After a rather hard day I wasn’t feeling very inspired to write a post today but that would just not be good enough. So I decided to annoy my son again with his clothing clutter and I quickly got the short shift there. So then I had to move to plan B. There wasn’t actually a plan B in place but I have a method that doesn’t usually fail me. I just picked a room and opened a cupboard and a couple of drawers and sure enough I found something I had passed over before.

As it turned out it was a couple of pieces of sentimental clutter hidden away in a drawer in my daughters bedroom. Funnily enough it was actually the third drawer down but I promise it isn’t a junk drawer. When I pulled these items out a thought suddenly struck me and that was how long had each of these items been cluttering up my home. Then I thought how much fun would it be if for a week I add together the clutter years of each item together and see how many years I come up with.

Today’s item has been in my possession for fourteen years. It was a gift from a job I left once and was bought for me by a very lovely lady that I was sad to leave behind.  I have never really used this for anything it has just sat in the china cabinet looking pretty for all these years. So technically it has been clutter for all that time. So that makes fourteen years to start the tally for the week.

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This item has moved from one end of Australia to the other then to the USA then back to Australia again. It is in good shape considering how fragile the fluted edge is.

For the last 207 days finding things to declutter has been a reasonably simple task due to the sheer volume of stuff that needed to go. Now it is time to tackle the tricky stuff. The stuff that so far I have avoided simply because I didn’t want to make the hard decisions.

Things like…

• Those craft items that I keep telling myself I will eventually use one day but after years that day has never arrived.
• Some of the sentimental items that deep down I know are just clutter that no one but me would ever want.
• Items that I know I don’t want but have been struggling whether I should give away or sell.
• Even some items I should sell on ebay but am getting a little tired of dealing with pricing, photographing, describing, watching, mailing and just taking the gamble as to whether they will sell or not.

You know, I feel better just having admitted these things to myself and I am now eager to get started. I am tired of this stuff sitting around taunting me with the guilt of having wasted the money on it in the first place. Other stuff that  I must admit I have been too lazy to deal with so far. Realising that I can risk a few eBay insertion fees because we have done well enough on eBay so far it won’t matter if the odd thing doesn’t sell.

It is amazing how even though I declutter and write about decluttering every day I can still manage to forget the rules. Still manage to fall into the psychological pitfalls that I advise everyone else to be wary of. Well luckily I caught myself before I was too far gone. Maybe now I am getting a little melodramatic but you get the idea sometimes a person needs to stop and take a good look around them and at themselves and get back on track.

If you are off track with your decluttering stop and think what is worse, the task at hand or the bad feelings generated day in and day out by being surrounded by the clutter. Do yourself a favour just get rid of it.

ITEM 208 OF 365 LESS THINGS

On refection maybe I should have kept this dream catcher and hung it over my bed. Maybe it would have done it’s job of filtering out the bad dreams and only letting the good ones through like the dream of a clutter free home.

Today I received a comment from Hannah asking for help with a decision on what to do with old diaries/journals.

Here is what Hannah wrote…

I have just found a box full of the journals/diaries I have kept over the years! What to do! I don’t think I’ll ever read them again, and I don’t know if I want anyone else reading them either, although if I’m dead, who cares?! I think I actually know the answer for me as much as I don”t want to face it, but would be interested in your thoughts, and those of your readers.

Well Hannah, there are a couple of things you might want to take into account here. These journals are a record of your life. You may think now that you will never want to read them again and maybe you never will who knows. I used to do a bit of genealogy research and I would have loved to have had some old journals from relatives that have passed just to get an insight as to what they were like. So maybe it would be nice to keep them for when you are gone.

The upside to this is that the words are what counts not whether or not you have the original copies. I personally would scan them and save digital copies and throw the originals away. If you are not fond of the idea of someone accessing them at this point in time put a security password on the file. If you have a will keep the password with that.

I am sure some of my other readers will have an opinion on this so I will leave it up to them to comment and provide you with other ideas.

When I read your request I actually fished and old Abundance Journal out of the bin that I had thrown away earlier today. I wasn’t going to bother recording it on my blog but under the circumstances I thought twice about it. This journal only records five things a day I was grateful for back in 1998 and it really wasn’t riveting reading so I don’t think anyone ealse is likely to want to read it. I had no qualms about tossing it in the bin which is where it was returned to immediately after I took the following photo.

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This of course is the journal mentioned in today’s post

Following on from Tuesday’s post, Sentimental Clutter I wanted to bring forward some interesting points brought up in the comments and emails about gifts with strings attached.

Cindy had suggested about a week ago in an email to me that I should write a post on this very subject. Then MmmYarn made a comment about how she gives gifts in a very thoughtful way that I felt we could all learn from. So here goes..

There seems to be two kinds of gifts with strings attached…

1. Items gifted down through the family which you feel obliged to accept (whether you want them or not) and keep until you are at an appropriate age to pass them on to someone else. Or as Cindy so nicely put it “things that other people own but that live in your house”.
2. Gifts that are given to you with the intention (whether imagined or real) that you should keep forever.

Items in category one usually include things like china, crystal, furniture, silverware, jewellery, medals etc. Items in category two include some of the items in category one (usually new rather than antique) with extras thrown in like handmade items, gaudy trinkets, souvenirs and many more.

These gifts are often received happily and greatly loved and appreciated. Sometimes however they are accepted graciously and dutifully kept regardless of personal taste. Like I said the intention for you to accept or keep these items can be either real of imagined but either way you do not want to rock the boat with the giver (usaully a loved one or family member) in case you hurt their feelings.

In the case of family heirloom type gifts the chances are that if you just explained at the time that they are not to your taste and you would rather see them go to someone who would appreciate them more it may not come as such an affont to the giver as you might think. You have to weigh up which option you can live with the most, a little disappoint for the giver or a lifetime being stuck with the item you don’t want.

In the case of the other kind, it can’t hurt to accept graciously and use/display it for a reasonable length of time then pass it on. It will appear that you have enjoyed it as intended and like your not refusing the gift in the first place the giver usually won’t question where it has gone. No harm done. If they do ask and you think they can’t handle the truth I really think a little white lie may be in order here.

The one thing we do have control over is never to impose this stituation on anyone else. This is where MmmYarn’s thoughtful giving comes into play. Here is what she had to say in her comment “I should add I’m a knitter and give away a lot of my finished items. I actively encourage recipients to pass the items on when they are outgrown or no longer needed”. Willow was impressed with this sentiment and  said “I give away most of my knitting as gifts. Thanks for the reminder to tell people that they are welcome to pass the items along without guilt. My girls bring back their old sweaters to me and sometimes I unravel them and reknit the yarn into something else. Recycled and repurposed knits!”

Thanks ladies for your contribution to today’s post and let’s hope open guilt free gifting catches on.

Make sure you read the comments for this post as there are some great examples coming through of other readers experiences in this matter.

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I probably should have decluttered something today to fit in with my post but I didn’t. Although I do have a few things in mind these bowls will have to do for now.

The item that is being donated today is a sentimental item that is kind of sad to see go.  As you know our mission at the moment is to declutter any items in our home that are not being used and are unlikely to be used in the future. The fact that this item has been unused and hidden away in my camphor wood chest for several years deems it clutter.

It is the last hand crocheted item left in our home that was made by my husbands grandma. Our linen closet used to overflow with all the crocheted hand towels and face clothes that she made for us throughout our  married life. She has been gone for several years now and we have  plenty of fond memories of her. She was a lovely lady who had it pretty tough for much of her life and we will never forget her.

You may wonder why we would give away this last physical reminder of someone so loved. My answer to that is because it is only that a physical reminder. Whenever I see any hand crocheted item I always think of her so there are constant reminders everywhere. We will always remember her and she will always be near in our hearts. We do not need to keep items that may be more useful to someone else in order to remind us of the good time we had together.

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I really only touched on this subject with my post Decluttering Pessimism but it seems to have evoked some interesting responses from people who have been subjected to the unfortunate position of dealing with a lost loved one’s clutter. And nobody wants to be forced into the very awkward position of having to broach the subject with an elderly relative that they need to consider paring down their possessions in order to avoid this very situation.

I remember when I was a child rummaging through drawers, cupboards and sheds at my grandmothers house and being intrigued with the interesting things I found. It was mostly just clutter that she hadn’t used for years. Stuff that belonged to my grandfather still lingered in all these places especially the sheds even though he had died several years earlier.

My grandparents owned and operated a bakery during and after WWII. My grandfather would not include the secret family sponge cake recipe with the sale of the business when he was ready to retire so no one would buy it. They just shut it down, stored all the equipment and fittings in the back shed and it was all still there thirty years later when my grandmother died.

We lived 500 miles away and my parents had to go and clear everything out when she died.  My parents had a business to run and didn’t have the time to spend going through all the stuff properly and deciding the worth of everything. They kept the good crystal and china, some tools, jewellery and a few other odds and ends. Then offloaded the remaining stuff quickly in a huge garage sale. I always thought it was such a shame.

It is never to early to get your clutter under control because that old person will be you soon enough.

So far I have focused on the inevitable event of old people passing on but there is an even more tragic situation yet to explore. Anything can happen any time to any of us and it is an even bigger shock for those left behind when someone is taken suddenly and unexpectedly. I am not saying that we should give away all our beloved possessions just in case but we should at least give some thought to keeping them at a level that is reasonable to expect someone else to have to sort through during such a tragic time. Maybe the things you own that you think may be a burden to someone else could be considered declutterable.

I am still not sure whether I am comfortable sending this post out it feels like it could be a little raw for some people. I hope no one is offended by it and if so please come forward and voice your opinion. I would be more than happy to withdraw it if you feel I should.

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Another ebay sale only $3.00 this time but every little bit counts.

I sit here with my hands poised above the keyboard drawing a complete blank today. I have been a little side-tracked as my son had all four of his wisdom teeth extracted this morning. So due to my lack of sleep last night, sitting in hospital waiting rooms for half  a day, swapping ice packs, warming soup and serving ice-cream to him I have been a little distracted.

So I am going to keep it light today and just admit to you the strangest item of clutter lurking in my home. Being as we have discussed this week about childhood clutter and in keeping with the above paragraph I think this is an appropriate confession. At the fear of losing all respect as a declutter blogger this is it…

I have two tiny bottles stashed away in my jewellery box which contain the baby teeth of my two children.

So does anyone have anything stranger than that hidden away somewhere? If so please tell us about it because I would like to think that I am not the weirdest one among us.

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I am on the fourth go around in the kitchen and these didn’t make to cut this time.

If you have been reading my blog for a while you will know that my take on decluttering is ” slow and steady wins the race”. One of the advantages to this approach is that you can start with the easy stuff and as time goes on you become more ruthless and eager to reduce your clutter more and more. The job gets easier as you go because what seemed like hard decisions at first become simpler and comfortable for you.

Betty Jo from Joy With Less has discovered this and she recently wrote about it in her post The Little Things. Here is an excerpt of what Betty Jo wrote..

Like Betty Jo has discovered, decluttering is a process one that gets easier as you go if you give yourself the time to get comfortable with the areas you find challenging. Learn as you go, get ruthless when you are ready and youwill find out how liberating it can be.

ITEM 167 OF 365 LESS THINGS

This vase hasn’t been used for a long time, someone else may use it more than me.

I received a comment from Loretta yesterday and here is what she wrote…

I’ve got a question for you: since your children are now grown, what advice do you have for those of us with younger kids with regard to keepsakes and clutter? Is there anything you regret not keeping for your kids, or did you (and they) keep ‘too much’ childhood stuff?

I recently went through a big box full of cards my mother kept for me from the time I was born: birthday, Christmas, invitations. I had 40 years worth! Tossed most of them, but realised I was doing the same thing for my kids. It is quite liberating to think I don’t NEED to keep this stuff any more!

Much to my Mother-in-laws horror I have never been one to keep too much of this kind of stuff. Because we move around every now and again due to my husband’s job I have continually decluttered over the years. My approach this time around is different, it is more of a case of minimising with the intent never to accumulate again. Below is  a list of some of the items I have kept for and of my children.

• Baby cards (birth and Christening) Confirmation and First Holy communion cards and mementos (rosary beads etc.)
• A few special outfits they used to wear ( Unique items I and my mum knitted for them)
• One or two special toys. (a silver rattle and a music carousel)
• My son’s Thomas the Tank Engine & Star Wars toy collections.
• Some examples of their school work.

Which when you write it down like that it sounds like an awful lot. These are just the things I have kept for them. Once they were old enough to choose things they wanted to keep themselves that is when things started to pile up. I have always encouraged them to sell their old toys whenever I have had garage sales over the years and they were happy to make a little pocket money from that. Nevertheless, here is the list of what has accumulated over the years and is cluttering up every spare bit if space in their wardrobes….

• Every band t-shirt/hoody my son has ever owned. (my children love their music)
• Skateboard and Sports Illustrated Magazines
• Travel souvenirs
• KISS dolls
• Every note slipped between friends at school that my daughter ever received (there are a lot)
• A doll or two
• 2 Build-a-bears
• Every Rolling Stone magazine she received by subscription
• Both have piles of CDs
• Mariners Baseball souvenirs ( both children)
• Photos frames with friends and other odd stuff (daughter)
• Both have a sleeping bag (huge) that came from I don’t remember where but came in handy for sleep-overs and school camps.
• A box of Little Golden Books and Dr Seuss books they were particularly fond of.

And I am sure there is other stuff but I have scared myself enough already with this lot. I think I have mentioned before that this is my area of doom when it comes to decluttering.

The beauty of my decluttering strategy is to leave the hard things until last but the day of reckoning is coming and I do plan to minimise these items. My daughter is visiting next week and she is aware that I am planning on going through her stuff while she is here and hopefully she will be prepared to part with some of it.

As much as this list of stuff is large and scary and I really would like to see it minimised I do believe you shouldn’t force you children to part with things they are not prepared to let go. I suppose the best thing is not to over indulge them in the first place. There isn’t anything I regret not having from my childhood but then I didn’t have much in the way of possessions we made our own fun those days building cubby houses, fishing with the family, and other physical stuff. I wouldn’t change that for anything.

Anyway I digress. In a couple of weeks I will let you know how things went with my daughter and I will speak to her and my son about this subject and how they feel about their clutter and if there is anything they wish they still had.

I would like to think that if you set a good example of living with less maybe your children will follow suit and feel the same way but you never can tell.

Thanks Loretta for such a great question. I know I have only given you half an answer but when I have actually dealt with my children’s clutter I will give you some feedback on how that went.

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Another ebay sale $6.50. I guy from the local post office and I are on a first name basis now.

I received an email recently from Deb telling me about how she is doing a similar thing to me but documenting it from very different angle.

Here is what Deb wrote…

Quite the opposite to my photo archive but really handy for insurance purposes if Deb ever had to make a claim. Also a great way to make the choice of what stays and what goes. I like it.

If anyone else has an original way they decide what stays and what goes please drop me a line I would love to hear about it.

ITEM 158 OF 365 LESS THINGS

This guitar did not appreciate the 240 volt jolt it received to its 110 volt system so was only good for it parts and thanks to Freecycle I found someone happy to take it for this purpose.