I received an email from a new minimalist blogger on the weekend. His name is Marco Laberge and his blog is Toward Minimalism. He asked me to check out his blog and give him some feedback. I am a busy lady these days with my blog, my craft making and selling, my other volunteer work, friends and family, so reading is just one things I don’t have a lot of time for. Most of the posts, from blogs I subscribe to, that appear in my in-box are deleted without receiving any of my attention due to these other commitments. However I was intrigued enough to take the time out to read some of Marco’s posts.

I have to say I was suitably impressed. Marco, like myself, focuses on the mind rather than the clutter itself. As I have said many a time, clutter is all about mind set and not the items. The items are just the material manifestation of a skewed attachment and want for stuff. His post ~ Are you too attached to your possessions ~ sums up one aspect of this thinking beautifully. I urge you to read it.

Today’s Mini Mission

Declutter a sentimental item that habit says keep but your mind says is just wasting space.

Eco Tip for the Day

Use a microfibre mop to clean your floors. All you need is a little water, no harmful chemicals. Even green cleaners have to be manufactured so why use them if you don’t need to.

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

I wanted to share two comments from yesterday because they are both good examples of rationalising ones belongings. So here they are along with my own thoughts on the subject.

From Claire

I have been working on Monday’s Mission, glass, for a few weeks now! We moved across country about a year ago and even though I had given away probably half of what we owned we still moved way too much stuff – we had over 80 boxes for 2 people, yikes! I found that kitchen items were at least 1/3 of those boxes. And also that everything glass took up twice the space in boxes because it had to be wrapped and padded. We are in an apartment that we will probably move from in a year, so I want to get our belongings down before we move again. I just added 8 Christmas glasses to the give away. They are wine glasses, we don’t drink, and they have Christmas flowers all over them. Only good once a year. I also added 8 soup bowls/crocks. They are really nice for soup but nothing else. I haven’t made soup in over a year now and don’t have plans to. If I did, I can just use regular bowls. I got rid of about 10 decorative dishes that don’t suit us anymore. They were made to hang on the wall but have been in a cupboard for years. I have 4 glass pitchers, rarely used, so I am parting with one. I still have way too many breakables/glass items for two people! I’m going to keep working on it for sure.

Claire’s rationalising is a good example of realising that items designed for a single use are often just clutter and we don’t really need them. This is especially so when we have more versatile substitutes already on hand. There is also no need to stock your home with items that you don’t use on a regular basis, such as wine glasses when you don’t drink wine. Sure someone may visit with a bottle one day but they can easily drink the wine from an ordinary drinking glass. Feeling that we need to cater to the enth degree to the occasional guest is a recipe for a cluttered home. This includes food items. I recently visited my in-laws in another state. My mother-in-law uses margarine, whereas I use butter (I don’t like margarine) and I love mint sauce with my lamb roast but she doesn’t stock it in her pantry. My toast was was quite edible with the margarine and my lamb roast was still delicious without the mint sauce. Had she bought these items they would have languished in her fridge and pantry for months.

From Vicki K

Ooooh – I am ready for Tuesday. I’ve been making my way through your archives, Colleen, and found a post about gift wrap. Really, I enjoy wrapping gifts but there are some wraps that I’ve had forever because I don’t like them well enough to use! While I was at it, I cleared out all the mashed bows, unusable tissue paper, tags, ribbons, one-purpose dispensers and left only the items I know I will use. Now it is all contained in one small bin – but I will use ALL of it.

And I am going to be disciplined about using up what I have before acquiring more. This part is key in a lot of areas!

Vicki’s example of rationalising is about downsizing a collection of items without compromising on enjoying it. As she says, she “..really enjoy’s wrapping gifts…” but doesn’t need to keep the materials she doesn’t like so much. She also realises that she can still enjoy it with less variety on hand.

I also found this to be the case with my craft supplies. I am enjoying my craft as much as ever these days with a whole lot less stuff on hand. I have a limited amount of space to store it and intend for the collection to remain within those confines. I did the same with my kitchen items, my Christmas decorations, my linen, my clothes and many other groups of things in my home. In fact their are a few areas of my new home that I think could still do with a little rationalising on now that we live in a smaller space.

Is there in area in your home that you need to rationalise in order to reach your declutter goal.

Today’s Mini Mission

Declutter some paper items ~ Paper is one of the materials that can be really difficult for many people to deal with. Items made from this are either usually loved or hated. Books, magazines, letters and photos can be numerous and cherished, while paperwork is a pain to sort through and deal with. You only need to spend 10 minutes on this so make the most of it.

Eco Tip for the Day

Use only the amount of product required. This could be, hair products, cleaners, paper towel, toilet paper, deodorant and other toiletries etc etc. Using too much doesn’t do a better job it just causes waste.

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

I received the following comment from Willow yesterday…

“I like to do the mini missions when I am cleaning different rooms in my house. For example, as I was cleaning the bathroom, I decided to declutter the baskets we use to keep things organized (like my makeup, nail files). I pulled out all the old expired little medicine bottles and we were able to get rid of several which I will put in a plastic bag and recycle at the local police station tomorrow. It’s amazing what I find as I’m cleaning.”

I was amused by the comment and inspired to write this post at the same time. The reason for my amusement was that I had decided to answer some comments while at the same time hoping that one might inspire a blog post. Willow’s was the very first comment I read which gave me exactly what I needed.

I was also amused because she and I do the exact same thing – Start cleaning and end up finding areas of our homes to declutter. Today while I was cleaning I opened the under sink cupboard in the kitchen to get out some cleaner and ended up decluttering two hand soap bottles, to the recycling bin, that I had put aside in case I found a use for them, which I hadn’t. I also relocated my cleaning rags and sponges to an empty drawer. This effort left me with two empty baskets which I relocated to under the bench on the balcony. These baskets get repurposed over and over again. I think I have owned them for most of my married life.

The drawer that I relocated the rags and sponges to had become vacant when I relocated the spices that were in it to my wonderful new pantry drawers. Remember me saying how dysfunctional my pantry was, well it isn’t anymore. Three annoying deep shelves have been replaced by Five very functional soft close drawers of various depths. That won’t be the last reorganising in the kitchen either as the master cabinet maker will be back soon to complete the work he has started of changing my pots and pan/small appliance cupboard into a set of three drawers including a utensil drawer. I will post some photos when it is all complete.

But I digress. So often when I am cleaning do I get sidetracked into a little unscheduled decluttering. I am usually keen to get to the end of my cleaning but when a decluttering opportunity presents itself I just can’t help myself. It gives me a very satisfying feeling that spurs me on with my cleaning once I am done.

I suppose the moral of this story is ~ Always keep your eye out for a decluttering opportunity and don’t let the chance go by when it presents itself. And if it inspires some chain reaction decluttering, all the better. It is a great thing when a little decluttering ends with a whole bag of stuff in the trunk of your car ready to take to the thrift shop.

Today’s Mini Mission

 Declutter an item you realise you no longer love enough to keep now that you would rather space and simplicity over stuff.

Eco Tip for the Day

Don’t forget your reusable bags when going shopping. I keep a folded one in my handbag at all times so I am never get caught short. I think it has substituted for about 100 plastic bags by now. Worth its weight in gold I’d say.

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

Have you ever enjoyed one of those TV series where the two main characters have a love interest in each other that takes episode after episode to come to climactic fruition. The build up is intoxicating. It is almost a shame when they finally succumb to their lust for each other. In fact that is often when the series also comes to its finality and if it doesn’t the show is never really as appealing from that moment on. It is like fairytales where the endings are “…and they lived happily ever after. Clearly the teller these stories know that the buildup is more interesting and tantalising than the actually partnership beyond that point.

Well your decluttering can be like this. I revelled in the joy of each item I sent on its way rather than lamenting daily not being at the end of my decluttering journey. Even now that I am almost fully decluttered I still look for items on a regular basis to send on their way because I know, from experience, that the less stuff I have the easier it is to keep in order, the less time I waste choosing between items and the more breathing space I have in my home. It still gives me a thrill to flirt with the idea of living with even less. 😉

So don’t look at decluttering as a chore, think of it as a thrilling adventure that will lead to a satisfying climax.

And for those of you who are thinking “Does this mean that the end of our decluttering journey will be an anticlimax?”, the answer is no. I means that once you make the conquest you can settle down into a very comfortable, happy and loving relationship with you stuff, not wanting to ever return to your past lifestyle.

So enjoy the journey and reap the rewards.

Today’s Mini Mission

Another obvious clutter magnet is the junk drawer. I am pleased to say I don’t have one of these.  “Why do junk drawers exist anyway?” Surely all the things we put in there have a home elsewhere but we are just not putting them away properly. Maybe once it is emptied you should remover the drawer for a week and attempt to learn to live without it. 

Eco Tip for the Day

If you do iron clothes don’t turn on the iron to do one thing. Designate a regular iron session so you aren’t wasting electricity reheating the iron over and over again.

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

Doodles blog post yesterday got me thinking about how out of character my decluttering method is to my usual behaviour. Of the seven sabotaging behaviours Doodle mentioned in the post, I am not guilty of any of them when it comes to my decluttering over the last four years. Although there certainly are a few that I would previously have thought I was susceptible to.  Lets go over them.

1. Do you focus on how much there is left to do rather than how much you have achieved?

This is something I would most certainly have done in the past. I would be constantly looking at the volume of the task and lamenting what is left to be done. Wishing that I was doing just about anything else.

2. Do you find your self apologising a lot to others and calling yourself lazy and other derogatory names rather than defining yourself in more positive language and a ‘work in progress’.

This I would be unlikely to have done regarding keeping house. I have been good about keeping a tidy home throughout my entire married life (I lived at home prior to that). As an adult I have always been a hard worker, thanks to a good upbringing. “A job worth doing is worth doing well!” was one of my father’s favourite sayings.

3. Do you throw away essential things that then prove how risky decluttering is?

This is also not something I would ever do. I am too tight fisted to waste anything so getting rid of useful stuff would never happen unless I definitely didn’t feel the need to keep it.

4. Do you create such a mess when decluttering that you give up half way through a task and have made everything worse.

I would be unlikely to have done this either. I am a finisher once I start a task.

5. Does being a perfectionist stop you from doing small 15 minute tasks; one drawer or one shelf at a time. Is it all or nothing; an entire room or it’s not worth it…but you can never bring yourself to face a whole room?

I am a perfectionist that is for sure which is why I am also usually an organised person. Therefore I would have set a goal and stuck to it because failing would be out of the question. Being organised also meant that my task oriented internal time clock helps me to know how much I can get done in a day and be tidy again at the end of it, ready to begin again the next day until the task is done.

6. Are you easily distracted, starting off one task in the kitchen, wondering off to the bedroom to put something away and start sorting the  laundry on your floor  which leads you to the bathroom to put dirty clothes in the laundry bin when you spot the sink needs a clean…

I am prone to do this during my usual daily meandering through the house doing things. But when there is a major task to get through I can be ruthlessly single minded.

7. Over complex or unrealistic plans of where or how  you might get rid of stuff.

Here is where my perfectionism comes in again. I do like things to go to the best home possible which can complicate the task. However previous experience put me in a position to carry this off quite easily. And then as time went by I learned of a few extra outlets to utilise when it came to rehousing my stuff. So although in other peoples view I would seem to complicate this task, to me it was a case of just sticking to a plan.

All that being said, it was a shock to me when I came up with the idea to declutter a thing a day. I suppose it was my previous experience of doing it all at once that put me off going through that again. I was determined to make it easy on myself. And lo and behold I embraced the method from the get go. Never looking back.

Anyone who knows me personally will vouch for the fact that I am like the Energizer Bunny. Flat out is the only speed I know. So for me to decide to reduce a household of stuff for four people to the amount that would fit into a two bedroom apartment, at the pace of one item a day, was ludicrously out of character. So if you think you don’t have the staying power to declutter your home at such a slow pace, think again. If I can change my mindset in an instant you can too. The desire to make it easy on myself usurped any of my other personality traits that said get it done in a hurry.

My father had another saying ~ ” There is smart lazy and there is just plain lazy.” Smart Lazy is being clever enough to find and easy way to complete a task effectively. And that is always more admirable than being just plain lazy and not achieving anything.

In this case I think I have done a great job of being smart lazy. Wouldn’t you like to be smart lazy too?

Today’s Mini Mission

 Declutter something from a bedroom.

Eco Tip for the Day

If you grind and percolate fresh coffee why not use the grounds as fertiliser rather than using not so environmentally friendly alternatives. The coffee than also serves two purposed reducing its carbon footprint.

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

Doodle

Are there things you do to sabotage your de-cluttering goals?

I got the idea for this post after reading “No More Clutter” by Sue Kay. She suggests the following as ways we undermine our decluttering efforts:

1. Do you focus on how much there is left to do rather than how much you have achieved?
2. Do you find your self apologising a lot to others and calling yourself lazy and other derogatory names rather than defining yourself in more positive language and a ‘work in progress’.
3. Do you throw away essential things that then prove how risky decluttering is?
4. Do you create such a mess when decluttering that you give up half way through a task and have made everything worse.
5. Does being a perfectionist stop you from doing small 15 minute tasks; one drawer or one shelf at a time. Is it all or nothing; an entire room or it’s not worth it…but you can never bring yourself to face a whole room?
6. Are you easily distracted, starting off one task in the kitchen, wondering off to the bedroom to put something away and start sorting the  laundry on your floor  which leads you to the bathroom to put dirty clothes in the laundry bin when you spot the sink needs a clean…
7. Over complex or unrealistic plans of where or how  you might get rid of stuff

I have definitely at some point done all of these except for 3) The good news is,from my experience, that once you bring these behaviours from your unconscious to conscious level, all these traits you can train out of yourself and create new habits.

When working on my own stuff, I now consciously choose to tackle decluttering in small bite size chunks. If I am in the mood for a few hours sorting, I finish one bit before starting the next session, because I know how my energy for the task can suddenly go.

Of course, when working with clients, I work differently because we know we are going to be keeping going for 3-4 hours per session: I’m there as the energiser and motivator, attuning to each clients individual needs, so we won’t be giving up after 20 minutes. This does mean I can empty whole wardrobes and larders at the start rather than doing small chunks. In this instance, it is down to me to ensure the pace we work at balances with the time I allow at the end to leave the area we are working in   a far better state than when we started.

We create piles on the floor for things that need to be put away elsewhere in the house. Then we do that all at the end, rather than lots of too-ing and fro-ing distracting us from the task in hand.

A significant proportion of my clients apologise a lot and feel bad about themselves with regard to their clutter. I always gently challenge that view of themselves, because there are always life reasons why things have become too much and now they are taking steps to change: they deserve to praise themselves and believe this is the start of change.

In my own home, I find it very helpful to set an alarm/kitchen timer for 15 minutes to tackle an area I just can’t face: it means I make a little breakthrough and am then rewarded by being allowed to stop. Occasionally of course, it gets me going and I keep going long past the 15 minutes. But it is ok to stop at 15 minutes. It’s a technique I pass on to clients too.

Do you recognise yourself in any of the above 1-7 list? If you recognise any of them as the way you used to do things, how have you changed?

Today’s Mini Mission

Declutter something from a bathroom in your home.

Eco Tip for the Day

Here’s one way to save paper. Write your grocery list on the fridge with a whiteboard marker and then photograph it with your cell phone and take that with you when you go shopping.

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

Related articles across the web

I have been receiving and reading some good post by other bloggers lately that I feel the need to share with you. Here is a great one that Cindy sent through to me…

www.inc.com ~Want to be truly productive? End each day like this. By Kevin Daum

Please read it before reading on.

I particularly liked his first suggestion…

“1. Finish one “organizing” project. Busy people always have some organizing project they have yet to get accomplished. It might be cleaning out an old file drawer or clearing your email. Whatever it is, schedule 20 minutes at the end of the day and tackle it.  Even if you get partway done you’ll feel like you started to accomplish something.  Within a week at most the task will be done and you’ll feel lighter inside.”

Why not consider what you want to declutter during the day then take those 10 minutes at the end of the day to physically remove it to your transition point. This idea is in line with yesterdays post of separating deciding from doing. Take your time to make the decision during the day then do the task and enjoy the satisfaction right before relaxing and turning in for the night.

Quite often, even if you have no decluttering item in mind when the day starts out, you will encounter objects during the day that will come under scrutiny. Give yourself the rest of the day to make the decision as to whether an item can stay or go.

Also, as Kevin suggests, doing a small portion of a large task will give you satisfaction and inspiration to continue, if only in increments. Doing a big task in small chunks can be far less gruelling than trying to tackle it all at once.

You can then rest well in the satisfaction that you have accomplished another step in your decluttering journey.

Today’s Mini Mission

Declutter old videos, DVDs, records or CDs you no longer watch or listen to.

Eco Tip for the Day

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

There was a lot of chatter generated yesterday about an overabundance of plastic containers. It seems most of us still have an excess of these.

In a bid to reduce food items in both the fridge and pantry due to my long vacation and impending move late last year, I have become very efficient at catering, shopping and using up leftovers to the point where my need for plastic containers has become greatly reduce. I mostly shop for fresh produce, meat and dairy these days from which there is very little waste. Any leftovers are soon devoured.

I have also eliminated several baking items in my pantry. Because I only make dessert once a week, if that, there is no need for a plethora of ingredients to be stored in the panty. For starters, I managed for seven and a half years, living in America, using a combo of baking powder and plain flour rather than stocking self-raising flour so I decided that was good enough for here too. That eliminated one large canister in my pantry. We use rice much less these days too due to our lower carb eating choices so I reduced the amount I stored. Similarly ingredients such as desiccated coconut were so infrequently used I decided it could also go, along with several pasta varieties, chick peas, noodles and white sugar. Should I ever wish to make something with any of these ingredients I buy the smallest possible quantity so there is little or no leftovers, any of which I include in another recipe ASAP.

I also have a variety of glass mixing bowls that nest inside each other which can also be used of storing food. If I can make and store the item in the same bowl it also saves on washing up adding a little more efficiency and an element of eco friendliness. These bowls have lids, but if they didn’t I would opt for a plate to seal the food in rather than waste cling film.

Admittedly not having any children left at home has added greatly to this streamlining.

Is there an area in your life where efficiency would allow you to declutter?

Today’s Mini Mission

Start a trial separation of fashion accessories.

Eco Tip for the Day

Yesterday I cleaned all the glass doors on my balcony. What did I use to do that? Microfibre cloths and water. No chemicals and they are as clean as a whistle. A few good microfibre cloths and good old H2O is better for the environment and can save you cash as well.

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

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

We all are taught that perfection does not exist. What we fail to do is to believe that. I don’t really know about the rest of the world, but I am tired of seeing in all places the evidence of how imperfect I am. It is hard to avoid. You would have to live in an isolated island not to feel how your lack of perfectionism is ruining your life. They say it about the way you keep your house, care for your kids, live your marriage (?) (saw this one in a magazine)…Oh how life would be great…But not.

Let’s talk for example about decorating and de-cluttering:

How can I have a perfectly de-cluttered, decorated house? That is an easy one: by not living in it.

I have been reading de-cluttering blogs for a long while now. And all of them, at one point or another, have talked about perfectionism. Even here it has been mentioned a few times.

So where am I going with this talk? First, there is no such thing as perfection. Believe that, it is real. The reality for me is that, in de-cluttering and in housecleaning I have three categories: nice, great and YAY. I don’t have to clean for a week! Not perfect, not eligible to be photographed for a designing magazine. Just my house clean and uncluttered to my standard. For a while at least my trouble was I wanted perfection, I always aimed for it. Sometimes I felt like Lord Farquaad from Shrek (the first one) who wanted a perfect castle, and a perfect village and a perfect princess wife. His words were “I want order! I want perfection!”. He ended being married to an ogress and being eaten by a dragon. So much for perfection.

I did learn that wanting perfection leads to doing nothing. I was frustrated, wishing for that picture perfect house on so and so internet site, all the while I had a whole cluttered house suffocating me because I wanted to clean them up…perfectly. It accumulated. I did not clean or fix things because I had to do it all at once and perfectly. And there is another catch right there: to do everything perfectly we have to do it all at once. But there is never enough time. I certainly never had that much time available. And when I did I was too lazy to do it all, it was too much. And I always gave myself the excuse that (we rent) but when I moved to MY house, then things would be perfect.  I had other stuff to do instead of de-cluttering. Play with the kids. Go out with the husband. Chat with  friends on Skype. I didn’t want to spend hours and hours cleaning, sorting, de-cluttering, just to have a perfect house. I wanted to live.

As it has been said before and will be said again. Ditch perfection. Do what you can, when you can. Get one thing done or just get something done. And good is great. If you do a good job on time, you are way ahead than if you aimed for a perfect job that never got delivered. Like models, the perfect made up houses that are pictured in magazines and design sites, are really that: made up models. I have recently looked at pictures from a décor magazine and I saw huge, spectacular houses there, beautifully decorated. They were great, but all I could think about was: “Who is going to clean all that?” And lately: “I bet they have a full time maid to have that much stuff and a perfect house…”. So, I realized perfection has a price I am not willing to pay.

To quote a new singer/comedian in a interview about her new CD: “If we keep thinking about what we could do better  we’d never do anything. The things we do are imperfect, it’s part of human nature.” And that is the beauty of it.

Today’s Mini Mission

Declutter a few shades of eyeshadow, lipstick or nail polish that you rarely if ever use.

Eco Tip for the Day

When racing off to the grocery store to pick up something you need phone a friend or neighbour to see if they need anything while you are at it. You make save them a trip.

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