KonMari 2016 - The Life Changing Magic of Tidying Up

[Deleted User]

VJsmum wrote: »

Kittie - photos take forever, I find it really difficult to get rid of any of the kids.

yes I completely agree with that and looking back over 40 years, some of the best photos are those that would have been chucked out, the ones that have character. I remember separating them into large envelopes to start with, when dh put them into separate digital files. Then I scanned many for the individual scrapbooks, scanned because I worried about ruining the originals as they were to be cut, all this while dh was digitising. It took a long time but now the scrapbooks are wonderful, particularly the family one, It really is not a process I would want to go through again but I would still do it, so that family history is remembered

Great nieces and great nephews are scrabbling on facebook, trying to get old family photos together as suddenly, after three family deaths in 2 years, they are realising that time goes by very quickly and when we are gone, then no-one will be able to tell them about the old days, about what it was really like

I have just put files and cds away, am getting too bogged down and now think I will leave it alone for good, once I have my photos in a frame, no point in reminiscing for me, looking at my lovely young self and wishing, it is just giving me heartache and I need to move on and get back to living in the present All I can say now is be a bit careful when you kondo photos

VJsmum

<<weeps>>

OH has just emptied the contents of the caravan into the lounge :eek:


To be fair, some of it is doubles of usable things - cling film, foil, cleaning stuff. Some of it will filter into kitchen cupboards and replace broken / will break things - mugs, cafetieres,

Flasks can go in an appropriate cupboard, but i may have to get rid of a couple of things.

Some cutlery I have never liked and it can go to the chazzer as there isn't anything wrong with it.

Still leaves quite a lot though

greent

MMF007 wrote: »

Am a bit concerned about having 10 paintings to deal with at the end of the course!

That's Xmas sorted then! :xmastree::xmassmile

GreyQueen

VJsmum wrote: »

<<weeps>>

OH has just emptied the contents of the caravan into the lounge :eek:

Deepest sympathies. Was this necessary so that the repairs could be done, or is it a way of ensuring that the decluttering takes place NOW?

Worrying how the caravan can rot even in storage, makes you wonder about the ones you see parked out 24/7/365 outside people's houses and whether they're slooowly rotting away inside.

Reminds me of a car I used to pass for years going to and fro school. It was a capri style hatchback in the 1970s (but not a ford) and was pulled up outside someone's attached garage. It started off in so-so condition and a bright candy-apple red. It never moved, I guess it was someone's project car.

The projected work never took place. The car sat there for over 25 years, fading from bright red to rose pink. The tyres deflated and then rotted, the trim detached, moss was growing on the window-wipers. On the rare occasion the garage itself was opened (car was parked with bonnet almost touching the door) you could see just floor to ceiling Stuff, it was rammed with no spaces whatsover.

Eventually the rotted out car disappeared. The garage still was never used. Think the house has changed hands and now there's an old caravan out there, faded and grubby, with flat tyres and rotting in situ..... Perhaps that spot is accursed and destined to be a vehicular graveyard.

Just in from work and fished out the sitting-room curtains and matching cushion cover which I slung into the wash on the way out the door. I have racked them and will damp-iron them in 2-3 hours and re-hang them to finish drying. They're just cotton, nothing requiring special treatment.

Realised that with the stronger sunlight of early Spring, that there are a few things around here which are starting to look a tad grubby and need cleaning. Need to get cracking on it as once the gardening season is in full swing, I will be playing up on the allotment and not thinking about the chores.

silvasava

VJ's Mum - we sold our caravan last year and I did leave an awful lot of things in it. I knew I would end up sending them to the CS so the buyer had a 'van that just needed bedding. I haven't missed or regretted anything that went with it.
You're selling at the right time of year so do hope you get a buyer soon.

Karmacat

VJsmum, sympathies - it's necessary, but its horrible.

And the photos! Aiiiieeeeeeeeeeeee ... I gathered together every photo in my mum's house, and sorted them in clumps of roughly two years - they were all over the place, as she was kind enough to do good colour photocopies and send them to family genealogiests ... but everything was everywhere.

Last time I was up there, I scanned up to the start of the colour photos in the mid 1960s. All the photos are in a sort of blanket box. When I go up there next week, the job is to start on the ones of us as older kids. And they need to be shared out between the three of us. The historical ones - I'm the caretaker, it's been agreed.

Scanning has been a boon, though. Plenty of photos from the 1940s are only an inch and a half square, and you can't really see what's what. But scan at a good resolution, and it fills the whole computer screen, it's magical :j and really worth doing.

MMF007

greent wrote: »

That's Xmas sorted then! :xmastree::xmassmile

Er, only for people I don't like!!! :rotfl:

Thankfully I have a shorter day of paid work tomorrow. This week has been very busy and I am pretty tired. Just have a bit of shopping to do for a client, 3 hours with another lady, and then my weekly visit to client in a care home, on behalf of her absentee relatives.
Sooooo, I may get a random kondo done later tomorrow, not sure what category yet but something will spring to mind

My friend has asked me to help her choose new curtain fabric so my love of bright colours will get some exercise, she likes bright things, too! I am looking forward to it. We are sure to find some joyful fabric

PollyWollyDoodle

Photos were hard work for me, not so much for emotional reasons but because of the sheer volume and I couldn't believe I'd kept so many not-very-good ones, pictures of landscapes (where?) and of people I'd met and whose names I can no longer remember. It took me a long time to weed them - the digital ones still haven't been done. It has made me take far fewer photos though, it's so easy with digital photography to take far more than you'll ever really look at.

I have a few in frames but they sort of got missed in Kondoing; I need to look at them again because although they record some happy times, nothing stays the same and perhaps it's time to change them. My niece looked beautiful on her wedding day but she's now twelve years older and I'd rather have a picture of her and her two lovely boys instead. My favourites are the collages, some made of actual photos cut up, and some made digitally - I love having lots of images in one frame. So that's the way to go for me, I think.

[Deleted User]

pollywolly, that is exactly how I started the photos, First I got rid of the ones I took of holiday landscapes and of people I met on holiday for a short time. Trouble was that dh was an award winning photographer and his landscapes were beautiful pictures in their own right, I did the cowards way out and passed all his hard discs over to a dd and her husband, thousands of pictures, mainly architectural such as beautiful structures in cathedrals. SIL is a budding photographer and he wanted them. I kept the hanging framed pictures that I wanted to keep, while not cluttering any wall. Then eventually I got down to personal photos, sharing most of the physical photos out to the owners but it has been one of the hardest jobs ever and in all honesty it took years. I am looking forward to receiving the new frames as I think it will add a lightness, whereas the old ones were bulky. The one last job that I need to do today is to backup all the family photo files onto a memoy stick which will arrive today and then it really will be job done, they are already on my desktop. I was the one who got the `dumped` boxes of photos when my mum passed and I never wanted to do that to my children

No MK today, I need a complete change and to unwind, so will get engrossed in sewing a dressing gown that is already cut out and then I will read a book and if the sun shines will cycle up to the allotment

Pooky

I was ruthless with the photos yesterday, you'd have all been proud. Every family get together had at least 3 budding photographers taking snaps of the same things from a slightly different angle and always sent copies of the photos so DD1's first birthday - 3 copies of the same photo of lighting the cake, carrying the cake, birthday girl and the cake and blowing out the candles (repeat for each child and birthday up til the age of 7) I saved one of the birthday girl and cake and the rest went. Anything blurry went, anything that was from my childhood that featured old school friends I still know, were shared on FB with those involved and the photo has gone - no one apart from me could name the people in the photo so it doesn't need saving. I also got rid of any baby photos that weren't my own children.....I love my neice and nephews but they're fully grown adults and their parents are custodians of their baby photos - not me.

Today I shall be aiming to kondo this stinking cold that DH has passed to me and I might clear out the cupboard under the sink.

GQ - I was looking at my living room and study curtains thinking they need a wash but until we stop using the open fire there seems little point, I do love a bit of spring sunshine to show up just how slovenly my housekeeping skills are.