I wanted to do follow up on yesterday’s post with some practical advice on children’s wardrobes. I would like you to keep in mind that my children are 21 & 19 now and it has been a while since I had control over what they wear.

When my children were small, well actually they are still small but we will come to that soon, I was very lucky that I really didn’t need to buy much for them in the way of clothing. Both my mother and mother-in-law are very good at sewing and made most of the clothes they needed. My MIL would buy good second-hand clothing and shoes for them on occasion as well. I don’t recall them being inundated with more clothes than they needed so there was no out of control spending that’s for sure. Also because they were small the fabric required was minimal and were often off-cuts so no waste there much either.

As I mentioned, both my kids aren’t big. When they were little I could never predict what size clothes they would need for the next season because their growth rate was not the average. So I never took advantage of end of season sales. One of the advantages of having small kids is that they tend to wear their clothing out rather than grow out of them so that was my savings advantage. We also lived in the tropics for four years of their young lives so there was no seasons to buy for really.

When my daughter turned twelve I copped the usual teenage girl desire for name brand clothes and going shopping with her became a nightmare. I did what all smart mothers would do and gave her a clothing allowance. It didn’t take long for her to realize that the money I gave her would not buy much unless she settled for sensible brands with reasonable prices. She soon learned how to find a bargain and that she was cute enough without doing free advertising for companies whose clothes were not that well made anyway.

My son however has always been hard to fit because he has always been a skinny little thing so he tends to find something that he likes that fits and wears it to death. He still wears his little league t-shirts from when he was twelve he is now nineteen. Says a lot for how well they catered for sizes at his little league club but that is another story. He mostly lives in skinny jeans, t-shirts and button up flannel shirts these days because that is the skateboarder fashion. His one weakness is skate shoes but now that he is responsible for paying for them himself I am sure he will be more careful with them. Oh and he will not part with any band t-shirts or hoodies that he has ever owned and they are stored in a box in the garage. I am not happy about that.

Sure there were times where they had more than they needed. Sometime an item was bought that they didn’t like so much and didn’t wear to its full potential. Every now and again there had to be the “only for good” outfit that they grew out of before they wore out but for the most part we didn’t do too badly.

The moral of this story is we all know our kids well enough to know the style of clothing that best suits their everyday needs. We pretty much have a handle on their growth rate and their personalities. We know if they are the rough and tumble type or the gentle variety. We know how often we have time to do the laundry and the type of climate we live in. We know the kind of social lives we lead separately and together as a family.

All our kids need is enough clothing of the variety that best suits the needs of the categories above and no more. If something wears out it is easy enough to replace it so there is no need for multiple back ups. If you are lucky like I was and someone else is catering well to their needs in this area just be grateful of one less financial pressure. If that leaves you with extra funds maybe you could funnel the savings into a college fund or something else that suits their immediate needs. It is best to teach them now that excess is not necessary for a happy life, they will thank you for it in the end.

I am not going to be a hypocrite and pretend that I taught my kids all the right lessons when it comes to being frugal. Hindsight is a great thing but often too late. Suddenly having an independent income can go to their heads when it happens no matter how well you think you taught them. I just hope the fundamentals are locked in their somewhere and they will settle into it.

ITEM 22OF 365 LESS THINGS

This Thomas the Tank Engine train set was a Christmas gift to my son many years ago. He kindly allowed me to give it to his young cousins who are Thomas fans.

For a long time now my husband and I have kept track of our savings and spending using budgeting programs on our computer. We record pretty much every cent we spend so we know where the money is going.

Recently we bought a new Apple Mac Mini so our old software is no longer compatible. We downloaded and tried out a couple of free software programs but have not been to happy with the performance of these. I have been persevering with one anyway just so we can keep track of things as usual but after today we have decided that we really don’t need to do this any more.

There are two reasons for this. One is that we have now paid off our home loan so we don’t need to keep track. Nor do we need to keep track our spending so much either since not having a home loan means we have a lot more disposable income. But the best reason is that today when I was inputting and balancing our spending against the online banking statement I noticed that there was very little to keep track of any more.

The input went a bit like this…

groceries, groceries, groceries, groceries,auto (gas/petrol), groceries, groceries, groceries, groceries,auto (gas/petrol), groceries, groceries, groceries, groceries,auto (gas/petrol).

As you can see, we really don’t do a lot of shopping these days except to buy groceries or fill up the car and motorbike. The bit of cash that goes in my wallet usually goes on having coffee with friends, more groceries and hand outs to our son for school supplies and other incidentals.

Most other things we buy replace an old favourite, so there isn’t any clutter coming into our house to take the place of the stuff heading out the door. This is the key to staying decluttered and it also means we have more savings to spend on the things that are more important to us like:

• A nice meal out together occasionally
• Travel
• Being able to get the car serviced without having to worry where the money is coming from
• If any unexpected medical expenses crop up we have nothing to worry about except our health

I am sure there are many more things but these are the few that jump into my head immediately.

With that accomplished the next target is to get my husband semi-retired by the time he turns fifty.

ITEM 184 OF 365 LESS THINGS

More personal clutter ready for the recycling bin

Today’s Word of the Day is…

SIMPLE

• Do SIMPLE things to improve your way of life.
• Keep your spending SIMPLE buy what you need not things that just clutter up your space.
• Eat a more SIMPLE diet choose fresh ingredients that aren’t enveloped in wasteful packaging. Choose recipes that are SIMPLE to create using ingredients that can be used in subsequent meals so nothing goes to waste.
• Enjoy SIMPLE pleasures like a walk in the park, a coffee with a friend or a wander through a museum instead of spending all your free time shopping.
• Keep your decluttering efforts SIMPLE by concentrating on one SIMPLE task at a time so you aren’t overwhelmed.
• Keep the decision making SIMPLE so you don’t waste time and energy agonising over what stays and what goes. My Declutter Decision Making Guide can help with this.
• Make housecleaning SIMPLE, the less stuff you own the less work there is involved in maintaining a clean and tidy home.

It is true the SIMPLE things in life are often the best, enjoy them.

ITEM 173 OF 365 LESS THINGS

Do you think I will ever get finished with the kitchen clutter I am starting to wonder myself.

When I first started this adventure of decluttering at the beginning of the year that was all it was to me, decluttering. As I go along on this journey and discover the freedom that unburdening our lives of things that only bring stress on us I am starting to embrace the idea of taking it to the next level.

It really is a natural progression because the fundamentals of minimalism  have been a constant topic of conversation in our home for some years mostly without me even realising it. My husband has been reading up and considering the options available to us  for some time now and I have only just put a label to the concept.

In a round about way I stumbled onto a blog recently – Sanity In Simplicity – that follows one person’s journey into to minimalist lifestyle. I haven’t read that much of her posts yet but what I have read I have enjoyed.

Here is a small sample from the very first post from Megan’s blog….

Minimalism means many things to many people.  To me, it is a way to declutter my space so that I can declutter my mind so that I can declutter my life and sort out my priorities.  It a way to have more time and less stress, and be more environmentally friendly.  It means working less and playing more.  Minimalism, to me, is freedom…

Megan has some links to other great blogs about minimalism as well that are worth a look at.

Maybe next year I will have a whole new blog topic to consider “How I stumbled into minimalism” but lets not get ahead of ourselves after all one step at a time is the motto of 365lessthings.

ITEM 128 OF 365 LESS THINGS

This is another of my ski gear eBay auctions, a pair of child size 10 Columbia Snowboard Pants that fetched $32.95.

Today’s item is this rusty shower caddy.

How many of these items have passed through our home over the last 23 years I couldn’t say but it has been quite a few. I am yet to find one that didn’t go rusty after about 2 years. There must be one out there in the market that is made of a substance that doesn’t perish  with such monotonous regularity.

I know they only cost about $20-$30 but I’m stingy and I expect more for my 30 bucks. So I have come up with a cheap alternative to this design. I have purchased 4 plastic coated hooks with screws on the end at a grand total of $2 and I have screwed 2 of them into the bottom of my shampoo and conditioner bottles and hung them upside down on the edge of the shower screen.

The beauty of this design apart from the $2.00 price tag is that the liquid in the bottles is constantly in the ready position, that is since they are hanging upside down the liquid is always nearest to the exit hole so it is as simple as flip the cap and out it comes.

I will keep you posted as to how well this invention is working but for now I am quite happy with the result.The other items that used to reside on the old shower caddy were my razor and a comb for applying conditioner to my hair. The razer is also hanging over the edge of the shower screen and the comb is sitting in the channel above the door of the shower which works quite will.

I might add that the shower in question is very small and this new hanging method has freed up a Little moving room as well.

Now I know that uncluttering your ironing basket doesn’t actually remove anything from your house but it sure would lighten your To-Do List leaving more time for real de-cluttering. Speaking from someone who spent at least three hours slaving over a hot iron today, I am up for any suggestion as to how to reduce this workload.

It would certainly help if we bought clothes with less cotton content and more in the way of  poly/cotton blend.

I put fabric softener in all my loads to try to cut down on the wrinkles and I am sure that helps but not enough. I also hang the clothes on an airing rack inside the house so they aren’t out going stiff in the wicked heat of the sun. Drying them in the clothes dryer isn’t an option either because I have a washer dryer combo (all in one model) and I find it wrinkles the clothes even worse than hanging them. In a way this is a good thing because then I am not tempted to resort to this method because that would be a huge waste of electricity.

All I can hope for as that the current clothes will wear out and we can all buy replacements with a higher polyester content or that someone will leave home so there is one less person to iron for. The chances of that someone ironing their own clothes is about as likely as the clothes ironing themselves (now there’s a dream).

ITEM 107 OF 365 LESS THINGS

Since a photo of my pile of ironing is not an example of real de-cluttering you will find below today’s actual contribution. Yet another couple of toiletry items I unearthed when raiding the cupboards for the out of date medications from day 103

Colleen’s Helpful Hint of the Day

Denture cleaner in warm water makes a great silver and gold jewellery cleaner.

(Always test method first and never use this method on pearls)

I live in a townhouse so I don’t have much to care for in the way of garden or lawn but for what I do have I am endevouring to minimalise the amout of equipment and time required to maintain it.

I only purchase/aquire plants that can survive my neglect, requiring little watering or pampering in any way and hardy enough to cope with the varying climate we can get here at times.

When we first moved into the property we owned a lawn mower and an edge trimmer which seemed a little overkill for a lawn 5m long by 1.5m wide so my husband bought a rotory hand mower and gave the other items to charity.

After using the hand mower a couple of times I decided that was hard work so the next time the gardener that maintains the common areas of the property came to do his work I asked him what he would charge me to trim the edges and cut the lawn in the back of my home. He said he would do it for a carton/slab of beer at Christmas each year. “BARGAIN” deal done.

As a result of exploring options and choosing wisely when adding plants I now have a garden that requires little maintenance or equipment. Today I will send the last of the redundant gardening equipment that has been lurking in the garage to the give-away pile.

I might add we have no intention of ever again living in a propery that has big lawns and gardens so I don’t expect ever to have to replace the gardening equipment that we have purged over that last couple of years

Colleen’s Helpful Hint of the Day

If you should accidently write on a whiteboard with perminent marker just scribble over it with the whiteboard marker and it should rub right off.

When out picking up a few groceries the other day, I noticed a woman getting her handbag checked as she exited the shop. Nothing unusual about that except the lady had to rest this bag on a nearby store display in order to open all three compartments that were so crammed with God knows what that she could barely get the zippers open.

There was no chance she was about to steal anything because quite frankly she couldn’t possibly have fit another thing in. Although she quite possibly had already stolen 3 paperbacks, half a dozen DVDs, a flat pack bookcase and 2 bags of potting mix  the way that thing was heaving at the sides. Honestly her bag was like a filing cabinet with handles.

Seriously ladies, how much do we really need to carry with us for a couple of hours out at the shops. Depending on what she was carrying in that thing I am sure this Lady could have parachuted into Siberia with that handbag and survived for a month on the contents. MacGyver eat your heart out.

Ok, so I am getting a little carried away with myself but really, aside from your purse, cell phone, maybe a note pad and a pen, your keys, a few feminine heigine products and a little lipstick what else do you feel you need for one short trip that you simply can’t do without. Men manage to leave the house with a wallet in their back pocket for heaven’s sake.

After seeing this woman I went home and cleaned out my handbag and aside from several old grocery lists and some old shopping dockets my bag was looking OK.

So if you haven’t started de-cluttering yet maybe this is a good place to start.

Today’s give-away

Colleen’s Helpful Hint for the Day

To clean your washing machine just run it through a cycle with 2 cups of white vinegar. Why not throw your shower curtain in the machine at the same time and it should come out clean and mildew free.

While cruising the Internet looking for inspiration on the topic of decluttering I found a few interesting articles that take downsizing and minimalism to greater extremes. I am not prepared to go to that extent, not at this point anyway, but they were inspiring and made me feel that what I am attempting seems like a walk in the park.

When I say “a walk in the park” I don’t mean it demeans my efforts in any way, it just helps me see the bigger picture and I now feel very comfortable that the small sacrifices I am making are not such a big deal.

Some of the topics to google when looking for such articles and websites are:

• Simpler Lifestyle
• Downshifting
• Minimalist Lifestyle
• Voluntary Simplicity

Have a look at some of the links I have attached to these topics and you will see what I mean. Giving away a DVD is chicken feed compared to giving away the DVD player or the electricity for that matter. It puts things into a whole new perspective.

Today’s giveaway is a water flask that I haven’t used since I stopped playing softball in 1999.

Colleen’s Helpful Hint for the Day
Use an over-the-door multi hook hanger to organise long necklaces. It will keep them from tangling and you will easily be able to see and choose which to wear.

Today I just wanted to point out that just below the photo for each days Post there is a tiny word “comments”, if you click on that you have the opportunity to leave feedback,  share your stories or even mention an area of decluttering you might like help with.

I would love to hear from you and appreciate your tips and views.

Yesterday I had a comment from Janetta who has been inspired to start decluttering again. She is even reducing by  a bag of things some days because they are only small items.  As I have said before “Every Little Thing Counts” whether alone or by the bag.

Below is a list of small thing that I used today to make a Reusable Car Bingo Game for my niece and nephews.

• 2 Laptop Screen Protectors
• 2 sheets of chipboard
• 3 Sheets of coloured paper
• 4 whiteboard markers
• Screen clean sachet
• Plastic Box

These were all excess items and resources taking up space in our office/craft room. The screen protectors were from a laptop we no longer have. The whiteboard markers were from a stockpile no doubt at risk of going dry and useless in the drawer waiting to be used.

I am sure the kids will be thrilled with the result and I am happy to have purged yet a few more things.

Here is the photo of the Bingo Game I made for the kids.