No matter what you choose to help you get started — whether it be one of these ten or one of countless others — the goal is to take your first step with excitement behind it. There is a beautiful world of freedom and fresh breath hiding behind that clutter. How you remove it is up to you.
Discover the Life You Want— If you are tired of the clutter in your home and looking for a solution, on January 14th, we will be launching a week course called Uncluttered to help you. We only offer the course three times each year. Find out more here. Inspiring others to live more by owning less. Follow on Twitter Like on Facebook. I wish you all good luck! I think this is a great idea on decluttering your house!
Junk removal can be hard for some people, and decluttering can start with a single item. A minimalistic approach can be very uplifting to the spirit and our health; our lives should not be so burdened with junk. I have read two of your books and since that time have been decluttering my home. If I now buy something new to wear I give four things away from my closet.
Living simply has certainly made a huge difference in my life. I am too sentimental have just retired and need to decluter 3 rooms Keep putting it off I think everything I have I will need!!! The plastic tubs keep growing? I LOVE this cute little idea! I have a hard time motivating myself to get started, but limiting my time and playing fun music helps. This is an even better idea than mine! It will be a fun and rewarding routine for each time I leave the house. The challenge is actually great. I did clean my house by donating and returning useless things.
Have a donation budget per year. Thanks for the post…. I am so glad to know I am not alone. This whole too much stuff situation was becoming overwhelming.
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I know I will not be able to complete it in 10 weeks. But I feel less daunted knowing it is not just me and it can be done. Thanks to everyone for these comments. It gives me some comfort. I just happened on to your 10 Week Organizing plan on Pinterest and I am ready to join in! I will start this week with Week 1 on my days off. Thank you for giving me a little light at the end of a dark tunnel!! Thank you for linking up at the HomeMattersParty I am really glad you did.
I go through the reorganizing of my home every year. This is my first year of blogging and now I have more stuff then ever. I like how you have a step by step plan, it makes it less daunting.
I typically start with a garbage bag quota. I will decide to remove two garbage bags worth a day and start putting together my donations besides that. I plan to start next week!!! This will ensure the entire house is ready for spring, instead of trying to do it all in one weekend. My week 10 will be the attic and garage.
Purging things that we no longer use or even need. Hi Krista I was so impressed with your plan. I live in a large house with a husband and two grown-up kids who all turn almost everything they ever buy into the start of a collection! It ranges from guitars, books, die cast toy cars, old 33rpm albums…you name it!
I have to admit, I have also found this way if life addictive, going antiquing, collecting chinaware silverware kitchen stuff etc. Help Jayne in the UK. I logged onto Pinterest and this was the first thing I saw. It can feel so overwhelming to get started! Almost half the size of this one. Hopefully it will take some of the stress off me and put it onto the people who care about it. I also have things from several parents mine and my husbands who have passed away in the last few years. Even though I tried to be Judicious, I did save a few things that we liked.
I obviously was in need of plan and now I have one. I not only have to sort and decide what to do with the things I go through, but I also will be packing some of it. Yes, indeed, they are completely full of books. All to be gone through, and the remainder packed. Just to complicate things we also have a house in another state…. I figure if I start and plod along it will be better than sitting here having a panic attack…literally. It sounds like you have quite a job in front of you! I think the approach you are taking is a great one. Work away on one space at a time. I would encourage you not to move onto new spaces until you totally finish with one — or else we can tend to build up little piles of items and postpone decision making on things.
At least, I know that I do that. Good luck — and wishing you buckets of energy and motivation!! I plan to address both aspects in this series: I started week one unbenonced to me , with your 10 week plan. I decided that this new year was going to be the year of purging. I want to get rid of all the paper. So I started with my utility double wide closet that housed all my cookbooks, magazines, etc.
I had a boat load. I spent three full days going through all magazines looking for what it was that I thought I must keep for whatever reason. That was a mere dent. I ended up having the flu which set me back a few days. However, not well enough to tackle my long awaited project s. I, too, struggle with getting rid of magazines.
Maybe because I know they are so full of pretty and beautiful pictures… maybe because I know I spent money on them? Maybe because I associate them with having time to relax and read through them and I desperately want to have that time?? Glad to have you along — good luck with the process!! They want to overthrow and rule the house! One thing I started doing, when I do have a little time to browse quickly through: Get a 3-ring binder and a pack of page protectors even some dividers if you want to set up categories.
Any article that you feel is important enough to keep for future reference or to reread more in depth later, tear or cut it out and place it in a page protector in the binder. That way you save the articles, recipes, etc. I love keeping things organized, but also have a tendency to let things collect for longer than I should before cleaning them out. Excited to see how things go with the plan!
36 best Organized Home images on Pinterest | Free printables, Binder and Financial binder
I do the same! I will be posting times each week sharing tips, plans, and my own progress. You can follow along through the blog — and sign up to get my daily or weekly emails is you like! I love this idea, but when doing these sorts of purges, i struggle to keep up with the rest of the normal every day household chores, any suggestions. Yes, I get what you are saying! Then I can keep up with my other cleaning during the rest of the week. I think taking on only one space a week should help… and stretch it out longer, if need be! It is great to personalize it to your own home and rooms and areas that are an issue for you!
I totally want to do this but needed an achievable plan. I am looking forward to actually dedicating my time and energy to this so that it is done, once and for all. And then I just have to maintain it: I need to work on your week ten goals the most myself. It will take me way more than a week though! That is such a tough area, Denise! Your email address will not be published.
Notify me of follow-up comments via e-mail. This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. It is an awesome way to help recycle! I also use those bags for traveling-hold shoes, wet clothes, sandy beach stuff, etc. Thank you for such a great list; but please donate your plastic bags to your local food bank to be used for food distribution or take them to your local Walmart for recycling, do not throw in the garbage.
I must say your tips are great.
10 Creative Ways to Declutter Your Home
Some tips we see for organizing include buying expensive pieces to use for storage where as your tips require little or no capital outlay and can be done quickly and easily with what it already in the house. But I do agree with donating the plastic bags to a food bank, every bit helps the needy. Also another tip for a kids room is boxes or baskets under the bed for toys.
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- Join Me! A Ten Week Organizing Challenge for Your Entire House!
Label each box; dolls, legos, stuffed animals, ex. Another plus is it saves space on the floor! I love all of these tips. Thank you for sharing.
- Cecelias Big Day;
- Gilded Cage.
- 50 Ideas to Organize Your Home.
- Trusting Him with Your Addicted Child.
Another place to donate all the extra grocery bags to is the Public Library: I agree with Ruth and the others about the plastic bags. In Germany we also have to pay for them in the stores and lots of people use fabric shopping bags. Most organisations will, quite rightly, not waste money on producing their own plastic bags and so their shops rely on donated bags instead. I already do most of these things and I know the value of being tidy and organized!
Thank you for the great tips! Another great way to deal with glass shower doors is to treat them with Rain-X. What should I be looking for? It worked very well. That was a great idea. Will share this with family and friends. Instead of putting 10 plastic bags inside one and throwing out the rest why not do that to all of them and bring back to store where they will recycle them instead of throwing them in trash. So bad for the environment. But for me it was the perfect solution. No prizes just the satisfaction of being the winner.
What an awesome list! Every single one of these tips are very helpful and will definitely provide a less stressful lifestyle to those who implement these ideas in their everyday lives. Uve inspired my eternal optimism…. I live in Ontario , Canada. Maybe could also use plastic grocery bags? I know this post has been up for a couple of years, but, for those like me who are reading it for the first time… If you have clippings or pieces of paper with recipes written on them, take a photo with your phone and save the recipes in an app like Evernote.
You can do the same thing if you only make one or two things from a cookbook, take a photo of the recipes you use, instead of keeping the whole book and donate the book! Just read post for first time. You go, great post! I read this a couple weeks ago. Great ideas, thanks for sharing them. I was curious about the very first picture, the 3 cute white bags.
I was wondering if you would tell me where you purchase them from. Please email me, I would really appreciate it. Im sorry Brenda, its not our photo, so we have no idea!
Any of our readers know and can help Brenda? For those who are asking about the bags…if you have even the most basic sewing skills, there are thousands of pins with patterns for generic bags that could be adapted for this purpose. Thanks for these different organization ideas. Personally, I really like the idea of trying to organize cabinets in categories.
I wonder if it could be good to potentially label them at first so you have an idea of where everything goes. Mom has to busy all time to keep it organize. My house is like that. So i am searching how to get rid of this problem. Thanks for sharing such a nice ideas of kids room organization. Such a clever way to organize kids room. Your email address will not be published. This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.