Category Archives: Simpler Living

The Keepsake Solution

By Claire Posted in Clutter, Personal, Simpler Living, Small-House Living Tagged ,
My young daughter’s quilt sketch

I found this while cleaning out my sewing files the other day. It’s a sketch one of my daughters made when I was teaching her how to make a quilt, when she was around 10 or so. She was so proud of the quilt she made from that sketch. Finding the sketch brought a sweet memory back to me.

But keeping the sketch, along with a lot of other papers that were overfilling my file drawer, is not an option. I need the room for my current files.

What to do?

This is where the camera comes in handy. I have a tablet and a phone, and both have cameras. It’s so easy to just take a snapshot of a keepsake and then get rid of it. Whenever I want to go back in time and indulge in nostalgia, I can go through my photos of various items that jog memories. It’s that easy. And it’s one of the most effective ways to conquer clutter that I know.

The Best Week of the Year to Declutter Your Home

By Claire Posted in Clutter, Personal, Simpler Living, Small-House Living Tagged , ,

Today begins the best week of the year to declutter your home.

Why? First, because we’re just recovering from Christmas. The decorations take up space and make the house look more cluttered than ever. The Christmas tree is looking a bit disheveled and will soon need to be taken down. And most of us received more gifts than we really need. As a result, we’re starting to crave some open space and less clutter.

Then there’s the fact that a new year is just around the corner. New Year’s Day always promises new beginnings, and leads us to make new personal goals. The mood everywhere is one of renewal. What a perfect time to get a handle on the extra stuff that has parked itself in all the nooks and crannies of your home.

Take that energy and use it this week to:

  • Find duplicates of things you own that really don’t need to be duplicated (gifts, calendars, hair brushes, throws, pillows, tableware, you name it) and donate them, or pitch them if they’re not nice enough to donate.
  • Go through your closet, find anything you haven’t worn in the past year and move it along.
  • Clean out the interior and trunk of your car; those fast-food wrappers are evidence of this past year’s failed attempts at healthier living, and the empty water bottles are just begging to be recycled.
  • Look in each room of your house to see if there’s a piece of furniture or a decorative item (or two) that no longer serves a purpose or makes you happy. If so, remove it and donate it.

By doing this, you’ll start the New Year with a clean slate, and a feeling of being somewhat lighter (even if you ate way too many cookies last week.)

Happy New Year!

Joyful Decluttering

By Claire Posted in Clutter, Personal, Simpler Living, Small-House Living Tagged , , , , , ,

Ever since I was a preteen who watched the afternoon movie on television most weekdays after school, I’ve been a fan of old movies. My husband shares this interest. As a result, we collected dozens of old movies on videocassette over the years.

When our VCR died a while back, we sadly realized that our collection had just become obsolete, because it’s very hard to find a new VCR. We began collecting old movies on DVD, but kept the videos for sentimental reasons, I suppose.

Then I read that the county nursing home is looking for donations for their “canteen,” where residents can select items for personal use, like sample bottles of shampoo, or nail polish, and also entertainment items like videotapes and DVDs. This was the incentive we needed to let go of all those tapes.

So I made a list of all of them, so we’ll know what to buy in DVD format, packed up the tapes (three bags’ worth) and dropped them off for the nursing home residents. Most of the movies we donated are of similar vintage to the residents (1930s-1950s). I also included several more recent DVDs of which we had doubles; we bought the first season of a series, then later bought the whole series, so we didn’t need to keep that first season.

It felt good to give those movies to people who will hopefully get some enjoyment out of them, and now we have more room on the shelves. Win, win!

Merry Christmas to you and yours!

Oh, Marie….

By Claire Posted in Clutter, Simpler Living Tagged , ,

Decluttering guru Marie Kondo became so famous for promoting decluttering that she ended up posing on the red carpet at this year’s Oscars. But the woman known for her decluttering books and Netflix show just made a huge mistake: she opened up an online shop so she can sell high-priced clutter.

Of course, capitalizing on your fame by coming up with a related product line is an American tradition. Just think of how much money people like Martha Stewart, Ree Drummond and Paula Deen have made by turning their fame into additional fortune.

But here’s the thing: they weren’t decluttering gurus. They became popular for other talents, and parlayed those talents into stuff they can sell to their fans for a big payback. But when your whole shtick is getting rid of stuff, how do you justify selling stuff back to your fans, and high-priced stuff at that?

You can’t. There is no justification. Ms. Kondo is going against everything she has promoted in her books and Netflix show. I suspect she will regret this move.