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August declutter challenge - Page 11

post #201 of 222
8/23/07 at 11:26pm

Massive Progress

Yesterday my husband ordered a 8'x13' dumpster delivered to our driveway!!: If you opened the garage door you couldn't take a step inside--totally packed from front to back...it is now empty aside from some yard tools, a bicycle, and 2 Rubbermaid bins of old tax forms that my husband is required to keep for X years for his business...oh, and a toboggan that we'll be yard-saleing shortly. And we also emptied about 15 boxes from the basement, moved some furniture out that we want to yardsale/Craigslist. The dumpster is FULL and will be removed tomorrow afternoon. And we have a huge pile of cardboard to be recycled. And a few more boxes for goodwill. I'm thrilled that my husband has followed my lead and then some! There is light at the end of my decluttering tunnel!

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post #202 of 222
8/23/07 at 11:32pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by veganf View Post
Yesterday my husband ordered a 8'x13' dumpster delivered to our driveway!!: If you opened the garage door you couldn't take a step inside--totally packed from front to back...it is now empty aside from some yard tools, a bicycle, and 2 Rubbermaid bins of old tax forms that my husband is required to keep for X years for his business...oh, and a toboggan that we'll be yard-saleing shortly. And we also emptied about 15 boxes from the basement, moved some furniture out that we want to yardsale/Craigslist. The dumpster is FULL and will be removed tomorrow afternoon. And we have a huge pile of cardboard to be recycled. And a few more boxes for goodwill. I'm thrilled that my husband has followed my lead and then some! There is light at the end of my decluttering tunnel!
Good for you, mama! I don't have a garage, and maybe there's a blessing in that....I'm amazed at how much I've gotten rid of already. You really don't realize how much stuff you have until you start trying to get rid of it! I'm certainly glad that I won't have to move all of that extra stuff, though!
post #203 of 222
8/24/07 at 3:24am
Quote:
Originally Posted by Rikki Jean View Post
I had eight more things picked up for Freecycle, and I'm expecting many more to go today!

208/500
Another 150ish things gone, mostly to the trash (oops, we forgot to count! ). I did have some Freecycle things picked up, but I had some flakes, so that only accounted for about 10 of that. We had a lot of TRASH stored away in boxes, for some reason...:

358/500 Getting closer!!!
post #204 of 222
8/26/07 at 2:50am
I went through the bathroom closets and cabinets even more thoroughly and tossed, donated, recycled 25 more items.

Total 65/100 Items Gone
post #205 of 222
8/26/07 at 3:02am
I have continued to get rid of some things, but since I met (and exceeded--woohoo!) my goal this month, I stopped counting. I have passed on some books to a friend, thrown away a bunch of rags that were too holey to even be rags anymore, tossed a few more plastic glasses that had an icky texture, and got rid of some more toy pieces. I also basically finished my office, but I did end up putting some boxes in the closet to deal with later. There just isn't enough time to get through it all before my classes start Monday, and since they are distance ed, I need my office fully workable. I did buy some books from the TP, but even subtracting them from my total, I stayed above my goal. These threads/challenges are really good in keeping me accountable as well as mroe aware of what I buying/keeping/passing on. Thanks!
post #206 of 222
8/26/07 at 11:55pm
I've got rid of oh, 30 items today? Technically a little more than that, but there are some items that belonged together that I just counted as one. I'm less than 40 items away from my goal. I hope I can do that in the next week, but even if I don't, I'm really proud of myself for getting rid of so many items in just one month! You really don't realize how much stuff you have until you start getting rid of it....and have to pack the rest for a move! I never dreamed I'd actually find this many things I really could do without, but I'm so glad I have. I have many more items that I hope to get rid of in the next few months, but I'm trying to sell a lot of stuff and since we rent, I can't exactly have a yard sale, so I have to rely on a local forum I participate in. If worse comes to worse, I'll try Craig's List, but I'm not particularly comfortable with that (as those are complete strangers, and the forum I participate in is all mommies, and I've met many of them), and I don't have the time for eBay, what with all of the trips to the post office I'd have to make. Thanks for the motivation, everyone!
post #207 of 222
8/27/07 at 1:00pm
Okay, just found you all and decided to jump in.

Luckily, I've been keeping tallies anyway (because that's just the way I am.)

Between giving stuff to Goodwill, books to the library and LOTS of baby stuff to my sister-in-law I count about 403 items.

But then, if I figure in all the recycling and shredding from cleaning out some file drawers, plus spare box recycling and plain-old junk in the garage, I'm looking at a total of around 1800 things I've had to lay my hands on and make decisions about and get rid of this month. : Where does it all come from??

Which reminds me, when you all are keeping your decluttering count, how do you figure in the new stuff you bring IN to the home each month? Clothes, toys, books, whatever... Do you subtract from your total, or just kinda let it slide?
post #208 of 222
8/27/07 at 1:28pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by pradiata View Post
Which reminds me, when you all are keeping your decluttering count, how do you figure in the new stuff you bring IN to the home each month? Clothes, toys, books, whatever... Do you subtract from your total, or just kinda let it slide?
I let it slide. Being on a pretty strict budget, we don't bring in too many new things each month, so when we do, it's something that we actually need and/or will use, so I don't count it as clutter as it has a purpose.
post #209 of 222
8/27/07 at 1:34pm
I am in... I plan on cleaning out my bathroom cabinet. I know there are tons of outdated stuff. also cleaning out my food cabinets and throwing out all old food and taking inventory for the frugal meal planning thread. I know I could RECYCLE lots of paper stuff too if I get to that.
post #210 of 222
8/27/07 at 1:41pm
Well, late but am joining. My goal? When the movers come, we just found out we are moving, but wonderful navy, we don't know when, the movers say, are you serious? This is all you have? Yep, that my goal. I have dreams at night that somehow all the stuff in our garage just somehow disappears. My husband is working lots and his office and garage looked horrible and I am not sure how to go through them. I have already gotten rid of a huge garbage bag of clothes for my girls, and I think I have one more from my closet. But I also have to do this on top of getting a house ready to sell, and taking care of three kids. I am super mom, I can do it!!!
Umm, wish me luck too please. We are supposed to list the house ina week, and where am I right now?
post #211 of 222
8/27/07 at 3:28pm
pradiata, My accounting for new stuff is similar to stace's. If it is something we need or is functional, like new clothes, it doesn't count unless it is "extra clothes" that aren't really needed. For example, my IL are coming next weekend and I expect they will bring lots of little toys that clutter us up, so I will count those or at least try to part wtih a simmilar number to keep the balance about the same. my kids have too many little toys, and I keep packing up the ones they don't play with, but haven't gotten rid of them yet. I am in school to be a speech pathologist, so I will actually recycle a lot of them into my teaching materials, and plan to use the little things as prizes. OTOH, the kid's books I ordered of of the TP I did count against my decluttering, since they were strictly for fun (plus, I have a book obsession, so it really works against me : if I use my get rid of toequsl method because I never do )
post #212 of 222
8/30/07 at 2:05pm
ok as evidenced by my sig i have really done nothing this month but i am going to make an effort these next 2 days...

i probably won't meet my original goal but we'll see

i did just trash 14 pieces of paper, which is my focus this month so i'm going to edit my sig now ok done, see i really haven't done much.

maybe this post will help me be accountable:
post #213 of 222
8/30/07 at 3:19pm
FINALLY took 4 big boxes of dh's darkroom chemicals and 2 old printers to the dump for recycling yesterday - they've been hanging around for years! No more nasty corner in the garage to keep ds away from. Hooray!
post #214 of 222
8/30/07 at 4:59pm
Oh I so fizzled out. I'm not going to make my 310 goal, but I'm not going to feel guilty as I had another hospital stay and recovery in there so 180ish is not too bad. I'll do better next month!
post #215 of 222
8/30/07 at 7:41pm
I had a spurt of de-cluttering energy last night and got rid of...

Extra phone books
A cookbook I'll never use
dead re-chargeable batteries
a hand mirror inherited from somewhere that was never used
(except I'm thinking now it might have been used by my DP... uhoh)
some old correspondence
several past-dated magazines
some ancient tea that I didn't like
some ancient spices that were way past the "use by" guideline

And the bulky item pickup happened So the garage is now emptier of 2 toilets and one non-functional de-humidifier.

I might go try to find the mirror, but everything else is gone gone Yay.
post #216 of 222
8/30/07 at 8:54pm
I didn't think I'd do it, but I've actually exceeded my goal! We just went through the cabinet we keep in the kitchen and set aside for recycling three phone books (since the new ones are about to come out) and a whole bunch of old medicines and such that were expired. : I also tossed out three old candles earlier, and some pieces from a bag of DH's that he doesn't want. Oh, AND I finished typing up all of my old poems so I can shred those loose papers, and also finished scanning in all of our picture prints and tossed those (I think I mentioned this earlier, but I plan to simply reorder prints as I'm ready to scrapbook and/or organize into albums, they were all just getting ruined sitting around in boxes).
post #217 of 222
8/31/07 at 1:37am
Well, after decluttering the upstairs and middle floor, I threw everything down to the basement...ANyway, I went through the basement today, 1 big bag of garbage, one misc bag of junk to goodwill, one bag of mine and dhs clothes and one bag of my girls clothes that will be gone through at playgroup tomorrow and the rest taken to goodwill.
Now my goal changes to

going through our book
and : the dreaded garage
hopefully our house will be ready to be put on the market by next week
post #218 of 222
8/31/07 at 1:38pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by Rikki Jean View Post
Another 150ish things gone, mostly to the trash (oops, we forgot to count! ). I did have some Freecycle things picked up, but I had some flakes, so that only accounted for about 10 of that. We had a lot of TRASH stored away in boxes, for some reason...:

358/500 Getting closer!!!

Okay, I stopped keeping track, because there has just been so much going on, especially with decluttering, but I am absolutely positive that I made it to 500!

500/500!!!
post #219 of 222
8/31/07 at 7:13pm
OK OK I'm going to get off my but and go through some papers NOW: I'll check in at 7pm. send me ya'll
post #220 of 222
8/31/07 at 7:39pm
now i've cleared out what doesn't even belong in here, so i can really get to work. i'll post my actual count later - it'd just slow me down now.

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