Goal Tracking: Declutter and Cleaning

Funny that you mention that! A while back I saw some cool organizers online at Staples, too, & I bought 3 of them. They're still in the boxes they came in. I haven't cleaned the area where I want them to go, so they're not being used yet. Just adding to the clutter.

Unpack them and put them together! You can stow things in them and you'll feel so inspired! I want some! I need some! I could clear up the floor, the kitchen, the surfaces of the cartons!

The ones I bought are specifically to help me organize this mountain of paperwork that is always taking over my couch & my dining room table. I do have some storage totes for books, cds, video games, & xmas stuff, but these are the slim drawer kind.

Sounds like it could easily be done... Especially on a Saturday afternoon.

Hey, I want to join the 'buy organizing stuff and never use it club'!

Could this be related to the moon or something? I have been in the 'it's so messy, what's the point of trying' phase for a bit.

I did some dishes this morning, finally. I have the entire couch covered with laundry - I had to bring in the mothball stored stuff that I'd hung out due to rain, but I can't put it away because it still stinks - and now all the other clean laundry that was on the couch also stinks.

I threw out an unopened box of 300 plastic utensils I bought for a party I had SIX YEARS AGO. I would love to toss more stuff from the basement. I also reorganized some stuff in my backroom so that it is easier to get to.

My main problem is that I have way too much stuff for my space and I am unwilling to give it up. I have over 30 cashmere sweaters. Why? The majority of them have moth holes and I still keep them. Why? Yeah, they are warm, but I can't wear them in public without looking like a slob (and I do wear them in public). My dining room smells like a urinal because all these mothball sweaters are piled up on the couch. If I had just thrown most of them out years ago, maybe I could have taken better care of the others so the moths stayed away, who knows?

Sorry, I am really discouraged this week with everything.

I cleaned my room today, swept, mopped, made my bed, organized my stuff, took the trash out and sprayed some apple cinnamon air freshener

Apple cinnamon sounds wonderful!

Blue_Bird, your diligence is inspiring!

Reading this article helped me clean out my fridge:
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/23/ga...rie-kondo.html

I like the idea that if something doesn't 'spark joy,' you should toss it.

I also am experimenting in my kitchen with clutter free surfaces. I took everything off the microwave and put it in the cabinets. I cleared off the junk on the sink leaving just the soap and sponge (putting away the scrubbies and stuff we just use occasionally). I am actually interested to see how much this makes me want to put away everything.

There is a huge psychological difference for me -- if I see a completely empty surface with one thing on it, I put that one thing away. If I see a surface that has some stuff that 'lives' there and one piece of clutter, it's easy to just keep adding junk.

I have noticed that people whose homes seem clean to me do not have anything out-- it's all packed away in a cupboard. I am going to try to set up the kitchen completely like this and see what happens. It will be hard to find room for things, I guess...

I spent some time cleaning up the yard today, getting ready for winter. It looks much nicer! We had been storing junk on our patio -- it's mostly gone and I even swept up the sawdust from the latest construction project.

I am not sure what to do next...

Good job hvert! Just go with whatever catches your eye next

I haven't done much cleaning at all. I still haven't put away all the laundry I did during my laundry spree last weekend, & Sunday is almost over! Sigh. Tomorrow I'll do it. I have to go get ready to leave soon.

I haven't done anything but I did find my denim skirt to wear when the plumber knocks.

Ahh I feel so terrible about this. My boyfriend cleans the house everyday while I'm at work, but there is all this clutter that I keep piling up in one spot. He keeps asking me to sort it out (it really makes the whole room look trashed) but it's so overwhelming to me! I promised him I would do it today but I can't find the motivation.

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Musicjunkie, I had a huge pile of laundry hanging around for a week+ too. I finally put it away last night, but I took out all my summer clothes to store and haven't stored them.

Angelique, yay for finding your skirt! It's nice to uncover stuff

QuietCalamity, I hope you got the chance to start on your pile. Sometimes I tell myself that I will just look at 5 items, or just go through the pile to find things to throw out.

Cleaning the patio sort of irritated me because I threw out most of what was there. I could have done this months ago and actually had a patio to sit on this fall!

I found another motivator for decluttering. An apartment building burned down in my city a few weeks ago, only a few houses down from my best friend from elementary school. No one knows what happened, but apparently there had been complaints about junk and debris. The newspaper articles refer to all the clutter as combustibles. It sure makes me look at my house differently.

I also thought about a conversation I had on another thread on here about hoarding. We were talking about how we often don't get rid of a pair of pants or a sweater because it's just one thing, why not keep it? It doesn't take up much room! I'm getting rid of that stuff now. It really does add up.

I keep telling myself I need to clean up so we can have people bring in the new mattress when we buy it...I don't want people to see my house the way it is now!

Going to clean up my room in a little while, not much to do since I really fully cleaned it last week. Then sometime starting next week we will start cleaning to rest of the house so it's nice for Thanksgiving

On Saturday I bought a five-tier wire shelving unit for my garage. We already have several, but I've been meaning to get another to finish getting things off the floor. This one should do it. It will make it easier to see what we have piled up everywhere. I'm going to set it up today to motivate myself to continue cleaning the garage. It looks like this:

Nice! I have one of those in my back room, I have clothes stacked on it. I'm so antsy and desperate to get this place cleared out. I can't do it alone though and my friend has next to no time to help me. Not to mention the costs of hiring people to carry stuff out and move some more into storage.

I want to buy those rolling storage carts. I'm so desperate to change this place it's really getting me down.

I remember moving things in & out of storage; it was a real pain, literally. Now all of our storage stuff is in our garage. We have gotten rid of some things, but we still have quite a ways to go.

This is actually our 6th shelving unit like this. They all have different crap on them, but a couple are not really well organized, so the space isn't being used as efficiently as it could be. I eventually want to get my garage cleaned up so that I can have all of these shelving units along one wall of the garage. It will look great & it will be so organized.

I wish I knew what I could do in here by myself. I'm looking around and everything looks like more work than my back can handle. But in one corner there's one of the messy stacks of old bills and papers that are everywhere in here and it occurred to me that since I haven't gone near it in at least two years I can go ahead and toss it. It's just the sensory dread of picking up old dusty papers and trying to get into that tight corner.

If I nominated myself for a hoarding program it could all get done. But I don't know if I could deal with being filmed.

I'm so unhappy in this place.

Sorry to hear you're struggling so much emotionally. I've been there. I felt the same way about the hoarding show. I thought, then it would be done! But I also could not handle being on camera all the time. Plus, I definitely don't want to expose myself to everyone I know. I was so unhappy for a long time. Now I'm trying to dig my way out, & I keep reminding myself that it's not nearly as bad as I think it is. It was really hard to change my attitude about my house, but I felt so much better once I did. It doesn't feel inescapable now.

About the papers: See if your town/city has a "shredding day" where you can turn in a bunch of old paperwork to be shredded. Then you don't really have to do it yourself, & it's gone. I myself have a LOT of paperwork that needs to be shredded. It's just piled up, also very dusty. I don't even have an excuse for that. We own a shredder, & I have access to a shredder at work, & we even have a shredding company come in & pick up our shredding stuff! It's ridiculous that it's still in my house.

I know! It's crazy. I guess for a long time I just didn't notice the clutter. I was in such an unsettled state, thinking I'd just be moving again anyway so there was no point in fixing the place up, plus I had no concept of how much I really needed to get rid of. Actually I would like to move because there's no laundry in this place and the stairs are very hard for me. But even if I do move this stuff now has to be gotten rid of. Part of me wants to dump all the cartons in the kitchen and other spots because I haven't opened them in over two years. But I have some dishes I think and other things... I just don't know. Maybe dumping it all is the way to go. But I need help carrying it all out, I can't do it.

Part of me felt that way, too. I actually hate where I live because I despise my neighbors & I'm just unhappy with the house itself. So I just didn't really care what the house looked like, because I hated it anyway. What was the point of fixing it up & trying to make it look nice if I was still going to hate it? I want to move away NOW but as usual, it's a matter of money, & I don't have any at the moment, LOL. Next year I can start saving money up for that goal. So this year, I need to get rid of whatever needs to be gotten rid of, & start preparing for when I move. I don't want to wait until the last minute to do it. It will be stressful enough, I'm sure. & we have way more stuff than 2 people should, so I know we have A LOT to get rid of. Seems like no matter how much we do get rid of, we always have more. But it needs to be done.

Yes! It's such a huge task. How could I have just not noticed for so long? Well, I never had anyone over here so that inhibits seeing it as anyone else would. I hope you can save up to move asap. That sounds so good to me.

I'm currently cleaning my cottage that's just full of 2 years worth of depression. I've collected a lot of "junk" and there are piles all over the place. It's scary what depression can do and how you don't notice things piling up anyway, I'm about a quarter away from being organized. There's still a lot to do, but once you see a clear path in one section of your living space, it gives you hope that the whole place can be clean! I'm taking a little break and catching up with TV, but I took off of work/school because I'm sick. And I kinda felt like I got sick because I've been living in a rats nest for the past year or two! Oh boy! I'm getting there! I used to watch Hoarders Buried Alive while cleaning, it was a great motivator. Just wish they had more episodes. Good luck to everyone decluttering your space!