Hoarding - Springing Ahead

silvasava

Libbyrice - well done you for recognising that you are inclined to seige mentality! You are certainly not alone! You've made a start however small it doesn't matter. Grey Queen made a very pertinent observation about having an exit strategy. Can you find out if there are places in your area that will take the type of things that you stockpile? If you know where you can take it it does make the decision process somewhat easier. I now know that my local CS will take rags as well as saleable clothing. Most of us try to either sell or donate rather than take to the tip. Freecycle can be a godsend as one persons surplus (polite term ) can be someone else's treasure. Happy unHoarding!

GreyQueen

Afternoon all.

I'm very much into disposing of things responsibly, by which I mean in ways which get re-usable things into the hands of people who can (and will) re-use them, and then for items which have gone beyond re-use, get them recycled or the parts which are recycled stripped off and away.

This is more time consuming than just chucking everything in the bin or over the side at the tip, something I see all too much of, but it's the only conscionable way I can get rid of stuff.

I triage unwanted things like this:

1. OK, not needed in this role/ place. Can it be re-purposed in-house or in-allotment? You need to be a strict realist about this or you just end up shuffling things from A to B.:o

2. Would anyone else in the family like it?

3. Is it a saleable book in good nick and worth at least £5 - offer to online bookseller brother for stock.

4. Would a friend or colleague like it? I've had giveaways of a few things at work over the years (da management is cool with this).

5. Is it something which is sufficiently good condition and portable enough to be taken to a chazzer?

6. Is it a worn-out item of clothing or household textile? Donate to chazzer pre-sorted in own bag labelled clean rags. Not all chazzers have an arrangement to sell rags on, so check before taking this in. I strip off trimmings and ribbons. I re-use some of these but button jars always go well on freegle.

7. If it's a bit random, and the sort of thing a chazzer might bin, could it be offered on freegle?

8. Is there a charity collecting such things? I have given away manual sewing machine and manual type-writers, other charities collect old pushbikes, garden tools, old spectacles and old paint, art and craft materials to groups etc.

9. Can it be recycled? Would it need separating into component parts first? Where can I take it for recycling (only have a pushbike).

You'll notice I haven't mentioned selling stuff because I'm not presently doing that, as haven't got much which is saleable and don't want to be bothered for the odd quid here or there. At other times, I have sold stuff on via local ads, I cba with fleabay.

Once you have decided something is going, and where it is going, I think a little-and-often way of proceeding is the best. Try getting stuff out at least once a week, perhaps more. A bag on your way to the shops or work if you can set yourself up with a chazzer which is on the way to somewhere you go regularly.

If you can, allocate an area for staging. This might be a cupboard, where boxes and bags of to-be-donateds live temporarily, or a place on the spare bed. It must be used in a disciplined way or you have just moved your Stuff from A to B again.

Each item has the decision-making stage, the packaging stage (bagging or boxing or whatever) then the final stage is when you walk away from the chazzer empty-handed, or drive away from the HWRC, or wave off your dear friend who is pleased-as-punch with her bagful of Stuff.

Until you've completed the final stage, you're in danger of just shuffling stuff around.

pigpen

Libby... bring it to mine.. I will knit it .. it is all I ever do! There is a facebook group I am in which is where i shift a lot of unused yarns.. someone has to add you though.. if you trust me ?

Gingernutty

Two pairs of trainer socks - the elastic has frayed and they don't stay up so they're going in the rag bag.

Two necklaces - one was green painted plastic beads but the paint was peeling off them - that's been dismantled and put in the recycling and one was made with dozens of brightly coloured beads of various sizes.

It's too bright and jazzy and I have nothing to wear with it. Charity shop.

M.E.

For those MSE good folks with stashes of wool/yarn contact lovinghands.org.uk.
Similar in ethos to the OS board, Loving Hands members will knit up all wool into useful items that are given to charities who deliver the knitted items to those who need them.
Generally speaking, if you contact Loving Hands arrangements can be made for a member local to you, to come and pick up the unwanted wool.
Indeed I have picked up several boxes of wool from people who have contacted Loving Hands, and then redistributed the wool amongst Loving Hands members. None of the wool is wasted. Scrappy scarves, dog blankets and pom-poms are made from the smallest of scraps.
www.lovinghands.org.uk

thriftwizard

Oh, M.E., thank you, that's helpful to me too!

No further progress here :-( thanks to a resurgence of my sinus-type infection - can't settle to anything with my head whirling round. Doesn't help that I bought a box of 62 old dressmaking patterns yesterday - if just 5 of them are intact, I'll be into profit on that - to sort out! But a friend with a dressmaking business is going to take the ones I can't sell, so they're all destined to move on fairly swiftly.

Slinky

libbyrice wrote: »

For quite a number of years i was into knitting...but rarely got anything finished. So I have bags and bags of wool...some of which is nice stuff, like Rowan Big wool. I know i could sell this on ebay. My DD likes hats and scarves so I could finish some quick accessories for her but I also have a lot of wool that I bought for bigger projects which I will never start! It will be a wrench getting rid of it. My BF said if I binned it all and then wanted to buy it again he would gladly give me the money (I can see the reasoninbg here as he knows I would be unlikely to ever have the time to knit in the near future and he is just being sensible and trying to show me how crazy it is to hang onto bulky wool that is just gathering dust)

I threw away ONE BALL of scratchy horrible dusty wool yesterday then had a wobble and nearly fished it out of the bin! Thats how bad I am. I have to be hinest with myself about my craft stuff though. i like the idea of being crafty and making stuff but I really dont have the time. .

GreyQueen posted this on the KonMari thread a couple of weeks back, I certainly related to it, maybe you will too.

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

Gingernutty

Yet another pair of jeans. That's 11 pairs now. :eek:

I'm definitely a size 18/20 now.

A pair of prescribed reading glasses which are obsolete now I've got the new prescription. They can go to a charity bin in a local opticians.

mothernerd

yet another paring down of the craft stuff (139 bits today), still to go through the material stash - determined to only keep larger pieces that I have definite plans for. Will start to use the ones I have had for years 'saving them until I am the right size'.

thriftwizard

Posting one item off to the US today, and another two were listed on Ebay yesterday, both fairly large. One item didn't sell, but as I'd had to haul it out of use to list it, I'm not devastated. I'll leave it up there, but if no joy this time, it goes straight back into the kitchen & back into use! I only listed it because the Offspring don't like the look of it.

It's been a good weekend at the Emporium, so now I'm hunting round for a "headline" piece to take down there later, as the last one sold yesterday. The piles are steadily dwindling...