Let it GO! Decluttering (simplifying) your life of (people, places or things) success stories?
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What happens when you decide to deep clean your bathroom? You find some paint peeling and remember you always disliked the colour so run to the local paint store and buy paint to put a fresh coat up on the bathroom walls. Not the thing to do with a bad shoulder but I'm so happy with the outcome and wow I worked up a sweat. I had to go to meet the teacher night though a sweety mess and covered in paint10
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Today I was headed to physio and realized halfway there my appt is next week so I was excited to get home and start on the bedroom. I'm proud to say it's now done. All that's left is hubs office and the boys room and I might make them do their own spaces but probably not.
The bedroom has never looked so tidy and clean and organized and it's no wonder hubs was always coughing and feeling allergic we must have had the world's supply of dust bunnies.
Our housekeeper comes tomorrow. She's been looking after my husband for probably 20 years so she will always be our housekeeper my son calls her auntie. She won't have anything to do tomorrow. Maybe I'll have her make ho the basement for my brother's visit for my surgery.6 -
Well I made it to NY! I got so busy getting ready, I think I forgot to sign into MFP on Monday! I was at 797 days in a row! I guess I'll probably have to start over. Hope all of you are doing ok!6
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Well I made it to NY! I got so busy getting ready, I think I forgot to sign into MFP on Monday! I was at 797 days in a row! I guess I'll probably have to start over. Hope all of you are doing ok!
There is a link somewhere that allows you to reset it to where you should be. I'll try and find it.
My kitchen is now decluttered, my table is where is should be, washing up is a thing of the past .... bliss.
Currently having a "discussion" about a long CB aerial that DH has had for at least the last 31 years - all of the time that I've known him - as in all that time he has never used it.
He has hidden it from me
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@snoo61 - here's the link to request a reset of your logging streak:
https://www.myfitnesspal.com/account/login_counter_reset_request
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Madwife2009 wrote: »@snoo61 - here's the link to request a reset of your logging streak:
https://www.myfitnesspal.com/account/login_counter_reset_request
@Madwife, Thank you so much!4 -
So, the grandkids are great! (And exhausting lol) if I had this much push at home, every house in the neighborhood would be shining! Let's hope I can stay motivated when I get home.
Hope you all are doing well!4 -
Well I made it to NY! I got so busy getting ready, I think I forgot to sign into MFP on Monday! I was at 797 days in a row! I guess I'll probably have to start over. Hope all of you are doing ok!
You don't have to start over. Just go to yesterday's food log and enter your food items.3 -
Hi Friends, I went through my closet (five shelves) and took everything out. This is the hall closet with my toiletries, lotions, sun screen, etc. I then took many of those shoebox clear containers I happen to have. Re-organized and labeled them and filled them with items in a way that makes sense. I keep walking by the closet and looking in now. Makes me feel good.
p.s. I had about 7 clear shoebox containers that are Brand new just waiting for a need. I found them last school year in the garbage can; someone must have been in a cleaning frenzy so I took them. Not that I'm a dumpster diver but brand new good stuff thrown away is a shame. Now they are serving me well.10 -
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Just cleared out my linen cupboard. I now have less than half from when I started. Three bags of towels, sheets and other linen for the kerbside recycling collectors on Wednesday.
Gotta
decluttering.
Still overly excited about my dishwasher...10 -
Hi all, I'm home! Probably starting work next week, so I'm getting ready for that. Today's declutter is craft supplies. I have to rearrange yarn drawers so I can have a drawer for leftover yarn, for dog rugs.
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Good job and plans @snoo61 !!!
I am good in the declutting department, but I need to do some reorganization and drawers clean up too.
This week is garden week; I am getting the pots ready with the fall and winter flowers (I live in the S. California desert and we take care of our gardens all year long). I don't have big plans for the Holidays so I can take my time organizing the rest of the house or rooms as I wish.
@Madwife2009
You did good too!3 -
Good job and plans @snoo61 !!!
I am good in the declutting department, but I need to do some reorganization and drawers clean up too.
This week is garden week; I am getting the pots ready with the fall and winter flowers (I live in the S. California desert and we take care of our gardens all year long). I don't have big plans for the Holidays so I can take my time organizing the rest of the house or rooms as I wish.
@Madwife2009
You did good too!
Fall and winter flowers are so beautiful! My white camillia bushes have started blooming, red ones will start in a couple months. I love having flowers all year!5 -
And they say we may have snow this week in Iowa!
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RetiredAndLovingIt wrote: »And they say we may have snow this week in Iowa!
Snow?? Wow! Keep warm and safe if it does snow.
Back on topic - have just decluttered the best part of twenty years' worth of paperwork. Some has to go in the loft as it's tax stuff and my dear Mum, who used to work for HM Inland Revenue, always told me to a) not mess with the tax man and b) always keep anything that s/he might be interested in.
But it will be out of the way and not cluttering my living space.
(and I'm still thrilled with my dishwasher)5 -
I really love this thread! Is anyone available to be a decluttering accountability buddy to check in with everyday? If so, please add me as a friend.
Thank you!3 -
I've started another round of getting rid of stuff again. My main problem isn't deciding to let go of stuff...it's actually bringing it to where it needs to go. I don't drive so I can't just go over to Goodwill to drop it off, because the Goodwill is a 20 minute drive away. And I feel bad asking my husband to do it during his limited free time. And putting things on Craigslist or Freecycle is annoying because of how flaky people are, so I put off doing it. So there is a whole closet full of stuff that I still have to actually get rid of.
Last week I did bring a bag of stuff to a nearby clothing donation bin. This upcoming week I plan to start listing things on the Craigslist free section again for pickup. I also compiled another bag's worth of nonperishables to donate to the town food pantry (I brought over one bag a couple of weeks ago) so I have to bring that over there sometime this week.
We also have some large items that we have to get rid of. I have a bike that I stupidly bought and then never used because it turns out the roads are too dangerous around here to bike on. So I have to sell that. We also have a large and heavy couch that I inherited from a relative and we want to get rid of it and replace it with something smaller and lighter, so that we don't have to hire movers the next time we move. It's over 15 years old and I'm not sure if we can sell it or give it away, or if we should just recycle it...we'll have to figure it out. Earlier in the year we gave away a few pieces of secondhand furniture that were too heavy for us to move on our own...a solid wood desk (which neither of us were using anyway), and two solid wood dressers that I inherited (we downsized to just hanging things in the closet and putting non-hangable things like socks in plastic drawer units). That has been very beneficial to us in terms of how uncluttered our apartment feels, and future moving plans.
Our apartment is mostly decluttered and minimalist by now, but I feel like I'm always finding new stuff to get rid of. Honestly our apartment is way bigger than we need, especially because it's a two-bedroom (we used to have one of my husband's relatives living with us due to their health problems, but they recovered and moved out. BTW they're a hoarder too, which was extremely stressful for me to live with...I think I may have mentioned it on this thread months ago). But we're stuck here until next April because it would cost $4000 to get out of the lease. Once our lease is up, I'm hoping to find a small place...600 square feet or even less would be ideal...that is hopefully more time and cost effective as well. Our current apartment is 950 square feet and probably half of it is just empty unused space. It's such a waste of time to clean...it takes me 40 minutes just to vacuum...so there's no point to it.5 -
seems like it has been easier to maintain my weight since distancing myself from toxic family. Had to get out of denial which was difficult, yes decluttering people helps also!8
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@laurenq1991
Many donations places offer free pick-up, specially if you have furniture, appliances, or heavy boxes to give away. Just give them a call, ask them if they offer the service, and then schedule a pick up time that is convenient for you so you don't have to bother your husband.
You can put a bunch of items in several boxes so they only make one trip. Win-win situation since it will be convenient for the company and for you, and you don't risk having people from Craig list stopping by your house. I heard that it could be risky.
Good job cleaning things up, but I got a chuckle reading about how you think that a 950 sq.feet place is too big for you and your husband. My house is 3000 sq.feet in a fairly large corner lot. It requires a lot of steps to go from one area to the other, but I consider it a way to increase my daily NEAT. I would get very claustrophobic in a small place and my husband is worse than me. I suggested to him a couple of years ago moving to something smaller, but he said that I will have to wait until he is 6 feet under... We do have company and the kids with their families dropping by once in awhile, so the extra room is needed in those occasions. 
Hope that you find an expedient way to give away what you don't need anymore. Good luck!
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@laurenq1991
Many donations places offer free pick-up, specially if you have furniture, appliances, or heavy boxes to give away. Just give them a call, ask them if they offer the service, and then schedule a pick up time that is convenient for you so you don't have to bother your husband.
You can put a bunch of items in several boxes so they only make one trip. Win-win situation since it will be convenient for the company and for you, and you don't risk having people from Craig list stopping by your house. I heard that it could be risky.
Yeah I just get like, social anxiety about those pickup services. Like if they don't actually end up wanting the stuff I'm donating, then they'll get mad that they came all the way out there. A lot of them have very specific lists about what they do and don't take. On Craigslist, people see a picture of it beforehand and they generally take all kinds of random stuff that a donation service may not take (for example one thing I gave away on there was a huge container of ornamental pebbles).
I live in an apartment building so what I do for Craigslist is either come out to the lobby or outside and give it to the person, or leave it in the lobby with a note on it saying "Craigslist pickup" for them to get. So they don't even know what apartment I live in and sometimes they don't even interact with me in person.Good job cleaning things up, but I got a chuckle reading about how you think that a 950 sq.feet place is too big for you and your husband. My house is 3000 sq.feet in a fairly large corner lot. It requires a lot of steps to go from one area to the other, but I consider it a way to increase my daily NEAT. I would get very claustrophobic in a small place and my husband is worse than me. I suggested to him a couple of years ago moving to something smaller, but he said that I will have to wait until he is 6 feet under...
The funniest part is, I think this is the biggest place I've ever lived in. I'm pretty sure the apartment I grew up in was smaller than this, and that had up to four people living in it. And I know for a fact the other apartments I lived in, in college and my early to mid 20s, were smaller (the smallest being freshman year of college where I had maybe 40 square feet of space in a room with two other people...that sucked).
I do like having the extra space most of the time, even though it's not being used for anything, just because it's nice to kind of have room to breathe in. It's just the vacuuming that gets to be very annoying and makes me wish our place was smaller. Plus of course, it costs more to have more space...although that's not a huge concern for us, it does add up over time.
I don't even know what I would put in 3000 square feet! Is that difficult for you guys to maintain?We do have company and the kids with their families dropping by once in awhile, so the extra room is needed in those occasions.
Yeah we never do entertaining at home. Just not our thing. We're both introverts, and I grew up in a dysfunctional household and my husband grew up in a hoarder house, so we both kind of have a complex about people coming into "our space." We live in the NYC area so it's a lot more fun to go out, anyway. We have family members stay over a few times a year, but then it's just one or two people. We have the sofa and an air mattress for those times (we let them take our bed and sofa, and my husband and I take the air mattress).Hope that you find an expedient way to give away what you don't need anymore. Good luck!
Thank you!
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@laurenq1991
I am glad that you are taking precautions when listing in Craigslist and for the pickup of items as well. Better safe than sorry. Some of the donations companies have a place in their website where you can post pictures of what you want to donate so the truck doesn't make an unwanted trip.
My husband and I don't entertain much anymore (we prefer to go out to dinner with friends instead), but when my boys and their families come to visit during the holidays, it is nice to have extra bedrooms for them where they can park their stuff leaving the rest of the house in order. I don't do well with disorganization or messes.
My husband doesn't like small places and I like to decorate and take care of the garden, so that works for us. Although sometimes I think that I wouldn't mind to have something a little bit smaller. Maybe some day....
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I have egg muffins with, ham, and cheese ready to go in the oven. I'll freeze them for work. I'm about to start going through my winter clothes. Time to get ruthless!5
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Update on decluttering gains...got rid of a lot of stuff today:
*Metal rolling cart -- gave away on Craigslist
*A few craft and activity kits -- gave away on Craigslist
*Closet hanging organizer -- gave away on Craigslist
*Plastic storage container -- There's an area in my apartment building where people put stuff they want to give away, and people take it if they can use it. I left the container there with a "free" label, and it was gone within a couple of hours.
*Threw away some old pillowcases and cleaning rags I didn't need.
Plan for tomorrow:
*Donate another bag of nonperishables to food pantry.
*Cancel gym membership, which counts as decluttering since I don't use it. Please do not ever go to Club Metro Fitness. They are scammers. My contract was supposed to be over in September and they kept charging me without telling me, and now they aren't giving me my money back for those months.
Stuff that is left to deal with:
*Aforementioned bike and couch -- the most annoying things.
*Kitchen items -- I actually have to wait until the end of the year to give this stuff away because I have to decide what kitchen items to get rid of. TBH we mostly cook in the microwave lately. We lived in an apartment without a stove for a few years and we just got used to it. You can make a lot of stuff in there -- pasta, parboiled rice, eggs, etc. My husband is vegetarian and I don't cook meat because raw meat grosses me out, so we don't do any of that. And we mostly eat frozen or raw vegetables these days because it's faster, so not much cooking of vegetables going on. Anyway, the holidays are when we do the most cooking, so I'm going to wait to see what we use and if there's anything we don't use during the holidays, I'm going to get rid of it.
I'm also considering getting a nonstick pan and baking pan again. I had to get rid of my nonstick stuff because my MIL and her pet parrot were living with us for a couple of years due to my MIL being disabled. They finally moved out a few months ago. It would be nice to be able to make pancakes and non-microwaved scrambled eggs again.
*Tabletop convection oven -- This goes along with the kitchen stuff. For some reason our oven emits a burnt plastic smell when we turn it on so we use this instead (the stovetop does work without issues though and that's mostly what we used historically anyway). We probably should have told the maintenance people about that when we moved in, but we kind of forgot. Anyway we really only use this oven during the holidays, and we're moving out in April, so I'm going to give it away after Christmas.
*A few books -- We have switched to e-books, but do still have a few physical books. I'm giving us until the end of the year to read them and then giving them away.4 -
More progress today!
*Donated bag of nonperishables to food pantry
*Cancelled gym membership
*I actually realized that I already knew what kitchen items I wanted to get rid of, so instead of waiting until the end of the year, I listed those on Craigslist free section (except for the tabletop oven since I still need it). Someone came and picked them up just now. I also replaced my pan and baking pan with nonstick ones which is going to be so much easier and maybe will even inspire me to cook more (we don't have a dishwasher so cleanup was very annoying previously).
*I also listed a snow shovel we didn't need anymore on Craigslist free section, and someone picked that up as well.
*Started another clothing donation bag with a few items out of my closet that I don't wear or got tired of. I also pulled out some items that I'm undecided about and hung them up on my second closet rail so I know to try them out and decide if I want to keep them or not.
*I also finished one of the books that I mentioned (I read most of it a while ago, so it didn't take long to finish).
*I'm considering giving away a couple of our wall decorations in our living room, and maybe changing them out with something else. Sometimes you get tired of the same thing after a few years.
Overall I feel good about the amount of progress I've made in the past two days. And I feel good that the items I gave away are going directly to people who will use them.4 -
@laurenq1991
You should feel super good about your accomplishment. Awesome and very inspiring. You thought about it, you planned, you wrote your plans down, and you followed thru. Admirable!
Please keep the good work and when you are done, come over my house. My garage needs you...
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I am ridding myself of the "diet" mentality. Eventually I'll lose the weight and go to maintenance but this path will never end. It's a one day at a time kind of thing.6
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@laurenq1991
You should feel super good about your accomplishment. Awesome and very inspiring. You thought about it, you planned, you wrote your plans down, and you followed thru. Admirable!
Thank you!! That stuff has been there for months not being used, so I'm happy it's finally gone.
I may even list the bike for sale next week. Yesterday I took pictures of it and the accessories that go with it for the listing.
I also read about half of one of the books from the pile, and decided I wasn't into it. Then started on another book and got about 20% of the way through it so far.Please keep the good work and when you are done, come over my house. My garage needs you...
LOL, I've actually helped people with decluttering before, and have even been paid for it. The question I ask myself is "Do I like/use it enough to want to bring it with me when I move?" or "Do I like/use it enough to either clean it or clean around it every week?" If the answer is no, out it goes.2 -
NewLIFEstyle4ME wrote: »[quote="dodea48;c-44173648"]my goal is to simply my life by cutting out social media time ---- dam itYAY YOU...only a super tough, wise and COOL person would ever even dare consider giving at least SOME of the distracting, addicting, depressing, overwhelming and time/life consuming thing social media can DEFINITELY be and actually is. You winner you! Thank you ever so much for contributing to this thread. Honey, simplifying your life by cutting back or even getting rid of the majority of your social media ties is so admirable and again, wise and COOL.
BOOM!
{{{{{{{{{LOVE and HUGS to/for dodea48 }}}}}}}}}}}}}}
THANK you for posting here--you inspired me and encouraged me BIG time with your post/words!
Hey gang--what's happening with ya! I hope all is better than or at least well with you all!!!!
Ever since dodea48 posted that message, it's been on my heart BIG time to also simply my life by TAKING control of myself/my treasure (which is my time) in regards to social media, so that's why I've been MIA
(if anyone noticed ), just to give myself mind/soul decluttering and it's utterly amazing how saying NO to myself in relatively unproductive and/or areas in my life that, although seemingly good, but that can tend to become, ummmm...taking too much of my time/energy and life/POWER over me/my self-control. SO, that's what I've been up to and let me tell ya, like weight blastification AND decluttering...making myself simplify my life/time by taking mega breaks AWAY from social media and computer time and getting oot and aboot and fellowshipping with real (personal) people and getting some much wanted and needed sunshine and fresh air vs. spending so much time on my butt, on the "puter" has and is making a totally difference and is so much better for me. Also, I've been reading "real books" and writing on paper and with my beloved gel pens sooooo much more (like I used to in the "olden days") and I LOVE it--it's so refreshing and freeing and is doing something GOOD to my mind, body and soul that being on the computer/devices too much does/steals/stagnates/opens me up to obsession and just yuck in/thru/to me. Just as slow and steady wins the race for/in/thru/to me--so does saying NAH, NOPE, UH-UH, get outta here addition and compulsion--I'm in control of me, my time and my appetites, period.
That said...I'm now in the 130's as well...I'm now 139.4 (but my ticker isn't working for some reason) YES, it's only .6lbs since my last lost in early September:
Last recorded weight: 140 lbs on 9/05/2019 (my goal weight was 140lbs AND YA GIRL DID THAT THANG, but I just reduced it to 135lbs (hmmmmph, seeing how long it's taking me to reach my previous ultimate goal weight of 137lbs, I say WITH JOY I'll make it 135lbs). I'm still rocking sizes 6/8 from my larges of 22w--so that's so far 80.4lbs blasted to the place where the sun will NEVER shine. So, that's big ole unwanted/unhealthy/unattractive pounds and ounces and inches galore GONE forever.
Okay, here's receipts:
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