BellaOnline Forums Beauty and Self Journals Spring Cleaning

Today's journaling prompt from March's journaling prompts article March 26th-April 1st Prompts

"One of things I always think of when it comes to Spring, is spring-cleaning. What areas of your life need to be dusted? What things in your life are cluttered, causing you discomfort? What is preventing you from decluttering, dusting or tossing away?"

Thoughts?

My life needs to be dusted literally. LOL. I've recruited my husband to help me. He pulls files out of the file cabinet and says do you want to keep this and I say yes or no and he gets rid of what I allow. I just won't open the cabinet and do this myself. even tho it's quite simple. I'm blocked when it comes to decluttering so I need help.

Oh and during one session I must have yawned like 100 times. As soon as it was over I was completely awake and invigorated. LOL.

Each room in our house needs to be dusted - they all have way too much stuff in them. It's time to really, thoroughly declutter.

I came home at lunch time today and did two things that needed to be done. I left a note for my husband to put the dishwasher on which he did. I don't like it to run when no one is at home.

Interesting Angie! I suppose it makes sense - firefighters tell of houses burning down because someone started a dryer and then left the house.

As soon as my taxes are done I will start working on cleaning one room a day.

I asked my husband to go through our closet with me. We pulled all the clothes out of EVERYWHERE - the closet, the hamper, the maternity bags, the pre-baby bags, the drawers, etc. We tried on EVERYTHING.

By the end of keeping only those things which 1-Fit well 2-Were clean (barring a couple of work jeans and shirts for DH and 3-Looked good on me (dh vetoed a couple of mine and I veteod a couple of his) we managed to fill SEVEN bags for Goodwill. Clothes and shoes.

SEVEN BAGS!

It felt so good to pass those things on to a good organization and someone who might actually be able to use them. Not to mention cleaning out the closet. We might actually be able to fit all the clothes in there now!

If I ever get caught up on the laundry that is. *wink*

Angela <><

I received a bag from Amvets today. They will do a pick up next week so I have time to put some things I have decided to pass on in the bag and leave it by the roadside to be picked up. They come around a lot so if I were do be ruthless each time I receive a bag, they would receive a bag full.

Angela - that is absolutely amazing! What a great way to spend a day! Think of all the happy people who will benefit from your generosity and how much cleaner your home will be!

Be sure to document what's in the bags for your tax credit!

Angie that is really cool that they gave you a bag to fill! Here we have to bag and box our own things, to put them out.

I definitely understand the ruthless part. When BigBrother BigSister first started coming around here I found it easy to fill a box or two for them. But now that I've gone through all the rooms several times, it is harder and harder in each one to find things "easy to donate". They are still too full! There is obviously still things in here that need to go. It just gets more challenging to make that decision.

Lisa - It really was a pleasant way to spend the morning with my husband. He has a good sense of humor about things. We got a tax receipt of course.

Angie - Fun! When I lived in California we had people who would come by if you called them.

Lisa - Oh my yes - When we moved here I parted with a large box full of books by consoling myself with the knowledge that I was taking them to the library. But now...oh! It's SO difficult!

It's good when it gets difficult - means you're getting down to just the things you need. Or are at least headed in that direction.

Some of the toughest things to get rid of: things we paid good money for and they still have use/look nice (even though we don't actually love them anymore), things given to us by others, and things with some strange sentimental value/memory attached.

Those categories are really not even about the items in themselves - it's a deeper psychological issue at hand. So these things are harder to give up. I am working on letting them gracefully leave my life. For some things I can take pictures of them to keep or make an event out of using and saying goodbye to something.

I really have a problem with the first category - things i paid good money for. I just feel foolish and feel that i either need to sell them for good value, or keep them in storage - ie - my personal black hole. Yeesh.

What do people find the hardest to let go of?

do you ever watch Clean House or How Clean is Your House - they are ruthless. Even the things you love go.

Jilly - I think the idea of taking a picture of items is brilliant. You can treasure the photos, just like you'd treasure a photo of Monument Valley or something. The photo is always there for you to admire, and it takes up far less space!

If something still has good value then donating it to charity will give you back a good value! That's a good thing!

I'm looking around the living room, which is cluttered, to try to figure out what could go. We have the exercise bike, futon couch, and three small shelves. Several of those hold DVDs and video games - we've already whittled those all down quite a bit. We have the 3 consoles, the Rock Band setup with a few guitars, a humidifier, the Roomba.

I think what we need is a bigger living room

I suppose the 3 shelves we have right now *could* be smaller to fit more compactly around the things they hold. I will look into that.

Angela and Angie, that is great that you were able to donate so much stuff to charity! Lisa, you are right about the 'good value' part - doing good can only result in good. I will have to remind myself of this the next time i am in my storage shed...I will just keep triaging things to pull out for Goodwill until I am down to just what I intend to actually keep.

I swear, eBay and craiglist have actually made it HARDER to get rid of stuff. Now instead of just giving things away, I keep holding onto them thinking I will get around to selling them instead! yeesh!

Okay, Lisa's living room. Are you guys *using* the exercise bike? That would be the first thing to go, if you are not. You need the couch, the Roomba (can it live under the couch?), the humidifyer (is it on the floor or on a shelf)) and a place to hold your entertainment stuff.

What you CAN do is try to better store your toys. You've whittled down your games and DVDs, which is great! But do the rest of the toys all have to be sitting out in the open? If you could somehow containerize things, there would be less dusting to do, and it all might be more compact and neater looking. And it gets stuff off the floor, which always looks messy.

I know Ikea has some great solutions if you look around with an open eye. Sometimes you can find just the right thing in a weird area, like in the kitchen units or in the kids' furniture section.

For me, spring cleaning is about details I normally don't do--like baseboards and doorframes, grout, moving furniture to vacuum, washing windows, oven cleaning, detailing the fridge, cleaning out closets & cabinets, you know--that stuff.

I actually usually do that stuff twice a year.

I declutter quite a bit as I don't hold on to decorative items and furniture "in case" anymore.

I do see if my kids need it (truthfully, they're 25 & 21 and the last few years, I've "donated" loads of stuff to them as they've set up their own apartments and now houses--a couple of couches, chairs, beds, dining room suits, towels when I buy new ones, dishes, and so on) and now they're starting to say "NO!!!!" LOL Then, I ask friends, and then, do the goodwill drop off (there's a center within a couple miles.)

So, most of the stuff in my storage closet is archived paperwork, my painting supplies, and giftwrap & Christmas stuff.

My clutter problem? Books and magazines. I'm doing better now than I ever have, since there's a Hastings nearby that buys used books and I do pawn them off on my daughter & daughter-in-law, too. I'm till bad about wanting to hold on to nonfiction far too long, though.

Magazines, I'm doing better. It's always been a problem--I buy and subscribe to lots, and then keep them. I actually had a laundry basket full in my closet for months. Don't ask why--it's my "issue", I suppose. Everytime I've relocated, I've had to either move or get rid of piles and piles of magazines. I love to give them away, too. Finally, with the basket, I parked it by the door & made myself take an armload out each time I left--either to recycle or donate. Now, I try to prune more regularly.

Papers, books, magazines are my downfall too.

For magazines maybe there's a senior center near you which would *love* them!

Thanks for the suggestions Jilly - we'll see what we can do! It is pretty much over humidifier season with the April Showers coming, so that at least can go away.

If libraries have sales, sometimes they will take them. At 10 cents each, they can bring in a few dollars. Unfortnately, many don't sell and they end up in the landfill.

One thing you can do with magazines is bring them to Doctor/dentist offices and leave them there. That's really helpful.

I used to do spring cleaning, Deb, but now I spread out those kinds of things all year. I like to attack things with old toothbrushes to really get the crud out. Crud must die!

Me, too, Jilly--I particularly dislike the crud behind faucets and in drains. I use bleach on those places to kill the mold every once in awhile, but usually, it's a wipe down and a toothbrush scrub to keep it from getting really grody.