Hoarding - Springing Ahead

Saver-upper

My eldest daughter (will be 12 next week),has been away with a friend and her mum since Monday,and came back today :j:j:j.It seems half the texts she sent me didn't arrive,so I thought she must be having too good a time to think of us.Then tonight she shows me on her phone about 3 messages we didn't get.I did have a little heart attack when,first thing this morning got a text saying "look forward to seeing you tomorrow" :eek:.Seems she sent it about lunch-time yesterday,though :cool:.

Before she got home,today I decluttered,vacuumed and tidied underneath her sideboard(the one that I had decluttered the other day).It wasn't as bad as I expected:took just over an hour,and was really just a matter of putting,eg,all the notebooks together,all the boxed games together,pairing up the pairs of "house-boots",bed-socks and frog-slippers :rotfl:.Put them together in a pretty box.
Girls seem to collect so much stuff.And not just nice big things,but bitty bits:bitty toys with a million parts,bitty games with a million pieces,bitty craft sets with a million bits.I found dozens of erasers,several keyrings,more notebooks,card-making sets,jewellery making kits,old calenders.....I also found about 17 odd socks :eek:.My habit of keeping huge collections of odd socks knowing that their mate will turn up one day,has just been re-enforced .

Today I also did a job that I have been trying to catch up with for about 3 months,promising myself I would then keep ontop of : I ironed the kid's school uniforms.
Now,I absolutely LOATHE ironing.As a rule,nothing in my house gets ironed.Even stuff that really should.And a million mums at school over the years have told me school uniforms don't need ironing anyway.But for some reason,my kids uniforms always do,even the polo shirts.So usually it is a matter of kids come down for breakfast,dressed in uniform.I say "you can't wear that:take it off so I can iron it".I use precious time of a school morning ironing .
I keep saying I will get it all done in advance,but somehow the shirts never catch up with each other.Between the dirty wash basket,washing machine,laundry basket,stain-soaking bowl,I am never able to get it all together.
Now it is school holidays,have been able to catch up.Over the hols,shirts have been washed and soaked as necessary.All uniforms are now dried,all shirts,trousers,skirts and pinafores ironed (alot of individual pieces between 4 children).
The plan now is to only have to do ironing,say,every Sunday night(though my ideal plan is to make it stretch to fortnightly-they certainly seem to have enough uniform between them!

Thank you everyone for the inspiration of this thread.

Have a Happy Easter,everyone x

softpad

Happy Easter.

I got a steam generator iron and ironing is a pkeasure now, effortless. Can highly recommend as it takes no time at all

GreyQueen

Afternoon all.

I'm taking a break from the shopping and the decluttering. The folks are doing their regular Saturday thing, which is to be at my Nan's before 9 am. Mum takes a carload of little old ladies inc Nan and Auntie up to the shop, Dad gardens Nan's large back garden (think allotmentsized) and mows the front and back lawns. They'll be back 2 pm-ish.

Tomorrow we'll go fetch Nan to spend Easter Sunday with us and there is stuff to do at the homestead. I have been tacking The Sideboard. Not a big piece of furniture but Kipple Central. Thought I'd got it all sorted then looked around and saw that some of the stuff which came off it is still off it; on the sofa.

It's very slow going in this house, lots of stuff belonging to the 3 people who live here, two of which could reasonable be describes as chronic hoarders and one who is merely highly-disorganised (Hi Dad!). Love them all, don't love the clutter.....:rotfl:

The parents live in a council area with altenate weekly collections so they have 2 240 litre wheelies. They're staunch recyclers and the recycling wheelie gets good use. It's presently three-quarters full and will get more full when I get the chance to run some packaging past them.

:T Oooooh, can hear a hand-bell and see the scrappie driving very slowly on a neighbouring street. Hope he's coming to ours afterwards, not that we missed him on his way around the estate. Have a chunk of iron which needs to go off the premises so am keeping my ears open for the bell on our street. If I exit in a hurry you know what happened. Thank heavens that scrap is worth money these days and that people will come door-to-door to collect it.

YESSSS!!! And it's gone. And it was only an hour ago that I queried its existance and was told it was due to go but no one had gotten around to getting rid. Big ugly chunk of steel outta here.

Now, I feel quite re-energised by that unexpected opportunity so will re-engage with the battle. Cover me, ladies, I'm going in!

ginnyknit

Its those little success's that spur you on isnt it GQ?

I c*cked up and couldnt get to the Post Office this morning with the fleabay stuff but Im guessing no one will expect me to and Tuesday will be fine.

Freecycle lady let me down, all excited at trying to get the crafty stuff but didnt reply when I asked when she was coming down. Probably gone away for the weekend so I mailed her and gave her till today to contact me - :mad: wanted the box out of the way by tomorrow.

Hope everyone has a lovely weekend and remembers to throw away the packaging from easter eggs - you dont need bits of foil and card!

Saver-upper

Well,have spent mostof the afternoon under my sons bed :eek::rotfl:.
You know how I said yesterday that girls collect so much [STRIKE]tat[/STRIKE] stuff that clutters up the place.Well,I was surprised how much my son has hidden in an under-bed storage box.
I pulled everything out from under the bed,dusted about 1/2 inch of dust off skirting boards,polished these,vacuumed under bed.
Under the bed was:
-a couple of Trofast-size boxes,one with lots of Hexbugs,one with a marble run.Dusted all the pieces of both :eek: and returned
- large underbed storage box with all sorts of little boys treasures:all tidied,sorted,broken/not working/tatty bits thrown,good stuff kept together and re-stored
-an average-sized under-bed storage box which,when I only had 2 children (7.5 years ago!!) used to be a functioning "scarves,wooly hats and gloves" box.It worked really well when there was just those 2.Now 12yo has her own way of storing clothes (loves scarves,hats and other accessories,looks after them),and other kids just store their winters in their own clothes drawers.So everything in that box was emptied into the washing machine,getting ready to be donated.So empty box-result,underbed looks much less cluttered-result,and tidier-result :j.
Room vacuumed.
In that room there is still son's clothes drawers, and 2 Trofast vertical units to sort.Son did most of his this afternoon (while I did his undebed,cos I was sick of nagging him to do it ),and half a built-in-wardrobe (daughter did half last week,and I helped by decluttering all my clothes hanging at the top).Then that room will be complete,hooray.

lobbyludd

12 tasks from my list done, including a tip/recycling centre run and various diy jobs that have used things up, and remnants now in bin.

dear council, I am very in favour of your recycling scheme, not so sure that a 4 bag system was the way to go but hey ho, we've been working with it. However I strongly feel that in order to get residents to comply optimally it must at least be possible TO GET HOLD OF THE DIFFERENT SORTS OF BAGS. I went to 5 different places that are on the web-list as stockists, including the nearest municipal library and 2 community/leisure centres and none had them. I know from previous expeditions that the 4 shops that used to stock them locally no longer do, and the on-line ordering system yields nowt. they'll only pick things up in the relevant bags - which are "free" (paid for by council tax) - but the only bags I can currently get hold of are bought black bin bags, so I'm afraid it will all have to go in those this week as I can't have food/garden waste hanging around.

<rant over>

children want to toast marshmallows so a chance to burn some tat in the chimenea.

whitewing

Got 1 bag of rags and 1 big bag of clothes. Both have gone into the CS bin.

1 very decent bag, a woolly hat and some belts have gone to aunty.

Easter egg boxes into recycling box in the house. I assumed the recycling centre would be shut today; it appears to be open but DH refuses to go.

More personal paperwork shredded. DS' two sets of drawers, desk and wardrobe are virtually empty. He is away for a few days so there is no rush for the painting. There are a couple of piles of things still to be dealt with - some books to go back to school and so on. I am so mindful of the need to pace ourselves.

Everybody is thrilled with our Easter bits and bobs, complete with Easter gift tags. Yesterday was tiring with work and family visits but today we will be at home.

IrishRose12

Well yesterday I had another clear out as I walked around the house. Our CS bags won't be leaving the house till Friday as shop is closed Monday and Tuesday, and neighbour is on holiday from Tomorrow till Thursday, so it might actually be Saturday or Monday they go. That's gives me more time to tidy up and add to the bags while they're here, so don't mind when they go, as I know they're going.

Today is a relaxing day after all the running about, We've decided to BBQ today and next door's hubby is cooking so I'm happy with that arrangement :rotfl:

Kids are all sitting playing with the toys from one of their Easter Eggs, 2 are sitting out the front reading a book:eek: Which concerns me as they're way too quiet for this time of the morning and it being Easter.

Might go out in a bit and do some weeding and tidy up the garden a bit. It's not too bad TBH but the daffodils have died so they need cut back etc.

Happy Easter everyone and hope you all have a lovely day whatever you're up to

ginnyknit

Its very chilly here so no gardening for me. I have disposed of 2 empty boxes and a few other bits so progressing well. thrown some bits away from kitchen drawers and have tidied kitchen just have the floor to mop and thats done for now.

have a lovely day all xx

MessyMare

Question for you lovelies

We (or people we love) are hoarders...but now I'm worrying I've gone the opposite way and I'm now getting thoroughly addicted to getting rid of things. I almost got rid of two jumpers I love and wear all the time this morning because I was just itching to clear something...I get a rush when an email from Sue Ryder pings through telling me how much my stuff has raised (over £70 so far, and I've taken in loads more stuff since then) and I'm now mildly concerned I've gone the opposite way and I'll throw OH away if he sits still for too long!