Art Area Clean-Up - Part 2

Yesterday, I got in and cleaned up the next part of my art area. Because it's so cluttered with junk, it's going to take a few rounds to get it done.

Well, this time, I attacked the bench itself. 

I took everything off it, storing it all in my kitchen, and pulled out the cleaners and scrubbed off as much paint and glue as I could with paper towel, Ajax All-Purpose Cleaner and Gumption. This took about 15 minutes because of the acrylic paint which had dried onto the countertop.

When I built this bench with Dad, we went to a proper kitchen-building company on Compton Road and got the pieces cut to order. This was so it all fitted together properly and we didn't have to do anything much to the parts - well, okay, we took a few inches off the feet because it turned out the bench was a little too tall for me. But it's turned out to be a great bench to store my art stuff. And because we got it laminated, it's made it so much easier to clean.

Once it was all cleaned up and I had tossed out a bag of rubbish - yep, another one! - I wiped down everything from the kitchen with an anti-bacterial wipe and looked at the bench. This was a good opportunity to get in and see where I could place the big things, the brushes, the bottles of tiny pegs and other items I used every day. And so, I went and sorted through it all and made sure I worked it all out well, and it was all organised so I could reach my brushes, get to my paint and find my furniture polish as well. 

This took me about 2 hours to get done, and the results were wonderful! 

Art Area Clean-Up - Part 1

Being an artist isn't a clean and tidy hobby - and being one in a townhouse, is even messier than you'd think. 

However, in 2015, my Dad and I built a workbench for me - one that I designed - and fitted it into my townhouse and it's serving me so well that once in a while I had to clean it up and make sure it stays functional.

And yesterday was the day I got in and started the first phase of the clean-up - yes part 1 of the mess I called my art area.

It took me around 3 hours - between 2pm and 5pm and I'm darned proud of how far I got with it. 

First off, I cleaned off the top shelf hanging over the bench itself and had a good look at what things I had stored in the two plastic containers - to see what needed throwing out.
Then, I put everything from the art area which could be moved easily into the living room or the kitchen. Then, I looked inside all the buckets and containers which were on the top shelf and found better homes for the items inside each one. 
Any ceramic plates, bits of plastic and other things I didn't recognise were thrown away - seeing the plates were chipped and unusable. Then, looking over the back of the three-set of drawers, I found there was a ton of space there, and I pushed them back against the wall and have found more space for me in front of it. 

Great!

Getting the ladder out, I cleaned off the empty shelf so I had a nice new surface to put away things and sort out what I needed to keep that shelf uncluttered with items and yet still be able to reach for what I needed when I needed it. 

I found I had over 200 sprung pegs to paint (yep, I overbought supply) and a huge amount of dolly pegs as well. And I also have a nice little collection of canvas boards of all sizes. I also have no need for new brushes - as I seem to have overbought on them as well; as a good artist does. 

Once I got it all pulled back together, put my easel back, the right things tossed into the Donation Box and ready to be sent off to the charity of my choice, it was almost 5pm and the vinyl I had been playing finished. 

What an afternoon! I had gone through 2 bottles of ice cold water and there was 1 large rubbish bag by the garage door to throw out. Yes, this was a great success for a first go at my art area - but will be another afternoon of me attacking it soon. 

Oh! Photos! How could I forget the photos! Here they are! 

In With The New...

In the last few months, I have begun to really refine the way I've been doing my decluttering. If I seriously don't need it, it gets donated or thrown in the bin. 

And yes, I feel so much better for it.

Yesterday was a great day for this. 

I posted off a 5kg bag of books to the Northern Territory! Yep, I parted with about 10 books and sent them away - and for a person who collects books that's a big deal. Next pay, I'll be getting another 5kg bag and sending it off to Victoria... same deal, fill the bag up as much as I can and then post it off! 

Yep, this kind of decluttering of the house just makes me feel great! I'll have 20 less books to worry about and about 2 feet of space around the floor of my home office! Doesn't that sound wonderful?

Sure it does.

Well, I was online yesterday, chatting with a friend of mine and we came to the decision to go window-shopping at op-shops. So, we got ourselves organised and I picked her up (as she doesn't drive a car) and we were off! 

After a sight-seeing tour of a local historical house, we hit a Life Line Super-Store (these places have everything from clothes to beds, furniture to electrical goods - they're wonderful to go to) and she was looking for a small mixing bowl. However, she didn't find what she was searching for.

But I found a few small things for my place. I was mainly looking for a sandwich press; as mine has been making strange sounds since I dropped it accidentally last year (and I hesitate to use it). So, seeing I didn't find it, I thought it wouldn't hurt to look at other things. I came home with a lovely phone seat, a large flat-side bowl, and a teapot-cup with a matching saucer. 

Yeah, so much for window-shopping.

Anyway, we popped by my place for a cuppa and some water (as it's been hot here in Brisbane) and to drop off my goodies; and I wanted to get the phone seat installed into my house. Then, my friend asked what I was going to do with my old set of drawers I had, put to one side. I said I'd donate them... unless she wanted them? Squealing she said yes! So, after cleaning them up, we got the drawers into my car and relaxed a little.

Now, I told you this story because there's a great meaning behind it. When I buy something big - like I did with the hall stand - I make sure I get rid of the items it's replacing. The hall stand I bought replaced 3 pieces of furniture; that's right 3! The phone seat has made it easier for me to find my remotes and keep my lounge area tidier than it has been, plus it's lighter and easier to move around and clean. 

So, now for the weekend challenge:

Look around your house and find something you've bought to replace something. Have you given away or sold that other item? If not, now's the time to do that. Offer it up to family, friends and online... see if you get somebody wanting it. Or if you don't want to wait, take it to your local charity store and donate it. 

However, if you already do this? Here's another challenge: pick a sink in your house and get underneath it. Pull out everything there and figure out what isn't being used, what's out of date, what's a cleaner and what's not. Get in and clean the shelves properly; and then, put like items together and toss what needs to be tossed. Then the next time you go under that sink, you won't be wondering where that item is, you'll know. The best thing to do is to go and buy a cleaning caddy for your cleaning products and keep them in that caddy... I've done that and it's the best thing ever! I have also begun using a lazy susan under my kitchen sink; which keeps all my detergents in one spot as well.

So, there you go... two different challenges to have a go at. Do one, or both, and enjoy your weekend! 

Regular Housework

Today is Friday and I don't normally do much on this day. But today, I got in and washed some bathmats and two blankets which normally stay in the boot/trunk of my car. They're out on the clothesline right now drying in the hot sun.

But besides that I've cleaned the kitchen sink, swept the kitchen floor (so I can get in and wash it soon) and then folded and put away my shopping bags (I use re-usable ones - instead of the single-use ones from the store).
Then, I bumped out the major doormats from the front, back and side doors and put out the rubbish into the big bin after opening up the house completely.

Yes, today is the regular housework day. 

But I'm also going to be looking at doing out my drinking mug collection... there's so many I just no longer use! So, today, I'm going to be climbing up on a ladder and pulling down the ones I don't use anymore, wrapping them up and putting them into the Donation Box. 
Now, I do collect drinking mugs, but the collection has become a little too big and so it's time cull them back to the ones I love more than others; and this is a good thing for me. So, which thing have you collected to the biggest degree and have had to cull back lately? Doesn't it make you feel good that you've done that? Or is it something you regret doing later on? 

Well, onto the Weekend Challenge: 

Go through your shoes. Pull out all the pairs you have in your wardrobe and figure out which ones you wear all the time; which ones are your occasionals and which ones you don't wear at all - or only once or twice a year - and sort out the shoes you haven't worn in over 6 months. Then find the broken ones (you'll have some there, believe me!).
Put the unworn ones into the Donation Box - once you've cleaned them up - and bin the broken ones. Tidy up the rest of the shoes and make sure you can see all of them so you can wear them more; especially the ones you don't wear often enough, as you'll enjoy them more! 

Fridges and Freezers

The fridge is a huge thing to organise and I'd like to cover this for today; as it's Summer here and when you have stinking hot weather, you have to know exactly where things are in this appliance.

And if you keep opening and closing the door of this thing, your other items start going off.

So, to begin with, you have to make sure you have a good day to do this, know that you'll have to tackle one shelf at a time and you may not get the whole fridge and freezer done in one sitting.

Yes, this will take a few times to get clean in hot weather. If you're doing this in Winter, don't worry so much... the cold will allow for more time. 

How I cleaned out the fridge last time was that I tackled two shelves at a time, with a bowl of lukewarm water with dish soap in it and a cloth and I cleaned off one shelf of items, washed it down thoroughly, then wiped it over with a towel and put those things back - after looking at them carefully for used-by dates and making sure everything I put back was within date and edible.

The next shelf is dealt with the same way. 

It's not hard to keep the shelves nice and tidy with a weekly clean out and when the time comes to go shopping, don't be shy to take out the tupperware which you know hasn't been touched in over a week and to throw out the contents into the bin, wash up the containers and put them away.

I have a steadfast rule:  no science projects; and nothing that can make friends (fungus) while its inside my fridge. 

Deal with the freezer the same way. Look on the inside of the door and find out what you can and can't keep for how long. And if you can't recognise it? Well, bin it... it means it's been there too long. 

Remember to clean out the seals of your fridge - as they keep your fridge healthy and make sure the tops of the doors and the handles are clean as well as your crisper and other parts of your fridge door and dairy section. If this is done every week - once a week - it won't take much to keep your fridge working economically. 

Well, that's the fridge and freezer done. Leave a comment below and let us all know how you're doing with your fridge and freezer. 

Heatwaves and Freezing Tempuratures

Where I am, in Australia, we've been hit by a huge heat wave. However, I know this blog goes international; and wherever my reader/s are, there's also extreme temperatures where you are as well.

I haven't posted much this week, and there's a good reason for it - it's been so very hot and I'm taking it easy so I don't get heat exhaustion. 

I have been slowly cleaning out the kitchen a little by sorting out my kitchen knives and working out the herbs (as Peter Walsh has kept us on our toes with his daily decluttering challenges); and my Donation Box is brimming with donations for the charity store of my choice (St Vincent De Paul). However, actually getting those items there? Well, that's going to take a little time. 

I have been resorting through my art items for class and organising my living room so I don't have so much sitting around to trip over during the day or night. 

There's still a lot of sorting out to do, and I still have to organise myself to head into the city to donate some old music to the State Library (who have taken an interest in any music I have so they can preserve it). So, this is what I've been up to this week, how about you? Have you been kept busy with your decluttering? Keep us all informed with how you're doing in your endeavours to work with your clutter by commenting below. 

This weekend's challenge isn't too hard though: get all the pens and pencils you have around the house in your phone nook, office and in your drawers and sort out which ones work, which ones don't and which ones you really use and organise them. Toss out the ones which don't work, figure out how many pencils you have - and if you have too many, get them together and donate them to a primary school or your charity store.

Easy! The heat or cold shouldn't affect you with this one. 

Back to Normal

By traditional standards, the 6th, January is the 12th Day of Christmas and the very last day to have your tree and decorations up in your house.

So, today, I pulled down my boxes from the wardrobe and put the tree away. 

And seeing that around 2 - 3 years ago, I organised myself to have this all sorted into plastic boxes, I found that the way I decorate my tree and house and put it all away doesn't take half the day. 

It only takes around an hour... and you know, I decluttered some old streamers I had from my late-Uncle I didn't want anymore. So, what I did was added them to the Donation Box while I was putting away the decorations - not bad, right? So, now it's all put away and there's an empty spot where the tree used to be. 

How long does it normally take for you to de-decorate your house? If it's over 3 hours, you may want to look into how much decorating you do. If you're a person who adores Christmas, well, I'm not going to stop ya! Go for it! But I do find that if some of the decorations are getting a little old, it does pay to go and buy new ones and use them; tossing out the old ones. But the plastic boxes keeps your decorations from being eaten by something during the year that they're stored away.

And seeing it's the New Year, and we're back into the decluttering again, the Weekend Challenges are back! I scored this one from Peter Walsh's FB page today.
Go into your sock drawer and pull out your socks. Lay them out onto a flat surface - or your bed - and sort through the holy, stretched out or old ones - and throw them out. Keep the good ones and put them back. Do this in everyone's rooms.

If you're up for a second challenge, here goes:

Go to your bedside table and go through it! Toss out out of date ... um... things and items... sort out the usable things in there. And, no, I don't want to know what's there. Sort out your bedside table and make it nice, clean and usable - and not embarrassing. Let's put it this way: if anyone was to go through it while you were away, would you want them to? Right. Make it so you're not embarrassed about what's in there. 

Bedroom Wardrobes

Okay! I'm back into the decluttering again this year! And seeing it's been so hot lately, I'm taking it easy too - just like last year.

Last week, I bought myself a 55 litre plastic box - with wheels - from Variety1 at Arndale for just $8.00. And the other day, I sorted all my craft gear into it! I pulled down all of the small boxes, bags and other items I had craft gear crammed into and found that it all fitted into this plastic box! 

How cool is this?

That's not the best news - nope.

When I pushed the new box of goodies up the top, I found it only took up half the space all of that gear used to! 

This left me with a huge amount of space where I could put my spare pillows up there which normally went on the bed during the day! This is a good thing!

So, I've started on working on this room again - my bedroom - in a more permanent way. 

These plastic boxes will make moving house in the future that much more easier; and less messy. I won't be using as many cardboard boxes and when I get into a 3-bedroom house, these boxes will store away into an art room as easily as they do now. 

So, how have the storage boxes helped you sort through your cluttered gear? Or have you found different ways to use them? If you have, share with us all in the comments below.

The Right Way

I'm a member of a few op-shop Facebook pages and there's a running theme which goes through these pages... and it never ends.

It's the donation of goods at the large bins outside the op-shop/thrift stores for the public to leave their goods.

Now that the Christmas Holidays are over, every man and his dog are out there decluttering their homes for the new Christmas gifts they've received. Now, this is a good thing to do - but delivering those unwanted goods is another thing all together.

I have never dropped off my goods for donation at the bins of an op-shop - ever! The simple reason is because while it's next to that bin, anything can happen to it. It could rain, and the bags could leak; thus ruining the clothes I've lovingly washed, folded and put into that bag. And who knows how long they'll be sitting there until a volunteer comes along to pick them up?
Or if it's furniture, somebody of the public could come along and throw it onto the road or sleep on it, urinate on it (thinking it's funny - and yes this happens)... or Mother Nature could play a part again in being herself again and wreck the furniture.

Now, I've been seeing photos of the bags and boxes of items left overnight and all of those boxes and bags have been ripped opened by people who just won't leave things be. It's not theirs to open, and take what they want - and yes, it's called stealing and for those who want to be religious about it, it is a sin - and after you've gotten what you want (or not found what you were hoping to find in that box), it's often something you can't close up again. 

So, the right way to donate your unwanted items is to take it into the charity store of your choice in a box or a bag. 

Wrap the fragile items properly. 

Wash all the clothes and fold them up. 

Mend what needs mending. 

Wipe down all the books you no longer need and take out the bookmarks, photos and money from within the pages (yes I've found money inside books I've bought). 

And most of all, make sure you deliver your preloved items with as much care as you did when you first bought them. 

It doesn't take much to be a good person when it comes to donating your goods. Just be thoughtful about how you go about it, and you'll find that your charity store will pay you back three-fold when you go in there looking for items you need in your house later on. 

Op-Shops Are Open Again...

Now, I know this is a decluttering and organising blog, but just to say this is a good thing - in a way.

It gives us the time to get out there and drop off whatever we've been doing during the time over Christmas - you know packing up the old and introducing the new - and take it over to our local op-shop/thrift store to donate.

However, I did this backwards today.

Yes, I went out and looked for placemats for the kitchen table and ended up with a box filled with other goodies I didn't know existed - or I needed.

But when I arrived home, I found that I was decluttering my place without a second thought. I pulled a bottle I haven't used in 3 years which I bought from Woolworths with the honest thought of using when I had visitors - to fill with ice tea or nice ice cold water at some point - but it's just been sitting there doing nothing but gathering dust. 

So into the Donation Box it went - straight away, without me feeling bad about it. I also cleaned up the nice little 3-set canisters and am now using them in the kitchen. The old tea canister will be used to hold my paint brushes and the lid will have to be thrown away as, well, if I take the canister into an op-shop they'll just throw it out. It's better to use the part that is usable, than toss out the whole thing.

I then scored these lovely boxes - one I found and the other was in the store somewhere and I found that after somebody told me about it. Well! they let me have the two for $3.00! What a bargain! Well, I will be using those for my bedroom; as they're just so pretty.

So, I've started decluttering in a big way... so far. And I've also joined Peter Walsh's 30-Day Challenge as well - and I do encourage you do this as well; to kick-start your decluttering year. This is how I got started decluttering my house. 

However, this year, I'm going to make sure this house is going to be ready to have me moving to another house. So, I'll be container ready... yep, things are going to be put away and stored in the readiness to move to another place to live. I can't wait to get in and do this. What are you hoping to get out of this year?  

Welcome to 2018!

Welcome to the New Year of 2018!

This is the second year of this blog and I'm hoping to help you - as well as myself - along in the fight against our cluttered homes.

I started this blog last year in the hopes to get my cluttered home under control in some way; and it did a lot more for me in so many ways.

It was a type of therapy, a type of diary to not only show that I could get in and work out what was keeping me in some of my worst ruts around, but it also assisted me in making the biggest choices in my life of how to let go of old things; and replace a number of items with just one.

This year is going to be a good one, though.

I'm going to box up a whole lot of my art and craft gear in the hopes to move house in the next year or so. I've been wanting to move for the past 3 years; but no banking institution will loan me money. I don't have bad credit - I'm on pension and nobody will look at us because we usually don't have anything the bank wants in case we can't make the repayments. So, I'm stuck.

I want to get out of the stuck rut of living in such tight quarters and into a proper, larger place so I can spread out a little more and have a room for my art gear... and my precious items which should be on display, will be and will be used more often. 

My goals for this year are:

* Go through my wardrobe and clean it out.

* Clean up the Home Office completely.

* Clean up the Living Room to the best of my abilities.


These are the biggies... I really want to use the space I have right now until I move into a better place. So, what are your goals for this year? Please do leave a comment below and let's see if we can help each other through our decluttering together?