Posted on 12 Comments

Project: Simplify week one

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I’ve decided to play along with Tsh at Simple Mom, and join Project: Simplify.  I’ve had decluttering on my to-do list for some time, but there’s always some reason not to do it, and always an easy way to talk myself out of it.  Tsh provided just the push I needed – she’s made it almost like a game, revealing a new hot spot to declutter every week, and offering prizes to participants.  It’s actually kind of fun.  And this week it’s forcing me into the deep, dark recesses of an area I’ve been ignoring for far too long: the bedroom closet.

When I get in the mood to clean, I always work on the very public areas of the house.  As a result, my bedroom kind of looks like a tornado tore through it, and the closet is probably the worst part of the room.

Or, at least, it was.

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I tried on every last garment in that closet, and in doing so discovered a whole pile of things that look terrible on me – off to the thrift shop they go!

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And the shoes? Oh! the shoes.  Until today, I honestly had no idea that I had fifty-six pairs of shoes.  Yes, I said fifty-six.  Ok, so sixteen of those are $2 flip-flops, and more than half of those have been accumulated over the course of thirteen years, but still!  I’m a little embarrassed by the excess.

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I narrowed it down to my favorite eight pairs of flip-flops, and fifteen pairs of real shoes.  That still sounds like a lot, and I could get it down to ten pairs of regular shoes, but I didn’t bother, since I have the space for fifteen.  I may cull them further later.

So here are my two piles: “throw away” on the left and “give away” on the right.  Tomorrow I go through the give away pile and see what is going to the thrift shop, and what items may have other fates.  (If I were to put some gently-worn handmade shirts and skirts on eBay, would any of you be interested in them?  I’ve got about a dozen and I’m not sure if they’re worth listing, or if I should just thrift shop ’em.)

Technically, the “hot spot” this week was just the bedroom closet, but if there is time before the week is over, I’m also going to deal with the contents of my dresser.  Or, more specifically, the things that belong in my dresser but are currently overflowing a laundry basket at the end of the bed.  Ack.

Hooray for Project: Simplify!  I’m going to go gaze lovingly at my clean and organized closet now.

Good night 🙂

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Posted on 12 Comments

12 thoughts on “Project: Simplify week one

  1. good for you! my closet is 11″ deep, 28″ wide. I have to go through it regularly- warm and cool weather clothes cant be in at the same time. We all could do with some simplification.

    1. I had a closet slightly larger than yours in my old house, and I had to share it with my husband. Everything fit, though! It’s funny how easily you can expand your belongings to fit in a larger space, isn’t it? When I think about how empty this house was thirteen years ago when we first moved in, it makes me laugh! Now I’m tripping over things and daydreaming about adding more rooms onto the house 🙂

  2. good for you…. Reminds me of the old George Carlin routine More stuff…

    1. Thanks 🙂 I’ve never seen/heard that routine. Maybe I should look it up!

  3. This looks great! I love the flip flop basket. It’s so fun and reminds me of shopping at a little boutique.

    1. Thanks! It’s funny that it should look at all cute or trendy – I repurposed it from a gift basket which was kicking around the kitchen waiting for me to find a good use for it 🙂

  4. Wow, that’s quite a dramatic transformation! I’m also participating in the challenge, and while I didn’t have that many pairs of shoes, I found that I did have 50 pairs of underwear, some never worn!

    You did a tremendous job!

    1. Well, I guess the bright side of that much underwear is that you never have a desperate moment where you have to do the laundry 🙂

  5. Wow… great job!

    1. Thank you. I’m really enjoying having the contents of my closet be so easily accessible. It used to be such a headache…

  6. […] that mess (essentially) cleaned up.  This desk is in my bedroom, actually, so between the closet last week, and the desk this week, my bedroom is finally getting the makeover I promised it ages ago.  In […]

  7. […] that mess (essentially) cleaned up.  This desk is in my bedroom, actually, so between the closet last week, and the desk this week, my bedroom is finally getting the makeover I promised it ages ago.  In […]

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