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Hello Forumites! However well-intentioned, for the safety of other users we ask that you refrain from seeking or offering medical advice. This includes recommendations for medicines, procedures or over-the-counter remedies. Posts or threads found to be in breach of this rule will be removed.Hoarding - Springing Ahead
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Well, today I took 14 DVDs and a couple of other bits to the CS. It could have been dangerous - there's three CS's within a few doors of each other and I used to love browsing in them all before going over the road for a coffee. I had to park slightly dodgily though (it was fine for a few minutes but not for any length of time) so just ran in to one, put my stuff on the counter and left.
Brought into the house were two books - the next two for my book club.
I've realised that I'm starting to get bad re food again. I'm buying far too much and most of it's ending up being thrown away. I'm starting to figure out why, but it needs to stop. I have enough food for at least a week, so I'm challenging myself not to go into a supermarket for at least that long. It's going to be difficult, but I really need to get a handle on it.
I have improved a bit though. I went to my therapy/peer support group this afternoon and came away with a huge list of recommended books. Old Ames would have spent this evening finding the cheapest copies of all of them on various sites. The books would have come over the next week, shoved in a pile somewhere and lost until they avalanched onto me at some point in the distant future. New Ames has decided to buy one, read it, then buy the next.
Speaking of books, the one I'm reading right now is fantastic. I'm going to read 50 pages (about half an hour), then do 10 minutes of de hoarding, until I've finished it and it goes in the bag for the CS. It's by one of my favourite authors, but it's a thriller, which I don't re read, and if for some reason I want a copy in future there'll be loads in charity shops for pence. So there's no need to keep it, but if it makes it's way onto a shelf it'll be hard to get rid of.
I noticed the hoarding programme on C4 the other night, but I didn't dare watch it. I'm sure it would have lots of helpful tips/advice/insights, but I'm worried I'd look at it and go 'I'm not that bad, I don't have a problem'. Which I do.
Anyway, I'm off to put out the washing and do ten minutes tidying before getting back to the grisly murders.Unless I say otherwise 'you' means the general you not you specifically.0 -
I watched the programme - made me feel good. I don't have a cluttered house - just two rooms which need sorting.Well, today I took 14 DVDs and a couple of other bits to the CS. It could have been dangerous - there's three CS's within a few doors of each other and I used to love browsing in them all before going over the road for a coffee. I had to park slightly dodgily though (it was fine for a few minutes but not for any length of time) so just ran in to one, put my stuff on the counter and left.
Brought into the house were two books - the next two for my book club.
I've realised that I'm starting to get bad re food again. I'm buying far too much and most of it's ending up being thrown away. I'm starting to figure out why, but it needs to stop. I have enough food for at least a week, so I'm challenging myself not to go into a supermarket for at least that long. It's going to be difficult, but I really need to get a handle on it.
I have improved a bit though. I went to my therapy/peer support group this afternoon and came away with a huge list of recommended books. Old Ames would have spent this evening finding the cheapest copies of all of them on various sites. The books would have come over the next week, shoved in a pile somewhere and lost until they avalanched onto me at some point in the distant future. New Ames has decided to buy one, read it, then buy the next.
Speaking of books, the one I'm reading right now is fantastic. I'm going to read 50 pages (about half an hour), then do 10 minutes of de hoarding, until I've finished it and it goes in the bag for the CS. It's by one of my favourite authors, but it's a thriller, which I don't re read, and if for some reason I want a copy in future there'll be loads in charity shops for pence. So there's no need to keep it, but if it makes it's way onto a shelf it'll be hard to get rid of.
I noticed the hoarding programme on C4 the other night, but I didn't dare watch it. I'm sure it would have lots of helpful tips/advice/insights, but I'm worried I'd look at it and go 'I'm not that bad, I don't have a problem'. Which I do.
Anyway, I'm off to put out the washing and do ten minutes tidying before getting back to the grisly murders.
The house in the programme was cluttered but did look clean which is a change.Decluttering Achieved - 2023 - 10,364 Decluttering Target - 2024 - 2,874 April - 252/351
GC NSD 2023 - 242/365
2023 Craft Makes - 245 Craft Spends 2023 - £676.03/£400
Books read - 2023 - 37
GC - 2024 4 Week Period £51.35/£100 NSD - 77
2024 Craft Makes - 204 Craft Spends 2024 £312.42/£5000 -
Does anyone know what charities accept rags? And do they have to be washed first? I've got an old coat that's so pilled it's unwearable, and has no buttons but washing and drying it would be a bit of a pain, especially when I've got so much washing to do anyway.Unless I say otherwise 'you' means the general you not you specifically.0
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I know that our local Red Cross shop have an arrangement with a company who buys clothes by the kilo, I'd imagine the other Red Cross shops are the same.Erma Bombeck, American writer: "If I had my life to live over again... I would have burned the pink candle, sculptured like a rose, that melted in storage." Don't keep things 'for best' - that day never comes. Use them and enjoy them now.0
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Does anyone know what charities accept rags? And do they have to be washed first? I've got an old coat that's so pilled it's unwearable, and has no buttons but washing and drying it would be a bit of a pain, especially when I've got so much washing to do anyway.
My local Age UK charity shop takes rags, they have a sign in the window to say this. They just ask that the bag is labelled rags. Not sure if it's just that one or all of them but you could always phone up before going.
While I'm here, I did an amazing thing today. I bought a book from the charity shop today called Shoestring Chic for cheap home decor ideas. I decided as i was walking out of the shop to treat it like a magazine. After all, it was just to get inspiration, there were no detailed instructions I would later need to refer back to. So I read it this afternoon and it's already back in the charity shop bag!
That is something that would never have crossed my mind before. Things are changing, people!0 -
Well done with the book! I'm going to make sure I always have a CS bag on the go so I can get rid of stuff before it finds a home and becomes a keeper.
Well, not only did I put the washing out, but I put away the dry clothes that were on the airer, instead of just dumping them on a chair or table. They usually then slip on the floor and need washing again after a while...Unless I say otherwise 'you' means the general you not you specifically.0 -
I noticed the hoarding programme on C4 the other night, but I didn't dare watch it. I'm sure it would have lots of helpful tips/advice/insights, but I'm worried I'd look at it and go 'I'm not that bad, I don't have a problem'. Which I do.
My house isn't like the ones on that programme that I've seen, but I was well on the way before finding this thread. Sometimes I can watch them, sometimes I can't, depends how I am feeling at the time.
when I can watch them, I always end up throwing stuff away in the breaks/immediately after in order to ward off a sort of creeping panic that I could be where they are if I'm not vigilant!:AA/give up smoking (done)
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I watched the programme and my heart broke for that poor couple with all the rabbits. So much heartache. However, they looked as if they could cope better at the end.
Ames, we have a charity drawer dedicated to small things that can go out. If there is a build up, of course, there gets to be a small mountain of charity bags by the front door.
I was looking for something in my craft cupboard the other day and feeling slightly relieved about how neat it is after the massive clear out earlier in the year.
Have given up charity shops for Lent and can hardly stand it. Am going to be sorting out things that I am avoiding instead, like the garden and the allotment. Let's hope the weather is fairly dry.
Hope there is another successful decluttering day for everyone tomorrow.0 -
My house isn't like the ones on that programme that I've seen, but I was well on the way before finding this thread. Sometimes I can watch them, sometimes I can't, depends how I am feeling at the time.
when I can watch them, I always end up throwing stuff away in the breaks/immediately after in order to ward off a sort of creeping panic that I could be where they are if I'm not vigilant! OMG, yes, I recognise that phenomenon. I have to make a bit of effort to find hoarding programmes (on the web, haven't got a TV) but do it. I wouldn't say I enjoy watching them, but it's not a vicarious thrill and I'm certainly not mocking those poor brave souls who allow the camera into the Hoard.
It's more a case of a cautionary tale delivered to myself about where things could end up, if one doesn't pay attention to 'tendancies'. Landfill category hoarding doesn't spring up overnight. Individual hoarders don't wake up one day and say to themselves Hey! Wouldn't it be great if I rammed every room and outbuilding with stuff from floor to ceiling and cause myself and my loved ones enormous distress? What a fantastic idea, I must get started immediately!
Yesterday I was just leaving my friend's house and she was having a post-pet purge after a pet bereavement and there were two pet-related books to go on the table by the door. One of her ways of coping was to get the physical reminders out asap and I had been helping with this as well as providing emotional support. As I could see these were stressing here, I offered to take them for my current donation bag, which is where they are now. Depending on how things pan out this afternoon after I've gardened, I may step up to Hoxfam and drop this bag off.
Ames, excellent work with that book. I've done similar things but not as quickly as the same day. Have had some books back into the chazzer (not necesarily the same one) in the same week. Like you, I read whodunnits some of the time, and they're not really the kind of books which you're going to want to re-read, are they?
Today, I'm easing into the day then off to the allotment to declutter some more weeds etc. Yesterday I removed over a kilo of glass and nails which had been accumulating in my non-organic carp bucket as I dug over the previous few weeks. The amount of stuff in that soil which shouldn't be there is shocking. And I am getting to the bottom of the previously-removed tussocks of couch grass, that's three-quarters off-site and I may get some more to the tip today.
Have given one lot of excess strawberry runners away yesterday, another lot will go today and some will go into work tomorrow for a colleague who has expressed an interest.
Strawbs, they'll take over the world if we let them. Every increased possession loads us with a new weariness.
John Ruskin
Veni, vidi, eradici
(I came, I saw, I kondo'd)
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IT's SUCH a beautiful spring day here - I hope it is with all of you too, the doors and windows are open: light and air sweetly wandering through the house (which of course means the winter dust is much more apparent but I'm ignoring that)
I sanded the kitchen table yesterday (had to swap the broken plug for a new one on the sander: binned the broken plug) and a freestanding cupboard thing that I've never really liked, but looks nice now the horrible old varnish has nearly all gone: in doing that I've thrown nearly all it's contents, the door had stuck so the stuff in there had not seen the outside world for many a year.
painted an occasional table a lovely spring green from home made chalk paint getting rid of one of my collection of tester pots (that were bought for their intended purpose, but kept after), and may do the final one of the "set" of tables in another colour today: these are functional but shabby cheap yellowing varnished tables, too fiddly to strip back to natural wood. One is now white, one spring green and the other will prob be grey which with dark wood is my lounge colour scheme.
so some more paint pots will go and furniture rejuvenated into something I like - which declutters my "to do" list, and is a sort of treat to myself for flinging some stuff.
seed planting later, and may be a bit of a garden tidy from the winter debris.
have a great day everyone :AA/give up smoking (done)0
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