I’ll openly admit that I’m a bit of a neat freak; I regularly tidy and clean around the house and I ask my children and husband to do the same to maintain a neat, tidy and organised living space.
Should something break or become worn then I’m sure to throw these things away, and more often than not I will replace such items. I keep a regular stock check of my children’s wardrobes and am forever sorting through their clothes, making piles of clothing which is either too small or has seen better days. I then take these piles of clothes and separate them into five piles:
- Bin fodder
- Items for charity
- Items to be worn at their Grandparents house
- Items to pass onto other children
- Items to sell on eBay or other local selling sites
Every now and then I spend time digging through the children’s toys and belongings finding things that are either broken, have parts missing, are no longer played with or that they have simply outgrown and I also separate these into similar piles.
This past month however I seem to have gone to town with de-cluttering and have been through almost every room in the house including the dreaded garage. I have sold a whopping £300 worth of outdoor and indoor toys and have dropped off at least two bin bag loads of clothing to charity shops. I have also passed clothes onto friends and have given my children’s school stacks of spare uniforms.
It’s funny how once you clear a cupboard, empty a drawer or rearrange a box, things seem to feel so much clearer, cleaner and organised. Meanwhile, the kids have had great fun finding and playing with all kinds of things which they had forgotten about – they were all for getting rid of their old games and toys which they no longer wanted in exchange for space to store new things.
Rather than getting rid of their unwanted toys or games, the kids passed a lot of their belongings onto other families with younger children who will make use of these things. This pleases me as I hate waste; there’s no point in buying everything new when children use things for such a short space of time.
I’m not one bit embarrassed nor ashamed to admit that we too often bid for and buy second-hand stuff through eBay and such like. Why throw good money away on something which will only be used for a year or two?
I may well have cleared a lot of clutter but I am far from finished. I’d like to empty and rearrange the garage at some point – though finding the time (and convincing Paul to help me) to do this seems unlikely at present.
I’m forever tidying around and clearing clutter, it’s all part of having children right? I’m sure that one day I will miss the cupboards full of toys and games, the drawers stacked full of colouring pens and magazines and the shelves laden with half-finished art projects. Though I have no doubt that I will never stop clearing clutter nor will l ever tire of tidying.
