Day 278: I Need to Own Less Stuff so That I Have Less to Manage

Posted on October 4, 2020 by Sandra Madeira

The day started with me having to get up early for another plasterer to come round to look around and quote us for the ceilings that we need doing. He’ll come back to us with a price in a couple of days.

I then couldn’t decide what was the best use of my time. It seems that no matter how much I am clearing, I’m still seeing so much clutter around.

The answer has got to be to have less stuff and the only way to do that is to get rid of it even though I might want it one day. That’s the bit I’m finding hard. I need to own less stuff and that will mean that I will have less to manage.

This is what was on my mind this morning:

  1. A bedroom full of clutter that I need to sort out that seems to have grown arms and legs in the last week or so. It’s getting to the point where I can just about get into my side of the bed.
  2. The thought of having to empty our built in wardrobes before they are knocked out this coming Thursday.
  3. The spare room that I really need to continue working on as my daughter is starting to think that the room will never be hers (it seemed a much easier task few months ago when we said she would be able to move in there by her 16th birthday… which is in a few weeks).
  4. The garage that I need to continue creating space in by bagging things up. Deep down I wanted to do that the most today as I can hide in there 😀.
  5. Dinner to cook before the bedroom furniture designer was going to arrive at 1.30pm
  6. Allocating an hour or two for the bedroom furniture designer’s visit with no ideas on how I wanted our room.
  7. Two lots of washing including uniforms etc
  8. Cleaning the bathrooms as I didn’t get a chance mid-week

I know full well that starting the day with only a plan in my head is never a good idea. It wasn’t until I wrote it all down above that I could see that I was never going to get it all done.

As you can imagine, I got a bit overwhelmed this morning because of the amount of jobs I wanted to do. It took my youngest teen to put me back on track. She sat me down and made suggestions. Together we made some progress.

She reminded me that I wanted to take the small bookcase out of the spare room and put it in the hallway downstairs. So, she helped me take all of the DVDs out and put them on a couple of shelves in the cupboards. This is only temporary as the final destination will be the room that my eldest will eventually move out of.

Seeing the empty cabinet made me feel so much better and between us we managed to carry it down the stairs and put in the hallway.

DVD bookcase now in hallway

If you’ve been following me for a while, you may remember a month or so ago that I moved a glass cabinet from the hallway into the garage leaving us with clear space but no shelf . This cabinet matches the floor better and the shelves can be used until we find something we want that’s slightly smaller. I don’t want to buy anything until we’re sure so this will do for now.

I then spent some time cooking roast pork chops whilst moving the large plastic boxes out of the main part of the spare room. They haven’t quite made it into the garage as they were heavy so I’ve put the boxes of photos back in the empty spare room wardrobe for now. It’ll be easy to lift them into the room that my eldest daughter will eventually move out of. What I like is that items are now in categories in the spare room and out of sight leaving us with more room in there to get the room ready.

Bedroom designer visit

We discussed designs for our room with the bedroom furniture designer and he left us with a quote and few ideas. Although my husband wanted me to think about how I wanted the room, I really couldn’t think about it with everything else going on in my mind. I think the man knew that we weren’t in a position to make a decision today (he was getting impatient with us because we either kept changing our minds, or not agreeing with each other). He left us with the paperwork and his phone number. He wasn’t pushy which was good.

The evening

We did our usual Skype with my mum and dad which was lovely, and then my eldest and I watched a new film that’s just come out on DVD. It’s called Dare to Dream which is about the law of attraction and based on The Secret book by Rhonda Byrne. It was a nice easy going feel good film, and my daughter and I had a lovely cuddle whilst watching it.

Bath time now… can’t wait

Until tomorrow…

Sandra

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Day 277: Making Progress With the Garage Clutter, and Being Creative With the Toys

Posted on October 3, 2020 by Sandra Madeira

The trip to the carpet shop didn’t go too well this morning so we won’t talk about that. To take my mind off it, I decided to go to my cluttered hideaway, aka the garage, and sort sort sort. I was in the mood for clearing stuff which is always a good thing when you’ve held onto many years’ worth of stuff for one reason or another.

I started off feeling really motivated to clear space and get rid of things. I pulled out box after box, opening each one and making a quick decision about whether is was a ‘to be sorted’ box or a ‘definitely don’t want’ box. I also managed to find hidden strength to move things and be ruthless with what I was throwing away.

I came across a box of plastic kitchen toys and brought it into the house to clean it all up so that I could either sell or donate it. Bizarrely, it was at that exact point in time that my youngest happened to be taking photos of childhood items for her GCSE project so that she could draw them in a later lesson. She ask me what else she could include and I showed her the box of kitchen toys.

I washed and dried them and she took a few bits for her project. She then helped me sort them all out and arrange them so they I could take photos for selling.

Having fun with clutter

We then categorised them into colours for a bit of fun and I took a photo for Instagram. It’s all back in the box now and ready for selling.

I returned back to the garage and continued sorting boxes and moving things into categories until around 6pm. I found so many boxes of stuff I didn’t want and I was literally stashing them over the other side of the room ready to bag up for my charity shop run on 13 Oct.

How was I feeling after the clearing session?

Annoyed is a word I would use today. What was my reason for keeping some of this stuff that I clearly didn’t need? I came across things like coats, bags, kitchen crockery, kitchen appliances, toys, baby stuff, old cameras, old phones, a videos player and cassettes, toys, curtains, speakers and so on. I even found one big box containing my rucksack from my travelling days.

Embarrassed is another word to describe how I was feeling about the clutter today. This is because it’s taken me over 12 years to get round to going through some of these boxes. I’d completely forgotten I had a lot of this stuff.

Some stuff in the garage

Although a lot of what I was doing today was assessing and moving, I did manage to quite easily fill a couple of charity bags and half a black sack of rubbish. I also took out three empty boxes for recycling. I do love seeing an empty box when I’m clearing, as it gives me a sense of accomplishment.

Clearing clutter

I wore a mask whilst clearing, as getting to these old boxes was dusty work. I couldn’t wait to get in the shower after I’d finished.

My day didn’t stop there… the grocery shopping turned up, and then I made a mince beef and onion pie from scratch…

It was actually nice to eventually get to sit down and eat.

We just watched a good film called ‘Just Mercy’. It’s based on a real story apparently.

It’s been a long day but I’ve got loads done and I’m pleased with my progress. I think I’ll sleep well tonight.

Hope you’re all enjoying your weekend.

Until tomorrow…

Sandra

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Day 276: Putting Old Bookshelves to Good Use

Posted on October 2, 2020 by Sandra Madeira

It has rained all day today (all to do with Storm Alex apparently) and I had to do two trips to the school and back – the second one was because my daughter couldn’t find her bus pass. Anyway, I had a good chat to my mum on the phone on this afternoon’s drive to the school, and caught up with the girls in the car on the way home. They seemed happy that it was finally the weekend, and so was I.

So, you may be wondering what I did with the white bookshelf that I moved out of the spare room yesterday. If you missed the post, check out What’s behind the door? I can be quite resourceful when I put my mind to it, and tend to use things until they can be used no more. Instead of shoving the bookshelf in the garage with its identical twin and all of the other junk, I had an idea to put it in the conservatory.

It lacks shelving in the conservatory and I have been using the window ledge for part of my self-improvement books collection. You know how much I love my new little cosy sanctuary come office that I’ve made myself in the conservatory? Well, I equally love my books and like to have them to hand in case I want to refer to something, work on self-improvement or just read up on interesting topics.

Today on a zoom call, I was asked to go through ‘time management’ with someone that I’m mentoring, and I really needed the book ‘Eat that Frog‘ by Brian Tracy or ‘Time Management for Manic Mums‘ by Allison Mitchell, or ‘Getting Things Done’ by David Allen. Don’t get me wrong, I can talk about Time management all day, but it’s nice to have the exact diagrams and methods to hand in the books instead of having to remember the small details.

So, back to the bookshelves. I found a way of putting the bookshelf next to my desk serving as additional space when I’m working. I also placed one of my home grown geraniums on the top shelf.

Bookshelf put to good use

It was then that I remembered that there was another matching bookshelf in the garage that I could put the other side of the room next to the exercise machine. I knew that it wasn’t doing to be easily accessible in the garage because of the boxes that had been placed on, in and around it. After moving heavy boxes around, I literally had to lift the bookshelf out of the tight space (I’ve left a bit of a mess but it’s also made me want to go back in there over the weekend and sort things out, which is a good thing).

Back to the conservatory… I gave the bookshelf a good clean and put it next to the exercise machine with another geranium on top and a few books.

Second bookshelf put to use

Although they are both in compact spaces, I think that both of them match nicely and look good with books, plants, ornaments and candles. I still need to move the stack of books from the cupboard in my bedroom into this bookshelf but I ran out of time today because I had work to get on with. I can move them tomorrow.

I think that the previous owners left the bookshelves here when they moved out. Funnily enough I’m putting them back in the exact same place that they left them.

This weekend

We had a decorator come round earlier to go through what we need painting after the lights and plastering have been done. Lots more going on this weekend in terms of talking to a wardrobe designer and a plasterer, as well as another visit to the carpet shop to make our decision.

I also have lots of clearing and decluttering to do in the spare room and bedroom. If time permits I will spend a couple of hours in the garage making space.

So, time for some me-time now.

Until tomorrow…

Sandra

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Day 275: What’s Behind the Door?

Posted on October 1, 2020 by Sandra Madeira

I’m not quite sure why I have left the task of ‘clearing behind doors’ for so long. The one I wanted to focus on today was the bookshelf in the spare room. As my husband is working in there at the moment, I said to him that I would wait until he had finished work for the day and then sort it out. His reply was ‘oh, apart from a couple of files, it can all go into the bin can’t it?’

I think he was trying to help but I couldn’t even answer. I was horrified and wouldn’t even entertain the thought of opening a black sack and throwing it all in. This is why I find it difficult to delegate decluttering!

Mini project plan

I create project plans all the time for work projects, but don’t do it for home stuff. I thought about how many jobs like the bookshelf one that I still have to do around house this year. I also want to start tracking the maintenance jobs I’ve been getting quotes on.

I mentioned it to my friend at work and she told me about this app called Trello that she’s heard is good at tracking projects. I realised that I had already downloaded it earlier in the year, so decided to give it a go.

Here’s the bookshelf behind the door and the list of steps for today…

Before decluttering and moving

Here’s a bit more details on what I did with the items…

The books: The best place for these was the garage where I put the large bookshelf last weekend.

The large files: Two of these files were empty and I’ve added the rest of the files to the ‘paperwork’ category stack in the spare room ready to do a mass sort one weekend. I do love it when everything is in one place. It makes me feel like I’m getting somewhere.

The CDs: I need to work out what I’m doing with CDs. They are currently in three places: in this bookshelf, in another rack in this room, and in the garage. Again, it’s best that they are all in one place until I have time to go through them.

The DS Games: I have no idea if the girls even want these or will ever use their old DS consoles again. I’ll store them with the CDs for now.

So, to summarise, all items have a place or can be donated, the bin is definitely not one of the options for any of it.

Then I gave everything a clean…

Here’s the end result of the view behind the door. I felt really pleased with myself as I ticked everything off and it didn’t take very long. Today wasn’t about decluttering, it was more about clearing at categorising ready for the sorting another day.

It’s been a bit of a calmer day today. The roller coaster I was on yesterday felt like it had slowed down a bit and I even managed to grab a quick nap this afternoon. My husband cooked me a lovely dinner as well.

Bath time now for a bit of self-care.

Until tomorrow…

Sandra

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Day 274: Sometimes I Feel Like I’m on a Roller Coaster With Rest Stops

Posted on September 30, 2020 by Sandra Madeira
Rest stop

This post took a while to put together today. My thoughts were all jumbled up in my head and the only way that I could get them out was to put bullet points down first and then make some sense out of them afterwards.

I feel like I’m on a roller coaster, and I’m allowed to get off now and again to maintain the house and plug myself in for some quiet time to recharge. I’m slowly realising that I’m in control of these rest stops whereas before I thought that they were controlled by others. It’s a good realisation.

Things have felt like they are moving fast today with trying to coordinate the work we want to do around the house. It’s as if someone has pressed ‘go’ somewhere and I can’t find the switch to slow it down, but at the same time, I’m pleased that it’s going fast, as decisions are being made and people are popping up out of nowhere to help.

On these roller coaster sort of days, I don’t move forward with decluttering as such, but I do spend time thinking and planning my next few moves, and getting the family’s opinions (even if they are conflicting). It’s important that we are all on the same page though, and spending a bit of time out together today helped with that. Sometimes we each think that decisions have been made only to find that one of us never agreed to them. I’m trying to pull everything together whilst maintaining the calm in the house and within myself.

I’m pleased that I’ve got to this point of the day where I feel calm. Here’s a brief summary of my day…

  1. School run (am)
  2. Work
  3. Shopping delivered
  4. Popping to shop to get stuff I forgot to put on shopping delivery
  5. Popping to shops to get prescriptions
  6. School run (pm) which included an hour’s wait in the car between picking each daughter up. I did have a lovely chat to my youngest whilst waiting for my eldest
  7. Trip out as a family to look at carpets (it did get quite stressful at one point when we all had different opinions about colours, textures and whether or not we wanted different carpets in each room or same throughout). We found one that pleased most of us, but going back Saturday to see if we still like it.
  8. Trip to MacDonalds drive in.
  9. Plasterer waiting outside our house when we got back to look around at what we need doing round the house.
  10. Throughout the day I had conversations with electricians, plasterers and decorators and builders. I’m trying to coordinate everything that needs doing and my project management skills are certainly getting good use here.

The ‘me-time’ took a back seat

As I said yesterday, it’s important to have those pockets of time for self-care and today they’ve come in different forms. The two trips to the school meant that I had reflection time whilst driving. I also had a half hour chat to my mum on one of the trips. I then had an hour’s chat in the car with my youngest daughter whilst waiting for my eldest daughter to finish her extra dance class. If you include the trips out to the shops, chemist and carpet shop, that’s a lot of time in the car today.

I did miss my me-time in the conservatory though – I must make sure that I build in at least 10 minutes tomorrow during my working day.

So, now all is quiet. I’ve tidied the kitchen which allowed me to sit in a clear room to edit this post. I’m desperate for some relaxation time so looking forward to the time to myself in the bath and then a good night’s sleep.

I can’t believe that it’s the last day of September today, which can only mean that I have a quarter of a year to go to complete my challenge which is… to have a clear and organised space in my home, my garden and my mind.

I’m getting there!

Until tomorrow…

Sandra

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Day 273: It’s Important to Ramp up the Self-Care When You Have a Lot Going On

Posted on September 29, 2020 by Sandra Madeira
Different views of me-time

I started to feel a little bit anxious towards the end of today as I’m trying to coordinate a lot around the house. As well as all of the clearing and decluttering that I’m doing, I’m also trying to manage the process of getting quite a few of our ceilings skimmed, plastered and painted and get spotlights put in. I’m just waiting for one more quote and then I think we’re going to go for it.

I’m also trying to get the spare room cleared out for my daughter to have it as her bedroom. We want to try and get as much done as possible before her 16th birthday at the end of next month. As well as all of that, the builder messaged this evening to say that he can knock out our wardrobes in our bedroom next week! It’s fantastic that he’s free to do it (as we thought it would be weeks away), but it caused the overwhelmed feeling to go up a notch. I’m starting to wonder where I’m going to put the contents of two wardrobes!

On a lighter note, I sold the Kerpunk game. The man who collected it seemed really excited saying that he used to have fun playing it when he was a child and now he wanted it for his grandchildren. I’m glad that it’s going to get some use, rather than sitting in my wardrobe still in its cellophane. That’s another item of clutter out of the house.

What did I do on the self-care side today?

  1. I did my usual stretching and breathing routine that I do every morning when I wake up.
  2. I had some me-time around lunch time. I sat in the conservatory with some relaxation music, a candle and a drink, and tried to clear my mind whilst taking some slow deep breaths.
  3. I had an unplanned nap on the swing seat after work. I was listening to the Calm app and drifted off for about 15-20 minutes.
  4. I’m having a bubble bath this evening,
  5. I’m looking forward to listening to my relaxation program this evening.

It’s very important that I keep up the self care with everything that I’m juggling. In fact, even when I’m not juggling so much, it’s still important. I felt a head/neck ache coming on earlier and with all of the relaxation I’ve been doing as well as wearing the heated shoulder wrap around my neck, it quickly subsided. That would never have happened before. The headache would have lasted for a couple of days, so I must be doing something right.

Hope you’ve managed to get some me-time today.

Until tomorrow…

Sandra

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Day 272: Changing Habits of Holding Onto Things ‘Just in Case’ Will Save Time and Space in the Future

Posted on September 28, 2020 by Sandra Madeira

As I come across certain items around the house, I’m trying not to put them to one side thinking that I might have a use for them one day.

Unwanted items

Going clockwise from top left…

  • The tins went into the bin. Realistically, I’m never going to store anything in them
  • The shoe organiser with the broken zip, that I thought I could make use of, also went into the bin. I tried to put stuff in it without the plastic cover and it just didn’t work.
  • The new games (still in the cellophane) are slowly getting sold. Three have gone to buyers, Kerplunk is being picked up tomorrow for £7, and the others will hopefully get sold, otherwise I’ll just pop them into a charity bag next month.

It’s also quite easy to hold onto electrical items even though they are broken. Here is an AV unit and speakers that do not work. The unit has power going to it but that’s it. Then there’s a computer screen which is too old and too small, and no one in the house needs it.

Unwanted electrical items

I don’t want the above lying around the house collecting dust, so I’m going to put them in the garage in the morning.

It took half the time to do the recycling this evening

I’ve been keeping up the daily routine of collecting rubbish and recycling from all of the bins around the house every weekday. This meant that today there wasn’t as much to pick up from rooms, and putting out the bins took half the time than it usually does. I’ve also got plastic tubs and baskets inside and outside the back door. Everyone knows to put the stuff in there now instead of the utility room.

So, I’d say that my routines are working well! It might be time to add a couple more to the daily and weekly lists… but not before I’ve had a relaxing bath. It does me the world of good.

Until tomorrow…

Sandra

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Day 271: Sunday Roast and Creating Space

Posted on September 27, 2020 by Sandra Madeira
Roast beef dinner

As it’s Sunday, I cooked us all a roast beef dinner whilst pottering about doing some chores and creating space in the spare room.

I made quite a few more trips to the garage and my bedroom today moving books and other items. The plan was to move as much of the surplus items out of the spare room so that we can start preparing it for my daughter to move bedrooms. I didn’t quite get as far as I wanted to today but I did manage to clear one of the corners.

Before and after decluttering

When I say that I moved items to my bedroom, I didn’t go too mad as I didn’t want to create another problem there. I just took all of the personal development type books and made room for them in one of the wardrobes. It gave me an idea about how I could store them better in that wardrobe so that they are accessible for me to read. Creating a permanent place for them is a task for another day. I’ve still got quite a bit of decluttering to do in certain areas but I’m feeling pleased with my progress.

I didn’t get a chance to have my focused me time today, but I did cuddle up with my eldest to watch a couple of episodes of Friends. I wanted to try and encourage her to rest as she’s got a bad cold. The others have a milder version of the cold but nothing serious. I don’t tend to pick things like that up; however, I do dose myself up with echinacea (either a tea or drops in water) in the Winter months or whenever anyone around me has a cold. It always does the trick.

Hope you all had a great weekend. I’m feeling positive about the week ahead.

Until tomorrow…

Sandra

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Day 270: Moving a Large Bookshelf Into the Garage Was More Difficult Than I Thought

Posted on September 26, 2020 by Sandra Madeira

I was eager to get started this morning on planning the steps involved in moving the bookcase full of books from the spare room into the garage.

Step 1: Make space in the garage

This wasn’t going to be easy as the only wall I could put it against was crammed with ‘stuff’ including items that I was in the middle of selling or sorting out.

Some clutter in garage

Even though I’d created space by donating the ten charity bags this week, there wasn’t enough room for a bookcase to be moved in, let alone putting it against a free wall!

Feeling frustrated, I started moving things in an unorganised way and piling up items up that I’d seen a hundred times before in different rooms and different parts of the garage. This felt like a waste of my time, so I stopped, sat down and rethought things.

I got some empty charity bags and started to put things directly into there; items that I really didn’t have the energy to photograph, sell and store in case anyone wanted to buy them ‘one day’. I felt proud of myself filling three charity bags and putting them by the garage door ready for my next donation in two weeks’ time (as mentioned earlier in the week, I’ve committed to filling ten more by 13 October).

I got a tape measure and measured the space where I thought the bookshelf could go and moved everything else out of the way. I then had to shift the other cabinet to the left and sweep the area. Step 1 done.

Step 2: Remove books out of spare room bookshelf

Emptying the bookshelf

After lunch, I started removing all the books from the bookshelf. There were hundreds of them. There were also books and other things on top of the bookshelf. The stuff filled half of the floor when I was done. I started to sort them into books that I could give away and ones that I wanted to store back in the garage in the bookshelf for now. As it involved decision making, I didn’t do as thorough a job as I could have done; however, I did end up with about 20 books for charity.

Step 3: Move bookshelf to garage

This sounded easier than it actually was as the bookshelf was heavy and tall. I removed the three loose shelves. As I’d been doing all of this on my own up to now, I thought I’d ask my daughter for some help. We got as far as moving it to the top of the stairs and then I panicked about getting it down the stairs as I had no idea how to do this (our stairs have a turn half way). I felt like one of us could get crushed by a falling bookshelf! She seemed confident about moving it and got a bit fed up with me that I didn’t trust that we could do the job together.

My husband was having a nap and when he woke up both of them took it downstairs and made it look so easy. Sometimes we have to leave certain jobs to other people!

The next hurdle was getting it out of the front door and past the cars. I had to move my car back and then three of us moved it into the space I’d cleared in the garage. It fitted perfectly and you just don’t know how happy I felt. It was such a big achievement.

Step 4: Move books from spare room into garage

I took a break before I started this step and had some me time in the conservatory. Tea, biscuits, feet up, calming music in my tidy space.

Me time break

As you may have realised, I’m not very good for asking for help so I did the next step of ‘moving the books’ by myself. I must have made about ten trips from the spare room to the garage and filled the bookshelf with the books that I am either keeping or need to make decisions about.

Final destination

It all looks tidy in the garage and some other time I can spend some focused time sorting through the books.

Step 5: Remove clutter in spare room

There’s a lot of stuff in the spare room on the floor now that I didn’t move into the garage. I’m going to focus on that tomorrow. I’ve also kept some books back to put in the conservatory. Mainly my self-help collection.

It’s been a long day but extremely productive.

Until tomorrow…

Sandra

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Day 269: Moving My Desk, Fish and Chips and a Family Evening

Posted on September 25, 2020 by Sandra Madeira

I spent ages in the car doing the school run this morning due to traffic jams and rain, and then I had a full day at work. Late morning the sun came out and warmed up the conservatory which meant that I didn’t need the blanket that I was using. It’s getting to the point now where I might need to bring the heater back in from the garage.

At lunchtime I decided to move the furniture around in the conservatory again. For anyone that’s been following me for a while will know that this is something I tend to do every couple of months. I had to move it last time because it was getting hot by the window. Now it’s getting cooler, I’ll be ok. I only ended up swapping the exercise machine with the desk in the end but it feels a bit more spacious now.

Moving things around gave me the opportunity to do some tidying up. I haven’t cleaned in there for a few weeks – I might add that to my Friday routine. I swept the floor, cleaned the desk and chairs and wiped down the inside of the windows with my Minky cloth.

The sun shone through, and I felt so much more motivated with my work desk in the new position. I’m no longer staring at a wall, but can now see outside. If the sun gets in my eyes, I can just put the blinds down temporarily. I’m looking forward to relaxing in there at the weekend.

The evening

Delicious fish and chips

We treated ourselves to fish and chips this evening. I had to order it beforehand and then there was a long queue when I got there. I think that everyone had the same idea. It was then that I noticed that the indian restaurant opposite has gone. The girls were devastated when I got home as the buttered chicken that they did there is their favourite. We said that they might be just refurbishing the restaurant. I suppose it’s trying times for these companies at the moment. It’s a shame, as it has a good upstairs event room/bar where I had my 50th birthday party last year. We also like having a nice restaurant that we can walk to.

After dinner we had some family time in the lounge. The girls started playing the piano using one of those apps where the piano keys come up.

They played one hand each. It sounded lovely.

Then my husband had a go and even though he doesn’t play, it sounded impressive. Then they asked me to try it. I said no at first as I learnt to read music from a young age so prefer to play the old fashioned way from a book. I gave it a go, and although it went against everything I’ve ever learnt, it was fun.

Bubble bath time now. Have a nice weekend everyone.

Until tomorrow…

Sandra

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