Hoarding - Springing Ahead

lobbyludd

I got a hand made card from dd5 and breakfast in bed (2 hours after I got up, had to go back to bed to have my apple and water on a tray ). DS11 "can't find" the card he made, and stayed all day in bed playing computer games, to which I initially thought "bring on those teenage years!" but transpires he has an upset stomach so I've let him off.

that meant working from home today whilst he recuperates. have now shut off work computer and work mobile and I am going completely incommunicado until next monday. HOOORRRRAAAYYYYY!

I'm going to get a cup off coffee put the washing away and then start raids on the loft

caitybabes

Have been dehoarding moss from the front garden, does that count? Am trying out a new daily routine at the moment. A few days last week I naturally woke up at about 5.30am (probably because I'd been going to bed fairly early) so I thought I'd try actually getting up at 5.something to get stuff done before I go to work, so I'm shifting my 'home time' to the morning when I have the most energy, as I'm always shattered when I get home from work (I'm a teacher and it's usually non-stop). Today was a revelation! I made soda bread before going to work and found that I had more energy when I got home too so did some washing up and was shifting mossy clumps after dinner. I think this will help me keep on top of the house work and keep sorting cupboards and dehoarding as it doesn't seem like such hard work in the morning!

Right, off to bed now to continue the productivity tomorrow.

Keep at it, people, you are all doing a great job!

Cait

GreyQueen

Now, here's a thing; do you think decluttering is contagious?

Have been talking to my lovely mother, a woman of many virtues, and no vices, but with Isshews around hoarding. She volunteered the information that she had been having a turf-out in their bedroom because Dad couldn't get to the wardrobe (they have a wall unit with a wardrobe eitehr side, nominal his& hers but really hers & most-of-his-also-hers). Many couples will recognise this arrangement, I'm sure.

Anyway, Mum remarked that Dad isn't one for complaining but that it was getting him down so she unblocked his wardrobe by removing two large plastic crates, one of which was full of old magazines. Which she decided can go in the recycling bin right away. And the two crates are partially broken, probably due to their position, and will be going, too.

Baby steps, but heartening. I have sneakily converted her into a watcher of The Hoarder Next Door, which she does on the fly.

To anyone hoarding shoes, I'd like to tell you a little tale from Mum's Cupboard, the big walk-in one in their bedroom. Into this cupboard had been stashed a pair of unworn, still boxed, shoes. Not fancy shoes, just her everyday black laceup flats. These were stashed because she bought them at a time she didn't have immediate need of them. But when she did wear out her other shoes, she 'shopped the cupboard' and fetched out this pair.

Walked up the road to her car, new shoes felt a bit uncomfortable, which she attributed to their newness. Then she got out of the car, walked around town a bit, and the shoes were feeling weirder and weirder underfoot and she noticed that she was trailing a line of rubber crumbly bits, like Hansel and Gretel in the woods with their breadcrumbs.

The rubbery material of the synthetic soles had rotted in storage and was disintegrating as she walked. Shoes were quickly unwearable and she went into a shoeshop and bought a replacement pair.

The moral is that she'd wasted the shoes, the money, the space she'd used for storage and her time. They'd died in storage. I know a bloke who accidentally did the same thing with a pair of his shoes.

Yes, a first-class pair of all-leather shoes, carefully used and mended as necessary, can last decades. But most of our footwear isn't of this quality and won't be around come the mid-century. If we don't use it up, it will rot and become unusable. So, it's a good habit to think of releasing unwanted shoes sooner rather than later, so they can go on to serve someone else via the c.s. etc.

I presently have two pairs of shoes but am concentrating my wear on the older pair so I'll just have one pair on the go. I have shoes for work, trainers for leisure and boots for gardening, hiking and flip flops to cover the gaps, plus a pair of fabric slippers and that is IT. And it makes me happy not to have fleets of footwear tripping me up in the bedroom and elsewhere.

I'd like to recapture the simplicity of my girlhood self who'd wear her new shoes out of the shoe shop and dump the worn-out ones in the bin as she went.

I'm contiuing to dine a la Zanooosi (a rare form of haute cuisine, don'tcha know ) and have hauled out something to defrost to be tomorrow's supper. Three months to empty the freezer, oh my goodness, that's a lot of grub. Was much of it unrecognisable until it was defrosted, that well-known game called Freezer Surprise?

lostinrates

Hello hoarders.


LOOOOOOOOOONG time no see..

We' be been doing really Well. Apart from study almost all of down stairs looks normal....pretty amazing in a renovation house I think!

We've done trip after trip to recycling places, charity shops and even bins.

Books have been hardest. Things we value but no longer want for ourselves but that charity shops don't want and when we took to the book recycling place where there is a bin for sale or pulp the man at the tip said.....n'ah, they are proper rubbish, pulp. They are pristine.....just not junky fiction. .

Still, they aren't part of our life...so several boxes are gone. Heartbreaking. What a waste.



Now, upstairs is not as bad, but needs a bit of an edit. The thing I HAVE to take responsibility for? My I share of the wardrobe. Some things are boxed in the attic and are staying, no discussing. But there is stuff on the shelf I struggle to get rid of.

This falls in to more than one camp.

The camp I am struggling most with with ATM is

'Don't like it but its useful' . This is often vests in my case. I feel wasteful getting rid of them but they do little for my self esteem. But I feel throwing them might do even worse.

There is also
'Has some life in it still' this is less straightforward than you'd think. Unlike many I am pretty home bound and rarely see anyone. I damage clothes easily and regularly both due to nature of lifestyle and personal reasons ( I fall over a lot) so ripped trousers for example, can still be employed for dog walking around home, or mucking out horses. Its not that I plan to wear these out anywhere. I suppose this is a subsection of don't like it but useful, but it also includes 'love it too much to throw'



My plan is to try and break down my wardrobe into two weeks of attack.

This week hanging rail one.

This is comprised of five sections, if I can tackle most of it tomorrow I'll be very pleased.


Edit: if any one has any wardrobe Dericharding tips I'll be grateful. I know I'll be hanging on to things. E..g I have a frightful blue vest froma supermarket. I hate it, but its useful. I can see it now, there is nothing wrong with it,......il cannot get rid of it. . ( should say, we have already cleared quite a few bits of less disputed clothing. But....I know I am not wearing some of this stuff, because...um.....its really neatly folded from a long time ago! I'm wearing stuff I dislike to wear it out)

lobbyludd

could you give the stuff you don't like to a charity shop so that people who do like it can give it a loving home? we all like different stuff, and surely you deserve to wear things you like, or at least not stuff you actively hate? If you sort things into those you like and those you don't HOWEVER useful, will the "like" pile be enough to have a capsule wardrobe (which can include scruffs that you like for around the home if you want), sounds like maybe you're wearing a capsule wardrobe now, but of things you hate?

I did this a while back and it's been great - I still have more than enough clothes, but I like me in clothes more, and the other clothes have gone on to new lives with people who love them LOL

lostinrates

lobbyludd wrote: »

could you give the stuff you don't like to a charity shop so that people who do like it can give it a loving home? we all like different stuff, and surely you deserve to wear things you like, or at least not stuff you actively hate? If you sort things into those you like and those you don't HOWEVER useful, will the "like" pile be enough to have a capsule wardrobe (which can include scruffs that you like for around the home if you want), sounds like maybe you're wearing a capsule wardrobe now, but of things you hate?

I did this a while back and it's been great - I still have more than enough clothes, but I like me in clothes more, and the other clothes have gone on to new lives with people who love them LOL

Capsule wardrobes just don't work with my lifestyle. Sometimes I need to get changed four times a day, so if I have one perfect t I'm stuck! I'm not aiming for a capsule wardrobe, but I do think I need a really good edit.

And ip think getting the stuff I dislike out of it is a key move. It seems a real financial leap though, ( here starts the talking myself out of doing anything, because if I get rid of it I need new stuff! and what's the point of new stuff to garden , muck out or fall over in. And even though I hate my comedy vests, they keep me as warm as non comedy ones would.....right?

Sigh.

If I had a more normal lifestyle it would be much easier to see wood for trees I think. .

MrsAtobe

LiR, my darling sister in law to be came down a few times before we moved to help me go through the walk in closet that was overflowing with my clothes. She's training to be a counsellor, so she managed to hit just the right time with me. I purposely didn't tell her which was my mum's coat, because I wanted a genuine opinion on whether it suited me or not. It was a very good quality coat, camel in colour, woold and cashmere, but it just didn't suit me, so what was the point in me keeping it?

Is there someone you could trust to go through your wardrobe with you?

GreyQueen

Morning all.

Nice to 'see' you again, LiR. Well done on the house renovations, I remember your photos from partway through the process and how lovely it was looking in the bare bones, as it were.

Re needing scruffs, I have a much more modest version of your lifestyle, with allotment gardening in place of your holding and no animals. We do need scruffs for these tasks as they're in and out of the muck and in and out of the wash, and they wear up, but I find I have to set myself a limit, which is presently one-third of a drawer (excluding whatever is being used at a time).

I need scruffy trousers and longsleeved shirts to garden in, even in summer, as have to keep the sun off my pale skin or I'll get bad sunburn. I'm using up some of my old stuff from the office-y part of my life and a couple of cast-off shirts from my brother. When they've gone beyond even gardening usage, they can go for ragging.

Over the years, I came to the conclusion that, for me, the issues about clothing were about (lack of) social confidence. I was convinced if I just got the 'right clothes' my life would suddenly be transformed and I would be a different sort of person altogether. One who was confident, glamourous, sexy, accomplished, professional, arty etc etc.

It wasn't a single LBM but a journey dotted with them, including reading stuff like Alison Lurie's The Language of Clothes, which opened my eyes to the fact that confidence is something your grow from within yourself, not something you purchase. And that the great con of fashion and hyper-consumption of apparel is trying to fill the personal voids, the ones where we are five year olds standing outside the circles of the popluar kids with our lower lips wobbling on the verge of tears and our inner selves saying Why don't they like me?

I've grown in confidence over the years, from a terribly low starting point, and know what suits my temperament as well as my lifestyle, clothing wise, and when I'm trying to placate my inner five year old by purchasing (or even wanting to purchase) the in thing which I know will be a white elephant because it doesn't fit the life I have, but rather my Fantasy Self. Miss Minimalist has a lovely post on this very subject:

http://www.missminimalist.com/2011/08/declutter-your-fantasy-self/

lostinrates

Grey queen, its still bare bones, its just less cluttered barebones!!!!

Its going to be on going for years......we will NOT to a 'grand designs ' type thing and go in debt to do the house and enjoy it finished, so its a little at a time but enjoy the journey and that means waiting to finish it.


Fantasy self is interesting. There is a lot of the old me in boxes certainly, and its true I am not willing to let go of her yet, because I hope she is coming mp back one day.

But I don 'to think the fantasy self is the one clinging to the clothes I don't like. I think its just the really mean financially/tight one.

Now I have heating and hot water again (whohooooooooo) maybe I can survive with fewer scuffs? That's worth thinking about.

lobbyludd

clothes for "old me" is in bags and bags in the loft, me from 20 years ago. I'm not sure why I hold on to them - I don't hope to be her again, she was very unhappy (was before new anti-D's came through that I need). I look back on photographs of me then and I am young, too thin and pretty but fighting an exhausting mental battle to stay living in the world. I would not want to wear most of the clothes again - perhaps I can go through them and let them go today. thanks GQ and LIR