subject before on 365 Less Things, however, having just moved, I am finding it necessary to do a little more of it. Things have become a little scattered during my move. Mainly due to the fact that rooms have been eliminated from my options of where and how to store things. The office space/craft area/parents retreat has turned into the office space/craft closet/guest bedroom. The laundry/third toilet/storage closet has become the laundry closet. The kitchen/family room/dining/living room/entry with cupboard has become the living room/kitchen/dining room. And needless to say there are a lot less walls to hang our art and photos on.

Call me strange but I am having a fun time bringing like things together and eliminated bits and pieces of stuff that just aren’t fitting well into our new smaller home.

Functionality within a home very much depends on the ease of use. Eliminating things that just get in the way and the bringing together of similar items makes it simpler to find what you need and to get your hands on them quickly. How often have you given up on the idea of an activity because it is all to hard to find what you need and/or to dig it out from among all the other stuff.

Today I was reshuffling my craft supplies in the guest room cupboard. My objective was to make them easier to access when my creative juices were flowing. I have a number of craft cubes that can be arranged in several ways. I has a plan to insert some of the spare shelves so that containers were separated rather than awkwardly stacked on top of one another. Aside from the physical action of reshuffling the items and inserting the shelves a little decluttering was required. It was only a little but it made a huge difference. I decluttered two bobbins (which didn’t even work in my machine) making it possible to declutter the bobbin holder. This small effort made it possible to minimise the space required for my sewing kit which in turn made it possible to reshuffle everything.

The lesson is that even a small declutter, in the way of consolidating and refining, can make a big difference to the functionality in your home. So never underestimate the effect of a small amount of effort or change.

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

I mostly talk about clutter in the form of items that are unused and unloved that could be permanently removed from our homes.  However the detritus of unfinished tasks also mounds up over a very short period of time when a short attention span, lack of planning or sheer laziness has us making a half hearted effort.

Below are some reasons why this sort of clutter accumulates and the possible consequences…

• Mail is opened but not attended too. ~ At the very least there should be a designated place for mail to be filed when needing later attention. Not doing this can end up in late fees for unpaid bills. Any mail that is just plain junk deposit it straight in the recycling bin. Do what you can to digitise bills and cease junk mail to make this task easier in the future.
• Dishes unwashed or washed but not put away. ~ This makes a kitchen look dirty, untidy and ,in the case of small kitchens, far less functional. Then there is the time wasted looking for, and possibly having to clean on the run, items you need for the task at hand. And also there is the possibility of attracting germ carrying bugs.
• Getting dressed but leaving discarded clothes left lying on the floor. ~ This is bad enough when the clothes are dirty and simply need the little effort it takes to put them in the dirty clothes basket. But should they be clean, nicely ironed clothes that have been tossed aside in an attempt to find just the right outfit for the occasion then you have not only left a mess but you have wasted all the time and effort that you used to launder these items in the first place. Once they are crinkled in a pile with all the other dirty discarded clothes then they are no longer clean and wearable.
• Performing ablutions and then leaving your toiletries everywhere. ~ Toothpaste and brush left open or not rinsed on the sink,  make-up everywhere on the vanity, shampoo in the floor of the shower with lids off…  What and eyesore and a mess for the next unfortunate bather to have to deal with.
• Mending started but not completed. ~ Now not only the item that requires mending is hanging around out of place but also the equipment needed is out of place with it.
• Random items used and left discarded all over the house. ~ Right now as I look to my right I can see on my living room side table a hair comb, a used and empty coffee cup, a bottle of nasal spray and a used tissue. That last items is particularly gross. Everyone of those items has a place and none of them are in it. The cup belongs in the dishwasher, the comb in the bathroom cabinet drawer, along with the nasal spray and the tissue in the bin. I have been past the kitchen several times since I finished the coffee, the bin also resides in the kitchen and I have also gone upstairs and into my bathroom more than once. I could easily have taken care of all of these items during anyone of those trips without it taking me but a few extra seconds. Ignore enough things during the day and ones house can become an awful mess. Especially if neglected in this way for days on end.

If you are guilty of any of these clutter producing habits why not try to change your ways. With a little extra attention to detail and putting in place new strategies I am sure you can turn things around. Maybe you will save yourself some time, stress or even money in the long run.

Today’s Mini Mission

Décor items can certainly warm up a room and make it feel homely but too many can have a detrimental effect. They can clutter the space, make it appear untidy and harbour dust mite among other things. Declutter one or two dust collecting décor items this week. Scatter cushions, rugs, throw rugs, wall hangings, drapes…

Eco Tip for the Day

Don’t leave tasks linger for so long that you have to redo them such as drying the washing or folding it. This can cause you to have to waste more electricity rewashing and ironing. Need I also mention your wasted time and wear and tear on your appliances.

For a full list of my eco tips so far click here

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

Cindy’s Weekly Wisdom

I love a label. Love. Love. Love.

• My grocery store bags, children’s lunch boxes, our water bottles, coolers, and flashlights are labeled with our last name.
• All of my girls’ uniforms, sweaters and coats have their names in them.
• When they were littler and their feet closer to the same size, all of Audra’s socks were labeled on the bottom with a letter A to distinguish them from Clara’s socks.
• My canisters of food staples are labeled with their contents, even though you can easily see into the canisters.
• The girls and Dan and I have matching hairbrushes and matching nail clippers; matching, that is, except for the big “Mom and Dad” on the items that belong in my bathroom.
• All the leftovers in the refrigerator or freezer are labeled with the name and date.
• I label packages of food with the carbohydrate counts in large letters so they’re easier to find and read.
• My ipod, laptop, cell phone, and Clara’s insulin pump and supply bag are all clearly labeled with contact information on the outside.
• When I loan out a book, I slap a return address label on the inside cover.
• One lip balm is labeled “desk.” Another is labeled “bed.” Scissors are labeled “Mom,” “Dad,” and “Kitchen.”
• All of my garden tools are labeled on the handles – some so long ago that they bare my maiden name.
• All of my animals have name tags on their collars, the cats as well as the dogs.

These labels help keep me and the family organized, help items to come back to us if they’re lost or misplaced, cut down on waste, and prevent clutter.

Obviously, when many things are labeled, it makes it easier for everyone to find what they’re looking for and to put things back where they belong. Labels help to keep like with like. They help you to find what you want and prevent duplicate purchasing due to “I know it’s here…somewhere.”

Labels also help your lost or misplaced items to be returned to you. Recently Clara and I left her diabetes kit on the floor of a shoe store. (Dummy us!) Fortunately, Clara realized within a few minutes. We hurried back to the store, and the sales clerk was literally calling me as we arrived because the bag is plainly labeled “Diabetic Supplies” with my name and phone numbers.

Several times a year, we take many of our gardening tools to the girls’ school for big grounds clean up, and it is used by many different folks. Having everything labeled allows it all to get back to us, eliminating the need for replacement purchasing.

All these things are true, but I have to tell you what motivated this post. First a quote from Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s (or Philosopher’s) Stone by J.K. Rowling. Harry is looking over his school supplies list. First up are the required uniforms:

1. Three sets of plain work robes (black)
2. One plain pointed hat (black) for day wear
3. One pair of protective gloves (dragon hide or similar)
4. One winter cloak (black, silver fastenings)

Please note that all pupils’ clothes should carry name labels.

“Please note that all pupils’ clothes should carry name labels.” Oh if reality only mimicked fiction.

I volunteered to take home all the lost and found from my daughters’ school. Not the uniforms that had made their way into the Lost and Found but everything else. I was flabbergasted by what awaited me. First off, let me add that the girls had sorted everything as an end-of-school clean-up chore and had already returned everything that was labeled with a name. I brought home more than 100 items that I had to check over, sort, clean, and donate. 100 items for a school of 120 girls and about a dozen teachers and staff. Currently in my house are a couple of seemingly brand-new swimsuits, a couple of beach towels, a dozen tote bags, at least fifteen refillable water bottles, a dozen books, five or six lunchboxes (one still complete with lunch and full water bottle), a whole host of non-uniform jackets and sweaters, and someone’s special stuffed dog along with her nice hairbrush.

All these items have to be looked for and replaced by their owners (owners’ parents). How much simpler would everyone’s day have been if the items had been labeled to begin with and could have been returned before it was too late?

Is there anything you could label at your house that would make your life easier, more organized, and less likely to create clutter?

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Today’s Declutter Item

This camera case is no longer useful to us because we sold the damaged camera for parts on ebay.

Camera Case

Something I Am Grateful For Today

My son Liam handed in his last uni assignment in for the semester and all of last semesters unfinished work is also complete and handed in.. Now he can have a nice break for four weeks and return with a normal work load next semester. At last life post accident can return to normal. It is amazing how that time (9 months)has flown and how well he has recovered. Thanks again everyone for your well wishes during that frightening period in our lives, your support was a Godsend.

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

I don’t usually write about computer clutter in my blog as it is not really an area of expertise for me. However I am going to mention it today because it can be a problem for some. I would like to concentrate on email clutter.

I am not actually talking from a personal level here more from a professional point of view. It can be very annoying when you share a computer, specifically email, in he work place with  people who are not very computer savvy. The idea of using folders to sort emails is alien to some and even deleting unnecessary emails does not seem to be a priority. Therefore the inbox is forever full.

While I was at work today I made it my mission to delete and file all the emails that arrived in the inbox today and yesterday. Late in the afternoon one of the ladies asked me why it was that when she looked at the inbox there was no mail except what had arrived last week. She was surprised to find out that I had filed and deleted to the point where there was nothing left  in there. If you are wondering why I don’t do this all the time it is because I only work 17 hours of a roster of about 210 hours  so most of the cluttering goes on in my absence

As for my own personal email I  probably receive too many decluttering and lifestyle blog updates  but they often inspire my posts so even though they use up time they also save time otherwise wasted pondering over what I am going to write about. I try to make sure I empty my inbox everyday which mostly involves reading and deleting but sometimes I move emails to folders for future reference. I clean these folders out on a regular basis too.

Most of the time I spend on my computer is used writing my blog and responding to the comments and emails that it generates but I consider this my volunteer time. What I do is helping others so I feel justified in that.

As for desktop, my document and other files, I am a lover of  folders there also. I can usually find exactly what I am looking for because I create folders with major categories, and inside them I create subfolders to break down those categories. That keeps thing neat, tidy and findable.

It really is that easy!

ITEM 195 OF 365 LESS THINGS

These microwave bowls are now in the donation pile which I think will be heading to the thrift shop this week sometime.