get rid of all my clutter

maybe i had enough of this goal. will see what i can do. packed some things. i can’t get rid of valuable things, brand new, just becouse i don’t currently use them!! i’m keeping them for the time when we have bigger kitchen. it is already pretty organised but it is small!

i have pearl necklace i wear once in a blue moon, should i get rid of it? of course not.

so i’m packing stuff that is valuable, i know it is against every advice, but it is the only solution to this problem i can think of after 5 years. i need to move on with this. time to remember there are more important things in life besides home (although this sounds totaly wrong to me!). my smaller home, for instance; my temple – my body.

i extended the deadline for this goal to be no1 priority in my life for one more month becouse of Xmass. i want to do as much as possible in each zone before i give up this goal = i need to get a life!

so i’m giving this one more try. i was up late last night doing as much as i could after the choir rehersal. (i stayed awake since i was angry to our substitute conductor, i don’t want to work with him any more, he acted unprofessionaly on several occasion.)

i want to achieve visible result so i need to invest many hours. we need. i told my SO that i’ll give up on this if i’m the only one who cares about the home. he reassured me that he cares too.
{i want to feel like living with an adult. so i remind constantly to act like that (and like one lol) and be patient.}
it is high price but it is worth it. i only hope intend – after 5 years of decluttering and giving all i had to this goal – i’ll finnaly start to get visible results.

i have hard time parting with extra things, i need to find a way to overcome this. i need to coordinate amount of stuff with space available.

at my SO’s place – we emptied everything except 2 small rooms (we put everything in) and his relatives helped clean the place. my SO moved to my place. so now we have only 1 place to organise. and attic someday.

yesterday he brought majority of his stuff (el.appliances).
day before yesterday we browsed trough a tower of boxes with old books and decided what to keep. need to get out the rest. old paper would be the easiest solution. maybe the easiest is the best for now.

i organised my clothes (brought up the best), released some of my summer clothes (i could let go more, i know, i know.) i also organised my shoes and scarves. even ironed scarves! i plan to dress up (and that is great news), but in the morning i don’t feel like it… at least, it is all there in prime space, sorted. all sport clothes i removed to hall cupboard. and reorganised hall cupboard. yeah. :-D

now we plan to put the newest furniture to our living room and move the oldest one to his place. we want to surround ourselves with the best things possible.
too much stuff; i don’t have a clue how to do it all, i admit… but one step at a time will do it.

spent 2 days emptying one small room that we plan to instal small kitchen into it since it is adjacent to living room (in state of organising). we did amasing job, it was almost ceiling high with boxes and stuff. although there were also taking from one pile, making another pile in another room, for some things. at least we organised paper, boxes and boxes of it. i am amased how much magasines my SO let go.

i have found a box of my stuff there, with some important documents that were lying hidden there!!

although i sacrificed nice sunny sunday afternoon, maybe the last one in quite a while… this was cumbersome, but great pleasure.

now to repeat the whole process at my place, there are also lots of my SO’s magasines.

living room is doing fine, hanging cabinets are fixed to the wall, and bottom cabinets are ready to transport from my place. i have plenty decorating ideas and enjoy this creative phase of work, practising patience. (still, the woodwork is old and ruining the whole picture, but i’ll hang curtains…)

spent all afternoon. right containers are important, crucial for decluttering! contain and conquer!!

my MIL’s room starts to look decent. her SIL washed her windows and curtains, God bless her soul!

...this project is too big to be no1 priority…

decluttering my SO’s mother room, and i’m sooooo tiredddd!!!! and MY clutter stands still.

painting was the only way to start massive decluttering project at my SO’s place.

i went yesterday there to mop the floors after painting and help make new arrangement of furniture. i was all eager but all we did is moved some of his mom’s things to her room. moving furniture around proved to be time-consuming task.

and i am not glad that her room become too crowded with things and stuff. we need to find some space in cupboards to put stuff in it, in order for the room to look decent.(someone help with grammar, please!) i hope her relatives will take care of details so we can focus on rest of the house.

i was all excited and we worked very hard all afternoon and evening. but there is so much to do – not that i’m complaining or anything, just simply saying it takes time and effort to see results.

it was soo nice to came there and see empty rooms and white walls, and i want to keep that nice, relaxing feeling of spaciness. that is all i ask.

next step is moving hanging furniture from other room, lots of work, since it is full of stuff, rarely (if ever) used, that need to find another home. maybe boxes, temporarily. i hope we will do it tommorow.

now i’m going to the store to see top-of the closet containers, i hope to find some nice ones. i want to turn that place upside down, to relocate rarely used items to hard-to-reach places, and reclaim premium storage space for stuff currently floating around. therefore the need for top-of the closet containers.

yesterday we spent whole afternoon at my SO’s place emptying 2 rooms preparing them for being painted, which has hopefully started this morning. now the tidying up has the whole new meaning!
i was very enhusiastic yesterday when i heared the news and was glad to cancel everything and jump in for help. i’m so excited for this, bcus it will lead to new arangement of rooms, and i’m so looking forward to it!! we will turn everything upside down, noone room will stay the same.
so tehicaly it is not my clutter but someone’s else, but i’m so happy when things are happening. and besides, in one of those 2 rooms being painted i plan to set up home magasine library, that will free MY place of many things that belong to my SO so hopefully it will be easier for me to declutter it.
i plan this for happen very long time so i’m very excited to see one step of the plan coming true!!
i will sort and purge everything. why it is so much easier with someone else’s stuff? maybe i need to pretend that my place will be painted, too, and empty everything likewise?
we celebrated it with barbecue and it is nice way to relax, although i’m vegetarian, i now don’t mind barbecue (smell and sight of it), it’s OK with me.

when my SO entered the room yesterday, he said “so, we have normal living room now!” at last! i doubled all my efforts and now i have one room.

i really feel stupid, i must admit, for dedicating 4 years of my life with such a slim results. that’s why i decided to focus my efforts on outside appearance. i just can’t leave the house with such a mess inside, and i keep promising myself, i can do it within one month, and one month, and another month, and 4 years of my life passed as a prisoner! only way to deal with it is to do it, i can’t see any other way. i need to be efficient.

i need to release things faster, i have way too much stuff. they cost me too much time of my life. i need to cut my belongings into half. that means letting go many good things and keeping only the best. for example, i limited my clothes to-be-fixed-someday to one big suitcase and let go the rest. so thew are not lying around in plastic bags, they are contained. i am aware that i kept too much. but i can’t help it for now.

i need to dedicate smaller time slots, but more often. 2hrs tops, everything longer becomes inefficient. i sacrified weekends and weekends of my life, and i did 80% things in 20% time. e.g. first 2 hours. i could go outside enjoy life the rest of the day. i regret i didn’t for 4 long years.

i need to focus on outside apearance, to make room looking decent. from there on i can organise things, not before. this was my main mistake.

i realised that my cupboards in living room are bursting of dead weight! it is awful! so that is why i started with media centre.
(i forgot to blog about sorting magasines into neat boxes i’ve collected at work. my SO has big collection of magasines that are very precious to him. every couple of years i organise them for him, but this time he needs to learn to keep them organised.)
all these years i was preocupied with wadrobe and kitchen cupboards and sort of neglected other cabinets and chests. it was big awakening to me – now i can understand why i feel unease in living room!

purchased some of those cylindrical boxes for CD-s to put away movies, series etc. they are sorted by type in 3 different boxes, i don’t need direct acces for those, stacking them works fine. and boxes stack themselves, too! great space saver! i can’t figure out any clever use for jewel cases so out they go!

i searched for some system for CD SW collection (those CDs in clear sheets that come with PC magasines) and concluded narrow shoe box is good enough. i can still have direct acess, and it is inexpensive. with righ foil, scissors and bit of patience, any shoe box can turn into smart storage solution. i can even add smart dividers in the same color. there is “black leather” foil that looks pretty neat.

i sorted almost all SW and video CD/DVD yesterday afternoon until too late so now i’m dead tired. but i was so excited about that and stil am. and especially since i’ve put every single unlabeled item into my laptop to see what’s in it and labeled it. i’m so proud! LOL

i believe this evening i’ll finish that, and audio collection is my next stop. for now i’m keeping them in original jewel cases but i hope someday i’ll have it all in digital form (well they are digital already, but you know what i mean) i just need to find the right SW.