The KonMarie method

chaliepud

maman, My local newsagents sells lovely little gift boxes for very little money and they would look lovely on a side table with your manicure bits inside, they're not flimsy and last well. I have a few dotted around the house with various things in and will buy more when I have finished kondoing.

greent

maman wrote: »

I have a bit of a dilemma between mse and MK here. I finished the last bottle of unjoyful shower gel this morning. All I have left is 2 small (50ml) gift size bottles of Clarins which match my perfume. Now do I buy more joyful shower gel or something functional from the SM and keep joyful stuff 'for best'?

Definitely use the joyful Clarins! I have joyful Clarins and joyful No7. Neither are especially cheap, but I love both! They shall be on my Xmas list! - and my birthday list!

maman wrote: »

I can see the point but I'm not sure I ever had containers for some things so really thinking hard. I find if I keep manicure bits (hand cream, buffer, emery board, nail oil) by my chair in the sitting room I look after my nails better. Previously they were just scattered over a table top but haven't returned since we decorated. I want something that looks better than a mushroom punnet. Any advice?

A small basket which is joyful? It is perfectly acceptable to buy something in this instance, I feel!


x

maman

FurryBeastOz wrote: »

I agree with Sally A I've started using my Clarins stuff (Eau Dynamisante - Red) more often, and it always makes me more joyful. A reward for a good work-out. It's Permanent on my Christmas/Birthday list in whatever form. Then I get presents I know I'll love.

I'm convinced! That's what I use Eau Dynamistante. I love the stuff.


And thanks for the gift box idea chaliepud, may be easier to get a small size box than a small basket.

GreyQueen

First of three coats of white paint on; hall, stairs, landing (small 1960s terraced house btw). Covering over sage green. Painted from 10 am until 4 pm, with several breaks. All toys now put away for the night.

Parents, including highly dubious it'll -look -like-a-hospital Mum very impressed and pleased. Coat two tomorrow, coat 3 on Weds and on Thurs all the bits put back and me taking the bulk of the day off before returning to my flat.

I'm as happy as a pig in the proverbial, I do love a bit of painting.

The folks were banished to other parts of the house. The Queen of Sheba, one of the two parental mogs, (a snooty mongrel Burmese) spent a good ten minutes sitting on the stairs staring at me through the banister as I was painting the hall.

The weight of her stare actually made me turn around. She didn't pass comment but eventually retired to bed. The fluffball Wild Thing has been out all day in the pouring rain. Doors have been open, so it's purely her choice. She's the one who provokes head-shaking and the comment she's not right (in the head), is she?

The walls alongside the stairs actually seem further apart, now they're painted white. Freaky.

greenbee

Well done GQ By the time the coats and a few pictures are back, it will look lovely - light, open and uncluttered but not unused.

Where are they going to put all the stuff that was there before?

GreyQueen

greenbee wrote: »

Well done GQ By the time the coats and a few pictures are back, it will look lovely - light, open and uncluttered but not unused.

Where are they going to put all the stuff that was there before?

Back. There is a cabinet opposite the foot of the stairs which is a junk magnet. Holds LPs, inc the country ones Mum used to put on to drive me out of the house when I was a nipper. I have a severe Jim Reeves allergy to this day. I'd have them down the chazzer, plus the cabinet, and have nothing there, but it ain't my house.

There is a mirror to go back, plus one of those long skinny school photies which has my Dad as part of the cast of dozens. Dodgy looking reprobate. And the coats on the hooks - they're on the spare bed behind my chair as I type, so will have to put them somewhere for the night or sleep like a hamster in a nest.

We did play some LPs today - Acker Bilk and a dramatisation of Star Trek episodes from the seventies (it's weird in my life ).

I find myself dreaming that Bea Johnson of ZWH adops me and I go to live at her house.............:rotfl:

greenbee

Sleep in a nest of the coats ... have a very disturbed night and find that lots of them are damaged beyond repair in the morning

As your parents apparently have something to play the LPs on I can see the point in keeping them. However, could you help them organise the cabinet?

I'm still (after 2 years) working out how this house works for me. I found that I was constantly dumping stuff in the hall because there was nowhere to put things when I came in. Now I have a shelf over the radiator where I can put keys, it has a mirror above it, opposite the stairs (hate mirrors, but occasionally remember I have to check that I look human before leaving the house), and notepad, pens, candle and a couple of photos - no room for anything else.

What kind of junk does the cabinet attract? Could you put a nice bowl/saucer of some kind there for keys? Or coins (my dad has an old plate on his CoD for loose change, as well as unusual bottles to put 5ps/20ps or whatever in). Maybe a basket of some kind for other junk that lands there and needs sorting? Talk it over with them and see what they think. Perhaps if you make it look nice when you put it back (framed photos, table lamp, some of the 'pretty' junk) they'll want to keep it that way.

As for coats, if they won't all fit on the current coat rack, send your mum out to her shed for a board and some hooks, and extend the coat rack so it is long enough to take them all. It'll either use up some things from the shed and at least make the bulk in the hall less, or it might make her think about the volume.. (I have a 6 foot coat rack, that my dad made from a piece of oak that used to be the windowsill in my playroom when I was about 6... I love it, although I still need to source one more hook for it...)

Good luck!

(and remember, if you want a holiday in Jane Austen country you have an open invitation to come and help with DIY/painting/gardening...)

GreyQueen

Umm, I have a few days leave in late September, was planning to paint some doors in my own flat, mebbe I should look up where Jane Austen country is and come visit Chez Greenbee? Will paint for food. You probably wouldn't like me IRL.:rotfl:

Umm, what does the cabinet attract? It's easier to say what it doesn't attract. It holds a small c-of-d unit of cassettes (the music centre has a turntable and cassette decks, CDs are played on other appliances). On this multi-level hell hole are, at any given time; shoes, slippers, bags, hats, coats, gloves (12 months of the year), books, things for recycling, Xmas wrapping paper (in August, I kid you not), the cats' vac records, sundry items of post, sales flyers for long gone sales, the argossy catalogue, sunhats, pegs, and more random Stuff than you can shake a stick at.

Regretfully, this isn't a household where you can put a lovely receptacle on the top of a cabinet. This is a household where the chazzer bags from the late 2014 sort-out were still behind the hall door 10 months later. I'm the only organised person in my family and I visit every 8 weeks for a couple of days.

Mum and I stood at the top of the stairs a few mins ago, looking at the space where the cabinet and its hellacious cargo normally squats. I sighed about how nice it looked without it there.

She remarked that there was nowhere else for it to go, unless she got rid of it. I idly remarked that would be a good solution and left it at that ..... a seed safely planted may germinate........ probably won't, but one can but try. And people do say I'm very trying.:p

greenbee

bit of a challenge there I'd say GQ, but at least your mum has the seed planted.

Could you suggest baskets for gloves/hats etc? Maybe she could make a nice shelf to go above the coat rack, and then put some baskets on it (bet there are some baskets in all the stuff they've got). Maybe she could make some cubbyholes to go below the coat rack (or just a couple of shelves) for slippers and bags? Stick filing box labelled 'cats' on there when you put the cat stuff back, and put a waste paper basket next to it as well... And suggest a couple of boxes/crates labelled 'recycling' and 'CS' which you could help deal with whenever you go back there...

I sympathise with you - my dad is like this (my mum keeps begging me and my brother to say we need stuff and take it away - I've finally worked this out, so do, whereas my brother says he doesn't need it). I did manage to get rid of a LOT of their stuff when they were moving. Easy enough with the junk, but had to be sensitive about some of it. My mum is always making holes in my dad's 'gardening' clothes bigger (he forgets they are gardening clothes and wears them in public) or turning them pink. She takes the collars off any shirts he claims are for gardening just to be on the safe side (sneakily removing buttons also helps make them useless and eligible for the rag bag...). Mind you, he is hugely attached to holey coats and wellies for some unknown reason (I think they may have belonged to his great, great, great grandfather or something...)

ETA - think I might be away in late Sept., but in all seriousness, you would be very welcome if you were down this way. I'm sure Mrs LW would love to meet you too. Although if you bring Nurse you can camp in the garden...

SpikyHedgehog

supersaver1000 wrote: »

....DD emptied a set of plastic drawers which I will kondo my sewing things into from a bamboo shelf. The bamboo shelf will replace a small unit by the bathroom and will hold a few towels and things. The small unit will go the top of the stairs with a few of our books on, and the deep unit currently at stair top will probably go into the living room as a log store (I saw something similar on Pinterest so hope it turns out okay).

MK says not to buy anymore storage until you've kondoed and she is so right. I have been using newly freed up containers and even giving them away. To think all that searching for just the right storage solutions was just trying to contain the mess, instead of setting it free :rotfl: I always stop myself from buying any cleaning 'solution' these days - I know I'm just trying to avoid the cleaning, but that no gadget will take away the fact that you just need to get on and do it (and that gadgets are just guilty clutter) 😄

Hope everyone has a great bank holiday and manages to get some rest and just a bit of kondoing done :rotfl::D:):)

I had a brain wave when I read this and ran off upstairs to play with the bookcase on the landing!

My bathroom is tiny and has no built in storage, except a nice wide window sill for cluttering up and a shelf at the end of the bath that DS1 rests his head on while taking a bath as the bath is too short for him to relax in properly (and he's too tall as it's not a problem for all 5ft 2in of me :rotfl:). I do have a narrow plastic 6 drawer unit next to the sink, which is all in use, and we had different shower gels, shampoos etc on the end of the bath.

So I weeded more books off the bookcase, and emptied the top shelf to put the toiletries on there. Took the shower gels bought on offer out of the airing cupboard and resolved not to buy any more at least this year and put the 'in use' stuff in a flexible basket from my bedroom that used to hold odd socks waiting for a mate. Bathroom looks better and the bookcase looks fine.

In reverse kondoing, I brought home 3 boxes of toys that my baby sister's children didn't want any more, but they're only in the car till I go to work on Wednesday, and a stack of small carrier bags that my brother gets beer in from his corner shop. I asked mum if she still had any dog poo bags as they're jolly useful for clearing the neighbours' cats' poo from the garden or the alleyway :mad: and got a wodge of bags that she'd neatly folded from the mass that my brother had given her to recycle. Folded, but not samosa'd, so that has been my evening task!

Other things that are in the bag waiting to go to the chazzer tomorrow:
- Coat hangers. We had too many coat hangers kept JIC, so they are all going - if I find a need for more hangers, I'll buy some sturdy ones, not use random supermarket ones that just about fit the clothes.
- Nightshirt that baby sis had passed onto me that had the subliminal message "Spiky Hedgehog is fatter than Baby Sis even when Baby Sis was 9 months pregnant".
- ~Polyester maxi dress that's for some reason ) too long for me and I don't really like the feel of the material.
Books... most of the last bagfull of DS2's books, various books that I've found around the house.

Also kondo'd today is a bath bomb that DS2 chose for my birthday - usually, I'd save it for special events and break it into small bits and make it last, so I had a bath this morning and used it all. Oh yes, and all the birthday cake has gone... with the aid of my willing helpers.