2025 DECLUTTERING CAMPAIGN MrsSD - The Joy of Decluttering

Mrs_Salad_Dodger

1. Write a daily To Do list - only 3 tasks
2. Concerted effort to sort out sleep patterns - Realistic targets: bed by 2:00 a.m. & up by 10:00 a.m 
3. Continue dealing with mail & email on a daily basis
4. Don’t put it down, put it away + deal with mini tasks as soon as they are noticed e.g. refill olive oil pourer or salt cellar, stitch up a hole in a garment etc
5. Commence ‘Operation Frog Tickling’ using the acronym - I.R.I.S. (Identify, Research, Implement, Sign Off) - One per quarter
6. Continue to keep kitchen clean & tidy - before going to bed

Monday continued: DH went out to the garage at 13:45 & I joined him at 14:15. DH had wheeled out the Harley Davidson & had put various larger items out on the drive including the work bench, bike lift, leaf blower, mechanical stepper machine, spare motorcycle seats etc. When I joined him, he was undecided where to start so we formulated a plan & got started. We started at the back left hand side by tidying up the wood into a bag, rearranging a shelf & creating some space then methodically worked our way clockwise round the garage emptying crates & boxes & matching like with like - sorting out into recycling, general rubbish, items for Tip run, putting some items away immediately & other items into a small tray to sort later. Emptied a collapsible crate & managed to clear a shelf which now only has Harley Davidson parts - panniers etc. Then cleared & cleaned the fixed workbench + sorted out the top of the large tool box. Swept & vacuumed the garage floor & then returned motorbike etc back into the garage - back indoors at 17:30. Lots of space now & I really wish I had taken before & after photos ☹️ There is still lots to do but all in all a fruitful afternoon. Will count 10 items for Tip, 10 bits of recycling & a full bird seed bag of rubbish which I will count as 30 items so 

1216 - 1265 Items from garage

For dinner we finished off the rest of Sunday night’s linguine. Wudupa.

1266 - 1269 Kitchen recycling, drinks cans, cardboard packaging, glass bottle - recycled 

1270 - 1271 Kitchen detritus, polystyrene packaging - binned

Liverpool_Anne, that is what I call a good way to spend a Sunday - a return to bed then the rest of the day spent watching football 😊 This “….. as OH's idea of "picking up some salad" consists of potato salad and coleslaw” had me giggling 🤭 although my DH would probably just buy the coleslaw (as he is not a fan of potato salad ) 😂 Hope it was cool enough after your shopping trip & that you were able to do a tip run 🤞

London_1, I do hope This “My late Ma-in-law said 'when the berries come early we will have a hard winter'.” doesn’t come true 🤞🤞Thank you so much for sharing such wonderful stories about your mother-in-law & your late husband 🥹  Such a pity that the book was lost 😢 

_Dolly_Rocker_, well done on keeping your dogs safe 👏 Fingers crossed that you can pick up a couple of extra paid dog walking jobs this week 🤞

QueenJess, excellent decluttering by both you & DD 👏 Great work reaching & passing your use up target 👏 a medal 🏅 is on its way.

YBR, shame about losing your lettuces to the birds ☹️ Hopefully the children will help you pack the rest of your stuff before you move 🤞 & will be excited to help unpack once you are in your new house 😊

Brie, shame about the water butt dying “a tragic death” 😞 The layer of mud should make a nice composting material 🤞 Good luck finding a new suitable water butt 🍀 

BridgetTheCat, excellent work in your sewing room 👏 Good luck with your sewing project 🍀

Oops 😬 just noticed the time so will post & go to bed. Will finish the cheerleading tomorrow. Sleep tight 😴 

MrsSD Awards: 💐 🌟 ❤️ ❤️ 🏅 💐 💐 💐 🏅🥉🏅 🎂 🌟⭐️⭐️❤️ 🍫🐾 😍🥇🥇 💐 🏆 ⭐️

DH Awards: 🏅 ‘Squirrel Whisperer’

DSis Awards: ⭐️ ⭐️ 🏅

Decluttering Target 2025: 1271/2025

1p Savings Challenge Running Total: £299.00

CRANKY40

Well done on the garage clearance Mr & Mrs S_D

@Dizzycap I took ds out to fetch something yesterday and he paid for us to have coffee out. In the cafe were two georgeous daxies and even better, one of them came to say hello to me. I hope that babyface hasn't set her recovery back too far by being fruitloopy. 

Between ds, the kitten and being too hot I have no idea what date I've counted to so up to last night the monthly total is 75. I think I'm not going to do any more "house general" things as ds has two cupboards of doom in his bedroom and we have plans for them.

One cupboard will be emptied of all the boxes that are stored in there but the memory stuff will be kept. That should make enough room for some more big storage tubs. The contents of cupboard two that he wants to keep (pokemon stuff, collectable figures) will go into the tubs and be kept in cupboard one as it's slightly less accessible that cupboard one. That will mean that we can get rid of the "kiddy storage" in cupboard one and put a chest of drawers in there so he has room for all of his clothes. I have no idea how long this project will take 🙄especially with the help of four very interested paws 😄

vulpix

 Oh dear Cranky, I am shamed to say I gave all DS's Pokemon stuff away whilst he was at uni. He reminded me of this the other day. Who is to know what is a fad and what will become a classic collectable? 0ops! Pokemon are classic now. Even my user name is a Pokemon.

 Fabulous satisfying garage sorting  Mr and Mrs SD. I was watching an American vid yesterday. The garage had carpet and was beautifully painted with just a few items in there. They MUST have a space elsewhere for the actual real contents of a garage. I have made Mr V a very happy man, I have suggested having a shipping container at the next house. He has been yearning for a shipping container for years but we just haven't had suitable space.

 Going back to read posts now. Have a good day all. It is pleasantly cooler here today with some rain forecast. Yesss.

 Vx

 

charlies_tribe

Ive struggled with the heat this week and not done anything other than what I have too. 
I got a pan out earlier and it must have sent vibrations through the shelf to a probably already balancing Pyrex dish. It flew off the shelf, landed on the bottom shelf and exploded everywhere. 
Had to empty the whole cupboard and clean everything out. Then the floor and now all the pots are going through the dishwasher just incase of any missed shards. At least the cupboard is clean now.
The house is currently driving me mad. Everywhere I look there's just stuff and I have no idea what yo do with it and no energy to tackle it. Will get there eventually, afterall its taken 24 years to appear so not going to vanish in months.

Right, DH has taken DD2 to dance so im going to get something done, hopefully. 

930  Beach spade
931-942  12cm school work/books
943  Underwear
944  Holey socks
945  Pyrex bowl

daisy_1571

sewing bee back tonight at 9 - I hadn't seen adverts but luckily mum mentioned it as my planner wasn't going to tape it for some reason

Dxxx

QueenJess

The bathrooms are mostly done now, although I have a few more bits of cleaning to do.  I rearranged DH's stuff (and cleaned it) and he agreed to get rid of multiple ancient toothbrushes he never uses as frankly they looked horrible.  His stuff is now neatly organised and hopefully it means he won't buy any duplicates as he can see it all.  I've not been brave enough to tackle him on his overflow in the upstairs cupboard yet, but I did tackle him on the stuff under our bed and I am glad to say it's all been decluttered (just in case offcuts of carpet we've had for 11 years...).  I now have a clear under bed space (but not clean as I need to vacuum under there).  It feels luxurious to me to not need to store anything under the bed (we always needed to when I grew up) and I was determined not to need it in this house.  It's weird the little things we class as luxury isn't it?

I have ventured into DS's room.  Usually I have to avoid it as it stresses me out.  He cannot keep it even vaguely tidy and it's impossible to dust as DS is trying to display absolutely everything he owns and it would take a full day to try and dust.  I don't care if it's pristine or not, but he does his homework on the floor as his desk is full of junk, he can't take a book out of the bookcase without moving multiple things and I take my life into my own hands if I need to open the window or put his clothes on his bed.  I've bought him a desk tidy and he can only keep what fits in that.  Then we need to go on a big decluttering spree in there to be absolutely realistic about what he uses, then we may need a few bits of extra storage.  I've been here before though and it just seems to revert to type once I've cleared it up.  My only conclusion is that he has more stuff than he can deal with, so it has to go.

House is a bit of a tip due to all the decluttering, but I am working hard on making sure things exit the house pretty fast once we decide we don't want them anymore.  I think I'll be working on the upstairs for quite a while longer.  To be fair downstairs is only a toilet (done already), the big hallway cupboard (already tackled a week or so ago, although I'm sure I could reconsider some of my shoes), the living room (can be reviewed, but it's always tidy so not an issue) and the kitchen/diner (pending me using up quite a lot of stuff and is quite an overwhelming room).  TBC...

QueenJess

Just posted so I didn't lose my post from earlier.  I came back from picking up DS and we worked through his desk and bookshelves with the promise that I would buy more storage for the things he loves, but first he needs to get rid of a lot of things - if he realistically isn't going to use it then it needs to go.  A fair amount did go, but there is more to do and the elephant in the room will be dealing with all of the surfaces.  Just finished sorting through it all, so listing it below.... the saga will continue tomorrow..

11 - sticker sheets (charity bag)
3 - kids colouring table/chairs (Buy Nothing)
1 - kids books (charity bag)
1 - DD dress she doesn’t wear (Buy Nothing)
2 - crayon/pencil used up
5 - pen used up
3 - carpet offcuts not needed (tip)
2 - poor quality crayon recycled
4 - bathroom storage that doesn’t work for us (Buy Nothing)
2 - packaging reused
1 - OOD toiletries binned
3 - DH ancient toothbrushes recycled
1 - box recycled
1 - cleaning cloth used up (composted)
3 - desk tidies (Buy Nothing)
14 - DS tat (binned)
9 - DS tat (recycled)
2 - DS books (Buy Nothing)
4 - DS toys (Buy Nothing/charity bag)
26 - DS stationery items (charity bag)
1 - sun cream used up

New total 3,152
Use it up total 261
Mini kitchen challenge 44/50
Big kitchen declutter challenge 37/150

Bathroom supplies 5/5

So that's a total of 525 things gone from the house since Thurs/Fri last week when I decided to start a big declutter.  Clearly we still have a fair amount of stuff kicking around..

Muddy_Walker

Hellooo
Well it’s been a week now without Pepper….and now that the weather isn’t trying to cook everything I am actually feeling…..a bit better. The heat exhaustion did NOT help but we are doing ok! 

Rogan is like a different dog…..quiet but still playful and chatty when we go out. It’s like he isn’t vying for my attention any more. He and Pepper rarely played together but he adores Dolly, my brother in laws dog when they stayed last year if you remember. They didn’t stop the pair of them…..dogs are funny things aren’t they!
There will be another puppy one day - I just couldn’t cope with a dogless house. We had an internet engineer here earlier and Rogan was insistent that he show the man his Kong and that it was empty and could he possibly fill it??? 😋😋
I will finally be tackling the weeds in the garden bit by bit and the dirty great brambles that have suddenly grown 😳…..and deadheading things….
Take care all and thank you all soooo much for your kind messages. Xx

Willowtree222

Those listings have done well. 
6 glass bottles recycled and a mini trampoline. £2 for all of them but I don't mind the money, I'd rather theyd be used. 

Found a bag of bark in the garage. I've used it in the garden. No sure it counts as decluttering as I still have it, but not dumped in the garage. 

daisy_1571

Aw Muddywalker love that rogan wanted to show the man his empty kong!!  So sweet.  Glad your coping not too bad without pepper

QueenJess id love under the bed to be empty so I understand how lovely it must feel.  I've cut down whats under the bed massively and get pleasure from using it with space between the boxes rather than having to remove 2 boxes to get to a third (like your son lol).  We also struggle to keep surfaces clear.  Out best tactic is to simply reduce the surface possibility.   Higher units help as it tends to be waist height surfaces where stuff gets laid down.  Bookcases with doors help cut down on dust (and stuff falling over as its properly displayed)

I'm knackered tonight.   Decided to clear craft room.  Well it looks great.  Landing, main bedroom, our little morning room and downstairs however not so much!  Now follows a pondering stage as I'm trying to work out what I need back in there.  When we moved in 4 years ago we got the room 'straight' and ive just worked around it since.  Now I'd like to get it functioning better so as Simon on find it fix it flog it says, it needs a couple more coats of looking at.  Tomorrow there will be more furniture moving as I wander the house eying up pieces that look about the right size and we humph them up to test the space.  The morning room is upside down as I fancied trying the bookcase in there for size.  Amazing how much more space books take up when in piles on the floor rather than neatly in a bookcase.   Anyway,  bookcase fits perfectly in the craft room, possibly a touch too big for the morning room tbh, so might stay, might go back to morning room.  Either way I'll most likely be checking gumtree for another bookcase for one room lol

Better sleep again tonight I think, weather a lot cooler here rained pretty much all day

Take care folks, hugs

Dxxxx