Sunday!

I'm free! 

Yep, the two days stuck at home have freed me up to get in and do some of the nitty-gritty things around the townhouse I normally ignore and put off.

Over the past two days, I have gotten in and done some serious work and sorting out around the place: 

Friday:

Woke to a dreadful earache, so headed off to the doctors, and found it was beginnings of a cold; so the doctor told me how to 'nip it in the bud' as it wasn't developed enough for antibiotics. The earache is gone and I'm feeling better! 

Once home, I got out into the back yard and looked at which plants needed to be pulled out and tossed out. This left me with 3 extra pots which I could recycle - not a bad thing really.
Then, I pulled the solar lights out of the garden, turned them off and pulled one of them apart to find out if I could replace the batteries in them - and I can! So, I'm going to buy new batteries and install them, and then put the lights back outside with them switched off so they can recharge.
I got into the home office and tidied up some one area of it - the hand-written notebooks mainly - and found where all of my pagan spell books were hiding. 
The kitchen towels were all put away and then I put out the rubbish and I sat down and pulled out all of the oil-based bags from the bag-holder in the kitchen, put them into a bag to take to Coles for recycling. Then, I put my fold-up bags in the bag-holder so I can grab them when I need them. This freed up one drawer in my living room!

Saturday:

I polished up the phone seat between my living room chairs. This meant I had to clean it off and organise the crap on it too! Then, I polished the piano too... both things look just gorgeous!

I put away bath towels, hanging clothes, sleep wear and warm clothes from the wash basket.

Ripped and burned music from cds - tried to do the same with some music on my computer, but it didn't work out... will have to look into why that's not happening.

I wrote a chapter of a new book I'm working on, edited 2 chapters and then made a pizza from scratch.

Today? Well, I still have some sorting out in the home office to do, and then other things to get ready for this week. But getting in and doing little things when I was forced to stay home was something I didn't think would work out; but it did. 

What did you get up to this weekend? If you had to stay home for two whole days, what would you get done? 

Habits

Over the last year, I've learned new habits in my decluttering. What I need, and what I don't - what will be donated and what will be thrown out in the bin.

However I've also brought into my life habits which I've stuck by. Now, scientists say that it takes 3 weeks to create a new habit and make it stick - so it took time for me to get into this to prove it'll work out. 

And it works! The washing up get done every night and counters are wiped over. I put away my toothpastes in exactly the same spot they were the night before and clean my hair brushes every few days. The bins are emptied every day and the big rubbish bin is put out for collection on the morning of bin day. But these are only the usual habits I've added into my life.

I've still got to get in and make my bed every day and put away the laundry every time I do it. I'm still finding it hard to throw out or donate items - even though I've been doing this decluttering journey for some years now. And now it's an on-going challenge for me to keep the house in some kind of order, I'm hoping to work at saving up some money; instead of going out to op-shops to buy something. 

Yeah, I've been spurging a little too much - and I know it - instead of donating my unwanted gear. But I'm getting there.

So far in the past few weeks, I've posted off three 5kg bags across Australia and have had happy people enjoy the books I no longer want. But I still have books I no longer need; so I'll be looking at donating them to an old folks' home or somewhere else soon.

I have to fix up the back yard and repot my plants this Winter and so I have to get in and stock up on bags of potting mix and then save up big for a few larger pots and then reuse other pots around the place - yeah, it'll be another reuse of old items if I can find them around places or garage sales. 

Getting into the habits of giving and donating as well as bringing things into the home is a delicate balance. You have to remember how much space you have, what you need and what you don't and if you really want to keep all your things in one place. And to make those decisions at the op-shop is good thing; however, when you make the decision and bring it home and realise that item doesn't fit anywhere? Well, it's time to really look at what have; and do you really need it? 

So, what habits have you worked on for yourself to bring your decluttering and organising around to a better place? Leave a comment for us below and we can all help each other.

Book Collection Clean-Out

I love books as much as the next person, but there does come a time when the good ol' book collection needs a clean out and the bookshelves need a dusting.

Now, last week, I helped out a friend at Sunnybank with her collection; and this time, it was my turn to ask for help from another friend of mine who's wonderful at helping me out with decluttering - but this time, we had to just sort through what I was and wasn't reading. 

No biggie right? 

Um... not really.

As I climbed the ladder to upper-most books, I found some that I hadn't seen in such a long time, I'd forgotten they were around! 

So, down they came from that top shelf and I sorted through them in to the 'Yes I'll keep', 'Not Sure' and 'Donate' piles. First though, I sorted out the series of books and figured out which ones I'd like to read - and which ones I won't be getting into... and found a series Mum asked me about by Robin Hobb; which I set aside for her. 

Once I had all the books down and I sorted them into those piles, I went to work looking at what knowing what I wanted at a glance, and what I didn't want immediately. I put the books I wished to read over the next year or so at the front of the shelf and ones I'll look at next time at the back - with the larger books on the bottom and the smaller ones towards the top - as they do when building a pyramid. 

Over the next three or four hours, we worked through not only my own collection, but the books I had acquired last Wednesday and found that I had grabbed books there I didn't need as well. I've put them off to one side to give away too. 

By the end of the afternoon, I had filled 3 boxes and was happy with the books I had parted with in them. I had also pulled a pile of books together for a sci-fi reading friend as well (as he knew I was going to sort out my collection; and is always on the lookout for new reading material, knowing that mine is some of the more interestingly out-there kind). 

So, how do you sort through your books? Or are you the more hi-tech kinda person and keep all your reading material on a Kindle or Kobo? Let us all know about your collection and how you keep it. 

Re-Organising

A lot of decluttering is reorganising the house. Once you've pulled everything down, given it a good dust and polish, then you have a really good look at what you've got, and realise maybe you don't need some of what you want to put back.

This is the good part of decluttering.

Knowing what you don't need. 

Right now, out on the clothes line are some clothes I've washed and are going to donated to a charity. Yes, I wash the clothes before I donate them, so when the time comes, I tell them that they've been washed only days before; it tells them that I care enough to do that for them.

But they go and send them off to be rewashed anyway.

But I've found that I have a very organised kitchen now. This is because I've spent over three years on decluttering and reorganising it to the point that there's only things in it that I need and will use from day to day - week to week - and it all has a place to be at the end of the day.

My next place in the house is the bedroom. I know that sounds like I'm taking a step back - but you have to remember, I did say I'd go over another place if needs be again; and so I am.

The bedroom does seem to be ignored after it's cleaned out, though - so do other rooms - and so coming back to it keeps it from recluttering into its former cluttered self again.

So, I cleaned up my jewellery section, found all my money boxes and collected them all into one spot where they could all be placed - under the wash table where there's a little piece of timber - and now, there's space around the house where they've been spread out where I can clean up and tidy. I have more space on my duchess (where 3 money boxes had been sitting) and now the jewellery boxes can be seen better. 

To say I'm pleased is an understatement.

The money boxes are in a safe place, I can get in and fill them all up with change and then take that change to the banks in my own time. And now, the bedroom is looking a bit better - but I still have a long way to go with it. 

Now, it's Wednesday, and I missed out on last week's challenge. So, I'll set you all two challenges this time:  Go to your bathroom and look inside your linen closet (if it's not in your bathroom, that's okay... mine is, so that's why I've said this). What you do is go through all your towels and find the ones which aren't matching and good-looking and separate them from the nice, fluffy ones which you're using all time. Grab a large bag and put the old ones inside them and take them to your nearest animal shelter for them to use. This can go for your old sheets too! Any old sheets which are worn through and you no longer us - send them away to the animal shelter near you.

Challenge #2: Everyone who have children... this one is for you and your kids. As children grow, they grow out of toys they no longer wish to play with. Now, go and find a large box and get your kids to put into the box what they no longer want or need. Get your children to help you wash up the toys and take them to the charity of your choice, so they know you're not just throwing them out. Or... if you wish, take the toys to a children's hospital and donate them there.