Finally we have tisked and tasked and totally eradicated mountains of junk! It took se7en long weeks and the project grew each week as I unearthed more and more problem areas… This past weekend we spent scrubbing, mopping and generally cleaning our house, my goodness – this is a genuine spring clean! Lovely.
Now I mentioned the se7en things I had learnt from this project in the last Tisket/Tasket Post.
And here are se7en things that kept me going:
- I was motivated. I really do hate clutter and think that stuff is a burden that causes endless stress and gets in the way of us doing what we would rather be doing. Maintaining stuff or chilling out – I know what I would rather be doing.
- I was accountable – to this poor blog and its readers – I couldn’t bring myself to say sorry no project this week! Not to mention I wrote to The Organizing Junkie every week to let her know how she inspired me and how far I had gotten along – well she was brilliant and wrote back encouragingly every time – far beyond the call of duty!!!
- Decluttering gets really messy really quickly so I kept each section small, in the past when I have tried this I have tried whole rooms at once and despaired … far better to tackle a drawer at time, then if you get interrupted you can slide it back into place and just carry on with life.
- I had an allocated spot for the stuff we didn’t need anymore – big or small I need somewhere to mentally say – it is no longer ours… we kept a spot at the front hall going, whenever the box got full we shifted it to the garage and started a new one. The box remains, its a whole new habit. At the end of the project I loaded all the full boxes into the car and donated them.
- I didn’t drag my family through the project behind me – I told them what I was doing and left it at that, eventually they all joined in, even the father person, normally I force them through it and they resist all the way – bit of reverse psychology I dare say!
- That being said, I had to put an end to sorting stuff all day long and set myself a se7en week limit, simply for the sake of my family who wanted to be doing other things – oh the higher calling of a swimming pool on a summery afternoon!
Now we already had a daily maintenance plan… but we have had to add a couple of things to the “tidy before each meal” regime – that was just a scratch on the surface!!!
I am very aware now that we have to ditch junk before it comes into your house – if you know you don’t want it then don’t let it in.
I realize some things had gotten completely out of hand – the mending basket for instance and the broken pile of books: so now I have a weekly maintenance list in my head:
Weekly Maintenance Plan:
- Monday: Sort and file the post, otherwise sift as it comes in.
- Tuesday: Mending bag, pop the odd button back on.
- Wednesday: Mend books, one or two a week.
- Thursday: Mend toys, it is usually only two or three.
- Fridays: Tackle a deep left over project.
- Saturdays: Finish the deep clean a spot that normally gets neglected.
- Sundays: Rest of course!
Apart from marching through every cupboard and every drawer, every shelf and surface a whole can of virtual problems were unearthed:
Who would have known that a laptop is a huge mountain of junk: junk mail, junk photographs, junk bookmarks, junk downloads!!! The list is endless! And even more surprising with just fifteen minutes a day at the start of each computor session I delete a whole lot of stuff – You might think fifteen minutes is a large chunk of time but it is nothing compared to the time I was spending reading endless newsletters that I was subscribed to, clicking next next next on itunes to get to the podcasts I wanted to hear… hellooo(!) delete the ones you don’t want!
se7en projects still to go…
I do have a couple of tisks and tasks left to do – but that is the cycle of everyday life, and I have a list of them to tick off as I go… I wouldn’t want to be resting on my laurels or anything! I never went near the kids computer or the garage and the junk drawer. I always have a quiet chuckle when people talk about their junk drawers… our junk drawer was rather more than one in every room, and I have reduced that to one kitchen drawer that I have to go through still. And so on and so on!!!
And here is a quick summary of the project and a recap on the past few weeks of tossing and clearing out in our house: A Tisket a Tasket… What’s in My Basket… And project progress was reported here:
- A Tisket A Tasket: Week One…
- A Tisket A Tasket: Week Two…
- A Tisket A Tasket Week Three…
- A Tisket A Tasket Week Four…
- A Tisket A Tasket Week Five…
- A Tisket A Tasket Week Six…
- A Tisket a Tasket Week Se7en…
That’s it we are practically done! And after this I pray that we are never blessed with a big home, this one may be small but quite enough to maintain thank-you very much!!!