Hoarding...not just on TV

bobble_hat

Hi all,

Cleared my wardrobe last night, hadn't intended to, just wanted coat hangers for the huge ironing mountain I've been intending to tackle all week! So think it was delaying tactics! Anyway have 2 bin bags for the CS. But still haven't got all the clean washing put away.

I have, however, washing and ironed all the material I have for my kitchen cafe curtains and my downstairs loo curtain, so I have no excuse for not sewing these up now.

Last day at work today then off on holiday and actually going away for a whole week, very very excited and looking forward to a break. House is fairly clean and tidy, but lots of de-cluttering to do in the occasional rooms.

So on my return it will be:

• Boarding the loft
• E-baying and car booting
• de-clutter the pantry
• Sewing

Once the de-cluttering is done in the house I can start on the sheds and garden. 'See' you all when I get back. :beer:

Jojo_the_Tightfisted

Val - much as I hate to suggest adding things - I think you might need a packet of wipes in the car - they'd do the job of loo roll, tissues and for hand/face cleaning in the event of a problem. And I might charge/boil up a set of handwarmers and leave them ready to go.


As I'm pretty much of top of things at the moment (Ha! Let's see how long that lasts), I'm beginning to think of things for winter like that.

whitewing

Somebody give me permission to cs a new address book. I don't like address books because people have an unfortunate habit of dying or moving away thus rendering it all untidy. I have a nearly new one that I never got all my addresses into, and I have a pristine new one. I also have my xmas card list on millions of scrappy bits on paper. What I should do is key the addresses onto an excel spreadsheet and get rid of the books altogether.

Aside from this, I have gone through 1 box and two piles of jumbled paperwork, so that's two bags of confidential waste. 2 broken plastic boxes are going to recycling, and are being replaced by the ones I have freed up.

1 photo frame + the address book are going.

Have done well but there are still two boxes to go through.

alec_eiffel

The charity shop would love the address book far more than you do!

KAT44_2

alec_eiffel wrote: »

KAT, stop beating yourself up. The perfectionist side makes it so easy for us to look at all the things we haven't done or to look at "everyone else" who can do all these things or to regret what we've been doing all this time and what we could have done instead. None of that matters now.

It is tough and it is overwhelming at times but all those clothes you dealt with today you never have to deal with them again. I always say it's like peeling the layers of an onion, there are some things at the top and they're pretty easy to get rid of so they go. But we all have our sticking points and when we say them out loud they generally sound a bit bonkers, but it's our connection so it doesn't matter.

If you can now see that it's junk rather than something you can never be parted from then that is a big thing. You should be proud of yourself for knowing that. I don't think there's anyone here that hasn't at one time or another walked into a room and walked straight back out because it's just too much for that day. A room is too much sometimes, a box can be too much, so if it has to be item by item then so be it, one item dealt with is one item you don't have to dread dealing with again.

Thanks alec, don't know what was wrong with me yesterday it was like a tidal wave of panic that came over me and I just froze and couldn't deal with anything. Still feeling a bit stressed today but have taken your advice and just set myself the goal of getting rid of 10 items a day, like you said that's items I never have to deal with again even if it's just plastic coat hangers, old pens etc at least when I've got rid of 10 things I can class it as my goals been reached for that day.

Went to the doctors last week, with what I thought was a pulled muscle and whilst he was examining me he found a lump in my breast. He got me an emergency hospital appointment and luckily it turned out to be just a cyst, but since then I've got myself into the mindset that I need to sort everything NOW.

Husband hasn't helped matters by bringing 4 binbags of clothes home from his sisters this afternooon :eek: she thought since I was selling on ebay I might like to sell them to make some extra cash, erm no the cash is just an added bonus to getting rid of stuff. Anyway instead of just leaving them hanging around for weeks (like I normally do) I set the timer on the cooker for half an hour, looked through them, kept 1 pair of jeans for myself, rang her to say thanks for the kind offer but I've got far to much stuff to sell already and if she didn't want them back could I cs them, and that's where they are right now :T so feeling quite proud of myself at the moment.

valk_scot

Jojo_the_Tightfisted wrote: »

Val - much as I hate to suggest adding things - I think you might need a packet of wipes in the car - they'd do the job of loo roll, tissues and for hand/face cleaning in the event of a problem. And I might charge/boil up a set of handwarmers and leave them ready to go.

I think there may be a pack in the back pocket of one of the seats come to think of it, though I expect they'll be long dried out. I've usually got tissues in my bag anyway. But now that I've thought of these back seat pockets ...there's a gardening book, some comics and a kite in there too. We get bored easily!

alec_eiffel

Fantastic, well done for dealing with the clothes straight away.

Byatt

Well done Kat on the clothes...you should feel proud. :T
As for the panicky feelings I am sure we all feel those, and it is an awful feeling, but it does pass eventually and then out of nowhere, new resolve kicks in. I did loads yesterday, but today, well I'm watching Tale of Two Cities, the black and white version!

Have done some washing though as weather gorgeous.:D

valk_scot

KAT44 wrote: »

Husband hasn't helped matters by bringing 4 binbags of clothes home from his sisters this afternooon :eek: she thought since I was selling on ebay I might like to sell them to make some extra cash, erm no the cash is just an added bonus to getting rid of stuff. Anyway instead of just leaving them hanging around for weeks (like I normally do) I set the timer on the cooker for half an hour, looked through them, kept 1 pair of jeans for myself, rang her to say thanks for the kind offer but I've got far to much stuff to sell already and if she didn't want them back could I cs them, and that's where they are right now :T so feeling quite proud of myself at the moment.

Brilliant...you got rid of them before you got attached to them! :beer: And you helped her get rid of stuff too and the CS gets a nice bonus. Win all round I'd say. :T


I had to go up the attic very briefly to put away the sleeping bags and to get some gift bags for DS's birthday tomorrow. I'm mean about gift bags, I recycle them endlessly and it's a family joke that everyone has to get the Winnie the Poo "You are One!!" bag every year. That's not clutter though, that's one box of stuff that's saved me ££££s over the years.

While I was up there I noticed that there were another two bags of stuff I'd sorted out to go to the CS, so they came down, and I brought down the four huge storage bags of duvets. I don't know about anyone else but when I've bought new duvets the others tend to be kept for spares or guests and given that the attic is a bit restricted in space to fold things up I don't think I've had every duvet opened out in the same place for several years and I've rather lost track of how many there are!
I recently bought a new winter one each for DD and DS so I'm going to get every single duvet out, keep one winter and one summer one per bed, one medium one for the guest bed and chuck the rest out. If we need more we've got plenty of sleeping bags....which is a job for a different day, I think!

Oh yes and I went to the dump again this morning with the last of the garden stuff including my world class collection of polystyrene fish boxes (just don't ask) and all the willow I'd cut from the allotment over the last five years to make baskets. I can make baskets btw, I went to a class a few years back and made a dozen or so really nice ones but I've never made a single one from my steadily increasing pile of home grown willow! It doesn't improve with keeping though so I decided to get rid of it. If I ever do get a sudden urge to make baskets again I can always use stuff from the hedgerows.

I did bring some things home from the allotment though. The last of the spuds, some autumn raspberries, three lavender plants, an alpine strawberry plant, the bean trellis that I use every year and a small set of folding steps which I need for pruning. I've been casting a sceptical eye over the contents of the shed though, there's not so much more I want to take apart from the tools, the set of shelves and the modest collection of chemicals. (Slug pellets etc, I'm 95% organic.) The rest of the Highly Useful Things I will leave for the next plot holder.

Lazy_Liz

Decluttering the car, I keep lots of just in case things in the car, we live in the country so even a couple of miles from a main road can be a long way from anywhere. I think all this" just in case" must have begun in Brownies where you had to have certain things in your pockets
piece of string
pencil
note pad
plastic bag
clean hanky
2p for the phone

Last time I posted I mentioned my 100 year old Granny and it reminded me she hords sugar. She has about 20 bags all dated and used in strickt date order. When I asked her about them she said that having gone through sugar rationing in WW11 she wasn't going to be caught out again and has stock piled sugar ever since.

Greenhouse clutter....oh dear the plant pots! I must do something about them, I'll have to soon as we are going to lay a new path in there and put shingle down over the borders to raise the floor level as the lower end of the greenhouse floods. I will need to dismantle the bench to do this so all the pots etc willhave to come off the shelf.

keep at it:)