2026 DECLUTTERING CAMPAIGN Mrs SD - our Year of Redistribution

GrannyKate

A quick post as tomorrow (or rather today now) will be another busy day. I seem to be getting 4 children organised for school/college at the moment. Youngest 2 are getting on well with walking to school with some support from grandma. Today they did both journeys on their own completely. Tomorrow I have to go out early so they get a lift some of the way. I also have a committee meeting for which I do the minutes. The two youngest DGCs have slept at their dads so far this week but at mine tomorrow night and I'll feed them as well. I decluttered money to get some Euros for DS2 and DIL to get a meal in Rome or something and a monthly bus ticket for DGS3.

Very little gardening done as the only potential space so far this week was when it was raining. Sox is wanting a lot of attention this week and keeps sitting on the keyboard. DGS4 has managed to get biro on most of his new school uniform in his first week. Google suggested hand sanitizer and a toothbrush. I could not find any in the house - it was everywhere a few years ago but 2 small local shops didn't have any at all. Lovely shopkeeper in second shop had a basic pot he kept behind the counter to use. He said he was sure he had an unopened one out the back if I didn't mind waiting while he cleared his queue of customers. He fetched it for me and wouldn't take any payment as he said it was old stuff from when covid was at its height. It worked a treat on the tie - I told DS2 to send the shirts up to me and I'd have a go at them as well.

868-870 Three random items found in garden binned - broken plastic bowl, one of those sock holder peg thingummies, storage bag for outside cushions had fallen to pieces.

871 Garden cushions packed into storage box in utility room.

872 Council Tax form completed on line (to confirm I live alone)

873-875 Three frogs I needed to do for tomorrow finished an hour ago!

876 A small amount of lavender bush trimmed back and filled garden waste bin before it was collected

Bedtime now.

weenancyinAmerica

Still hot here - 33C. Supposed to start cooling off into the high 20s. I can't get anyone else motivated, but I have gotten rid of my old bedroom curtains, three notebooks worth of papers, and a sackful of books. Didn't need to put water in the pool - our rainstorm yesterday added enough water. Neighbor kids still enjoying the pool. They have offered to help clean up the back garden next weekend. Keeping my eyes crossed. Two roommates to take cans in to be recycled. Need to work fast as next week we will be carless for a couple of weeks. Having bus transport to use and maybe a little help from my sister, plus a delivery from the grocery, we should be okay.

Part of my cleaning involved looking at my goal list from 20 years ago. Depressing to see how little has been accomplished. Planning to rewrite them and put in just as much as I think I can get done in the next three months.

Mrs_Salad_Dodger

1. Daily To Do List - written the night before
2. Sort out sleep patterns - initial targets: bed by 03:00, up by 10:30
3. Don’t put it down, put it away + deal with mini tasks as soon as they are noticed e.g. refill olive pourer or salt cellar, stitch up a hole in a garment etc.
4. Commence ‘Operation Financial Frog Tickling’ using the acronym - I.R.I.S. (Identify, Research, Implement, Sign Off) - One per quarter
5. Continue to keep kitchen clean & tidy - before going to bed
6. Plan & Execute ONE Major Project - 2026 New Bathroom
7. Target 2026 items out

Tuesday it started raining at 04:00 & was still going strong at 14:00. It is so dark that I have had to put a light on. The forecast is for a high of 18°C, low of 13°C with a WNW wind making it feel 2° cooler + the rain is forecast to last for another 2 hours. 

1519 - 1522 DSis bedroom recycling, 3 plastic bottles - recycled 

I spent 5 minutes decanting various products into smaller usable jars/containers - tea bags, coffee, sugar & soda crystals. The rain stopped at 16:00 but only for a few minutes then completely stopped at 17:15 & now only have white clouds in a blue sky 😊. Just had a parcel delivered with the delivery driver sprinting away before I could get to the door - I wouldn’t mind if it was for us but wrong house number AND wrong road name 😖 DH did a small shop in A*da + posted a couple of birthday cards 👏. Dinner was shop bought pies, oven chips & baked beans. Wudupa

1523 - 1525 Kitchen recycling, plastic bottle, drinks cans - recycled 

1526 - 1527 Kitchen & lr detritus - binned 

Happily I am now 3/4 of the way to target so am awarding myself a Gold Star ⭐️ DSis & I watched a lovely film The Intern starring Robert de Niro & Anne Hathaway.

Florenceem, sending cwtches to you & your family especially granddad 🤗 What a lovely gift from the retired SA officer 🥹

Great decluttering QueenJess 👏 Good luck with your planned decluttering of work 🍀

Great decluttering Yorkie1 👏 Hopefully you don’t have to get up too early to do the packing 🤞

Brambling well done on sorting out the bedside tables 👏 Very generous of you to let your cat sleep on your bed ☺️

GrannyKate, organising your grandchildren is definitely keeping you busy 😊 Hopefully the next time you get some ‘you time’ it will be dry & you can do some work in the garden 🤞Great decluttering especially the frogs 👏 What a lovely shopkeeper ☺️ & thanks for the tip about removing biro marks from clothing 👏

So lovely to see you weenancy 👋 I hope you are feeling well 🙏 Sorry to hear about the still high temperatures 🥵 but will keep everything crossed that the forecasters are correct about lower temperatures 🤞Excellent decluttering especially the sackful of books 👏 I will join you in crossing my eyes that the neighbour kids do help clear the back garden next weekend 🤞 Sounds like a reasonable ‘Thank You’ for allowing them to use your pool ☺️ Hope being carless doesn’t cause you too much inconvenience 🤞Good luck with your revised Goal list 🍀

Sleep tight everyone 😴 Plenty of cwtches are available for anyone who would like one ☺️

MrsSD Awards: 💐 🙏💐💐🌟⭐️❤️💐💐⭐️💐❤️⭐️🎖️🥇⭐️⭐️⭐️😇🏅💐🌻💐💐🌻🥇⭐️⭐️

DH Awards: 🏅🏅🏅🏅⭐️ 🏅

DSis Awards: 🏅

Decluttering Target 2026: 1527/2026

1p Savings Challenge Running Total: £373.61

Yorkie1

All packed and 45 mins until the taxi comes! I've got this down to a fine art - with a list of what to take, including copies of Good housekeeping magazine which I get with the bank account. I've also roasted some tomatoes, peppers and courgettes from the allotment and got them in the freezer, and all the washing up (including recycling stuff) has been finished.

I hope the school run went well this morning @GrannyKate ; look after yourself too.

Congratulations on 75% @Mrs_Salad_Dodger

I think a 3-month goal list is far more realistic @weenancyinAmerica . It's understandable that life has got in the way from 20 years ago. I bet, if you looked back through those 20 years, there are lots of other goals that have arisen and been achieved on the way

ruby_eskimo

Morning all, have decluttered 4 trees, a shed and a hell of a lot of soil and rubbish into a skip that's currently sitting on our drive. Will also be decluttering the contents of the shed over the next few days as DH's energy allows - need him to direct me to what to keep and what to get rid of - but it's currently all over the lawn 😂. Fences will be replaced tomorrow so that's more to go in the skip too. Just wish I could make as much progress inside the house but I'm not paying anyone to do that so that might be why 😂 Do have a box of books to go to sell your books but need 1 more to add before it meets the minimum so will review the bookshelves and see if there's anything else I can part with. Although saying that I do have some more books on their way that I pre-ordered so not exactly making space!

Hugs to all.

Deb4

Been slowly pottering away, all recycling has been put in the bin, washing is upto date as well as the ironing. I have also sorted the towel and bed sheets out and rotated them.

Sorted out alot of paper work from the ROD and put them in the bin to be shredded, and I have sorted some other bits in the ROD and I can see some more of the floor.

DS went back to school yesterday, he had been upset about going back but once he saw his friends he was fine, did have a moment his pe t-shirt was to big and he wanted his old ones back but they had gone to the rag bag and then his shoe laces were two long.

Take care everyone ❤️

daisy_1571

afternoon all, soooooo...… I feel like this summer has wooshed past and ive little to show for it but ive been busy.

First the sad declutter- our lovely rescue Charlie the pirate cat decided to declutter herself off. At 15 she did well considering grade 4 heart murmur etc. When we took her on we thought we might get 6 months but we had her just shy of 3 years. House felt very empty so 2 days later we fostered a very pregnant kitty cat

And 5 days later she did this

7 wonderful little tiny kitties 💕. Since then my life has been one long round of watching kitties, feeding kitties, cleaning up after kitties, filling litter trays, cleaning litter trays, cleaning 'materials' that didn't make it to the litter trays, cleaning feeding bowls, feeding, ad infinitum on endless repeat ! Add in protecting house from escapees, catching the first 4 who breached the (final version of the 'wall' at 3 foot high) then realising this was now pointless 😆 🤣 so giving them the run of more of the house, unexpectedly having 20 or 30 sharp little claws up the back of your legs whilst you were just minding your own business 😉 😀 (we once counted the scratches from my toes to knees and gave up at 62 with more to count 😆 🤣 😂). Anyway, its been hard, lovely, relentless, amazing, heart wrenching, worrying, fabulous, gone too quickly, been too long 😆, tiring, exhausting, painful, inspiring and did I mention exhausting 😆. Weve met neighbours we didn't know, had over 40 sets of people come to the house to see them, play with them, socialise them and generally coo over them. Its been lovely but as we don't usually get many visitors that in itself has been quite peopley for us so is tiring too.

So the sad-for-us day came this week when 5 of them made their way off to start their new lives. A heart wrenching goodbye for us but of course a day of such excitement for the new owners some were literally vibrating with joy. There had been little doubt after a short time we would be keeping mummy but it was impossible to say cheerio to 2 of the kitties so we are a family of 5 again 😱 oh dearie me - vet bills and food bills 😱 a trip to pets@home this morning for cat litter turned into a supermarket sweep of chucking toys and cat tower bed thing into the trolley 😆

But after a restful afternoon I think tomorrow we can start putting the house back to rights and then get back to real life again 😀 😸 🐈 😻

Dxxxx

Wednesday2000

Aww, how sad and how happy at the same time.xxx I met someone the other week who was talking about fostering cats. I used to have 6 cats and 2 dogs, but only have an almost 15 year old dog left now.

regnbue

@daisy_1571 Well I was exhausted just reading all that so I can understand how much energy they must have sapped out of you!

Curious to know if the 2 you kept were the gingers? All our cats, bar one, were gingers 😻

daisy_1571

We've only had female cats and the gingers were both male so no. Black n whites 😀 my brother has had a few gingers, they can be very affectionate cats indeed

Dxx