decluttering

GRACE IN HOMEMAKING

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Okay friends, for today’s Thoughtful Thursday post I wanted to address something that some of my girlfriends and I were talking about this week. We were talking about this idea that there are different seasons in life that allow for different abilities and different bandwidth for homemaking.

I wonder if some people come to my YouTube channel and see my organized spaces, see my tidy home, hear me talking about my disciplined homemaking schedule and think to themselves: I don’t have the bandwidth for that. Guess what, I have not always had the bandwidth for the way I live now! We are all in different seasons of life, have different responsibilities and obligations, and we all have different abilities. Some of you may have a chronic illness, or depression, or other health conditions that limit what you can do in this season in life. You may have young children with busy schedules, or you have other priorities and commitments outside of your home – whether that is a job or an organization you’re involved in. I just want to let you know, if you visit my YouTube channel, you are seeing one stage in my life. You are seeing the stage of life where I have more margin in my life. My kids are older now and more independent, and in addition to that, ever since Covid I have not been involved in as many things I once used to be involved in. I have enjoyed this slower pace of life, and so have been more intentional with my schedule and what commitments I will make moving forward.

Check out my YouTube channel if you have not already!

Thirteen years ago I went through some health issues that affected my ability to be productive. I had pretty severe anxiety and debilitating acid reflux for quite a while before I learned about my food sensitivities and some of my hormonal imbalances. During that time in life, which was also when my kids were in middle and elementary school, and my husband traveled a lot for his job often leaving me essentially to be a single parent, I had to evaluate realistically what I could do. It’s in these more difficult seasons of life that we must give ourselves grace with regards to homemaking. Sometimes just keeping people alive is enough!

While I have always had a schedule, even when my kids were very young, I have also allowed myself flexibility based on what commitments we had in each stage of life. While I have always incorporated deep cleaning and decluttering in my schedule, it certainly didn’t happen as regularly as it does now. There were some weeks when my kids were younger that I just didn’t have the bandwidth to get it done. In those seasons I had to prioritize other things – like my kids activities, volunteering, and other obligations outside of the home. 

If you have watched my channel over it’s lifetime (which by the way I officially had my four year YouTube anniversary on November 1st!), you will have seen the transformation of my home. While I did my best to keep our home clean, organized, and tidy while my kids were growing up, that wasn’t my priority then. But since starting my channel 4 years ago, with my kids older and more independent, I have done a lot of organizing projects and a lot of decluttering, which I only now have had the time to be intentional about. It took us 27 years of marriage to accumulate all of the things we have today, and it has taken me the last 8 years or so of prioritizing decluttering and organizing to get my home to where it is today. I organized and decluttered our spaces little by little over time, it didn’t happen overnight.

I did want to share this with you to let you know that anything I share on my YouTube channel or my blog comes from a place of where I am in my season of life. I share with you tips and things that have helped me as I get my home decluttered and organized, but I fully understand that not everyone is in a season where they have time to devote to these things. This is why I am such a big advocate for doing things a little at a time, and being intentional about what comes into your home! 

I hope if you are in a season where you don’t have as much bandwidth for homemaking, that you would give yourself grace today. I truly hope anything I share is inspirational to you and doesn’t make you feel discouraged because you can’t do things the way I do them. I only share to inspire and motivate! If you are in a more difficult season, where you don’t have as much time or energy – just be encouraged that seasons change! They always do!

Check out the YouTube video that I shared in conjunction with this blog post!

IF IT FEELS LIKE A NO, LET IT GO!

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Okay friends, for today’s Thoughtful Thursday post I wanted to talk about a quote I recently heard from Joshua Fields Milburn. If you don’t know who he is, he is one of the two men who make up the content creators, The Minimalists. They have a podcast, YouTube channel, and they even have a documentary on Netflix. I have been following these guys for several years as inspiration on my journey towards pursuing minimalism. Recently in one of their podcasts, Joshua said something that I think is actually a catchphrase that he says often, “If it feels like a no, let it go!” I am sure I have heard him say this before, but on this day it just hit differently.

This may sound a bit dramatic, but I feel like for whatever reason when I heard this phrase on this day, it was a breakthrough moment for me. So often with my things I have looked at items and think that I don’t love it, but I like to have it around for an option. I especially struggle with clothes and home decor in this way. But as I began looking around my home, I started noticing a lot of “no’s.” There were several things that I was just holding onto to fill up a space or just in case. I have even said to clients before that “just in case” is a dangerous saying when it comes to making progress in decluttering. If I truly want to get to the place where I am managing less things, I have to quit saying “just in case” and I have to start saying “if it feels like a no, let it go!”

There is this cactus print I had in my bathroom for the longest time and it is a great example. It is something that I don’t really love anymore, but I was just keeping it to fill the space. I realized that it is okay to have spaces more simplified, and that is actually what has been more appealing to me lately. I purchased that print several years ago and I have displayed it in different places around my home. I’m beginning to realize that it’s okay for my tastes and style to change. Something I purchased 5 or 6 years ago may just not really be my style anymore. I am also realizing that if I purchased something and a year later decided I don’t really like it, that is okay too! It was not necessarily a waste, because that item taught me something. It taught me more about what my style is, or maybe it taught me to be more intentional and cautious when I make purchases.

Now suddenly as I am walking around my house I am seeing a lot of things that “feel like a no.” I was joking in one of my recent YouTube videos how I could have anything left to declutter, but the reality is over time I am just building my decluttering muscles and learning what actually is important to me! In addition to that, I have now been married for over 27 years and we have three kids, and had two dogs – and that is a lot of years of accumulation. So, it will likely take a lot of years of decluttering.

Over time I have learned that the decluttering process is kind of like an onion, the more layers you peel away the more is revealed. You don’t truly know how much stuff you have until you begin that process of hard core decluttering. The more layers you peel away, the more you learn to let go, and the more you realize what is truly important to you – what you really want to spend time caring for, cleaning, storing, and organizing.

I think more than anything, as I age I realize that relationships and experiences are so much more valuable than stuff! The more stuff I own, the more time it takes away from relationships and time and energy for experiences as I have to take care of that stuff. Slowly but surely I’m getting there! Well friends, I hope what I shared was inspirational or encouraging to you today. I always love hearing from you in the comments, so I would love to hear your thoughts on my thoughts!

Here is the YouTube video I shared in conjunction with this blog post!

10 MINDSETS THAT WILL CHANGE THE WAY YOU DECLUTTER

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Hey friends, today for my Thoughtful Thursday post I wanted to share with you some thoughts about decluttering. I know I have talked about decluttering quite a bit on my social media platforms. I have shown the process of decluttering, what I’m decluttering, and why I am decluttering items. But today I wanted to share with you mindsets that will change the way you declutter. Hopefully by sharing these mindsets it will give you a new perspective as you move forward in your decluttering journey. Today I am sharing 10 mindset shifts to help you declutter better!

The first thing I wanted to share with you is to have a positive perspective versus negative. Oftentimes when we approach decluttering we can feel like it is a negative thing: it’s difficult, time consuming, and maybe even tiring both physically and emotionally. When we have this mindset shift that decluttering is a positive thing, moving us towards our life goals, helping us deal with anxiety or other mental health issues, and making our external environment one we love to live in, we will be excited to start the process of decluttering.

Along those lines, another mindset shift around decluttering is to focus on what you are working towards. What is the end result you want? When you create a vision for your life and have that picture in your mind it can spur you on to take the necessary steps to achieve that life you are working towards.

The third mindset shift I wanted to share is to focus on what stays instead of what goes. Sometimes it can be helpful to choose the items you love and know you use regularly and set those aside first. Then you can evaluate what is left. I have done this with clothing for instance where I choose my top favorites, then evaluate if I really need to keep what is leftover. When we focus on what is staying it can help us to appreciate what we have and have an abundance mindset versus a mindset of lack.

Another mindset shift that is similar to that is to think of decluttering as curating. You are curating your collections – anything from clothes to kitchen items. When we think of curation, we may think of a museum. Museum curators are intentional and thoughtful about what they bring in. So much like this curating, it is an intentional process of only surrounding yourself with the things you love and use and removing everything else so it’s easier to enjoy the items you own.

The fifth mindset I wanted to share with you is to focus on the inflow as well as the outflow. Sometimes we don’t realize how important it is to change our spending habits as we work towards decluttering our homes. If we don’t change the inflow, then we will quickly come back to square one and the decluttering progress we made will have made little difference. Sometimes we must be ruthless with ourselves and implement a spending freeze or a no buy period in order to change our habits.

Another mindset shift is realizing you do not equal your stuff. Your value is not in the clothes you wear, the car you drive, or the stuff you own. Finding our value in something more important like in our faith, in our ethics, or in the way we live our lives makes more sense. If we find our value in our stuff, this is a very unpredictable thing to put our value in as we could lose our stuff or lose our jobs and not be able to continue to buy more items.

Something else I wanted to remind you of is having the mindset that the money is long gone. You cannot get your money back after you have purchased and then used an item. Some people find it difficult to declutter because of the money they spent on an item. If an item is sitting in the back of a drawer or cabinet going unused for years, it does not help us financially to hold onto it. Let go of the guilt you may have for spending money on items and then make better decisions moving forward in the future.

Speaking of guilt, let go of all of the guilt around getting rid of items. Whether it is guilt over spending money on the item, or maybe it was a gift given to you and you feel bad getting rid of it, or perhaps it’s something you inherited. If the item is no longer serving you, let go of the guilt and let go of the item.

The ninth mindset change I wanted to share that is adjacent to the feelings of guilt is that memories are not stored in things. You can have memories of a certain time in life, or of a person without holding onto items. Sometimes it can help to take a photo of something if you are struggling to let go because you have memories attached to the item. I do recognize that sometimes tangible things can spark our memory of a time or person, but ultimately the item itself does not hold the memory. The memory is in your mind!

Lastly, I wanted to share that decluttering doesn’t have to be a sprint. In spite of what Marie Kondo told us, we do not have to declutter our whole house in one day! I understand that different decluttering processes work for different people, but sometimes this mindset that we have to declutter all at once or set aside a big chunk of time to get decluttering done prevents us from getting started in the first place. If we have the mindset that we can do a little at a time it will feel more manageable. Oftentimes once you get started the ball starts rolling and you want to continue on, but you can have the mindset that it can be a slow and steady process!

FEELING LIKE A FRAUD

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Okay friends, for today’s Thoughtful Thursday post I wanted to address something that I’ve been thinking about lately and that is feeling like a fraud. This is something most people experience at some point in their lives. This is such a common way to feel. So much so that psychologists have coined the phrase “imposter syndrome” to describe this feeling. Two clinical psychologists, Pauline Rose Clance and Suzanne Imes first identified and named this phenomenon back in 1978. The definition for imposter syndrome is the condition of feeling anxious and not experiencing success internally, despite being high-performing in external, objective ways. This condition often results in people feeling like a “fraud” or “a phony” and doubting their abilities. 

I wanted to talk about this, because I feel like it is one of those taboo subjects that people feel this way, but don’t talk about it. Like I mentioned, it is natural to feel like a fraud from time to time. Often, it is just not true. We only see people from external appearances or what they portray – either on social media or in real life. Often we are comparing our internal feelings about ourselves to the external things we see others doing or accomplishing. I want to encourage you today to see things from a proper perspective when you are having those feelings. I want to share some practical things you can do when you are having this feeling. Feeling like a fraud can be a sign of self-sabotage, so be aware of that and then be intentional about addressing your feelings. 

The first thing you can do is self-talk. When you have negative thoughts that come into your head – telling you that you are not enough, you are not competent, or not successful – you can acknowledge that you feel that way, but remind yourself that you ARE enough, you ARE competent, you ARE successful. If you can’t do this just in your head, perhaps process these feelings with a friend or use a journal to write down your fears around feeling like a fraud. We must find a way to break the cycle of ruminating and turn our thoughts towards the positive. 

Along with this, you can make a 2-column list with ways you are inadequate and ways you are competent. Sometimes writing it out you may realize you are far more competent than you think, and this can help bring perspective.

You might say, but what if my inadequacy list IS longer than my competent list? Then I would encourage you to reframe your inadequacies. Often acknowledging our inadequacies is the beginning of growth. Look at your struggles as a way to learn and become stronger! Being realistic with yourself, evaluating areas of life you do need to work on, and coming up with strategies to make changes may give you some peace of mind.

Talking to someone who knows you well about your feelings can be really beneficial. Getting feedback from a trusted friend or family member can help you to have a better perspective. We are often much harder on ourselves than others are on us. Trusted friends or family members know you well enough to give honest feedback, but also see you in a different light than you see yourself.

Lastly, be gracious with yourself. We often forget that we are aware of both the internal and external portrayals of ourselves and therefore can be hard on ourselves. Remind yourself that you are only human. You cannot be perfect and you will make mistakes. But that’s all a part of the growth and learning process!

I wanted to share a personal anecdote with you about feeling this imposter syndrome. We all second guess ourselves. Recently I added some new pieces to my bedroom – a new throw blanket and pillow. That day I was thinking about how much I talk on my YouTube channel and here on my blog about minimalism and intentional spending. I also do a fair amount of decluttering on my channel as I continue to pursue minimalism. Sometimes when I bring new items into my home and share it on my channel I feel a bit like a fraud. Like why am I buying more things when I am trying to create a space that is minimal?

First of all, whenever you’re on a journey of any kind, it is just that – a journey! By the definition, it is an ongoing process and not a point where you arrive. So, pursuing minimalism is a journey for me. I may make mistakes along the way – I may make poor decisions, but ultimately I am trying to be intentional with what comes into my home. Most of the time with items like these two items – it is not an impulse purchase. I think about it several days before I decide to purchase the items. Also, these items are practical. Like I mentioned, we needed cooler blankets for the warmer months, and the pillow was just a cover to add to my existing pillow, just a design that I think works better for warmer weather.

 In addition to this, one thing that I am always trying to balance in my home is making my spaces warm, cozy, and inviting, without having too much clutter. I love decorating our spaces to make our home a place that my family and friends feel comfortable and enjoy being in. Ever since I did my no spend year back in 2019 I am definitely more intentional about what I purchase. I used to just peruse the aisles of Target or Home Goods, do online shopping, or be influenced by what others had and were sharing on social media. Now I am far less tempted to do this and find it an even more creative process to curate the items that come into my spaces or wardrobe.

Does this mean I will always be perfect in my shopping choices? NO! Even if I’m intentional about what I purchase, you never know how much you will love something or how well it will serve you. You make the best decisions with the knowledge you have!

Keeping your focus on your values instead of perfection will help tremendously in feeling confident in who you are. Success is not a point in time, it is a continual process, so there will be ups and downs.

I hope this chat was helpful or resonated with some of you. As always, I love to hear your thoughts in the comments! If you feel comfortable, let me know if you have felt like a fraud before and what was your experience!

The YouTube video I shared in conjunction with this blog post.

WHY DECLUTTERING ISN’T ENOUGH

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Well, it has been quite a while since I have posted here on my blog! I have been focusing on my other social media platforms – YouTube, Instagram, and Tik Tok. I have been thinking about how I would like to share more often here on my blog. On my YouTube channel every Thursday I share in a video series called Thoughtful Thursday where I share cleaning, organizing, and/or decluttering motivation and in the voiceover I share my thoughts on a topic. This week my topic was pertinent to my website, so I decided to go ahead and share the information that I shared in that video. But it got me to thinking that I would love to start sharing my Thoughtful Thursday thoughts here on my blog as well, even if it isn’t specific to cleaning, organizing, or decluttering. So, you can look forward to seeing my thoughts each Thursday!

So, for this week’s Thoughtful Thursday I wanted to share with you why decluttering isn’t enough to create a clutter free home. Over the weekend I was thinking about how much time, energy, and effort it takes to keep up with our stuff – caring for, cleaning, and organizing it. I came across a quote from Peter Walsh, a professional organizer and author, probably best known for the TLC show Clean Sweep. I shared this quote over on my Instagram feed earlier this week: “What I know for sure is that when you declutter – whether it’s your home, your head, or your heart – it is astounding what will flow into that space that will enrich you, your life, and your family.”

This quote has inspired me to continue decluttering my home, even though in some ways it seems like I have nothing left to declutter! When we declutter, we make space for other things that will enrich our lives. I also loved his point that it’s not just our physical stuff that takes up space – but also mental and emotional clutter can prevent us from experiencing other beautiful things in life. We must be self aware, realizing what we spend our time and brain space thinking about and telling ourselves. I talk a lot about the importance of self talk over on my YouTube channel, as well as on my Tik Tok page. It is meaningful what you say to yourself. Also, if there are unresolved emotional issues in life, I encourage you to not ignore them but deal with those issues. Whether that’s reconciling in relationships, healing from past hurts or trauma, or just dealing with day to day emotions. This may require seeking professional help, and I can tell you from experience that this is so worth it. When we make time to deal with our emotional “clutter,” if you will, it frees up space in our lives for something else!

I did want to camp out on the physical clutter aspect today. I think one thing many of us don’t realize is that decluttering is usually not enough to keep a clutter free home. First of all, decluttering is an ongoing process. As long as items are still coming into our homes, we will have a need to assess what we are using and loving. Over time, as we go through different stages of life – for ourselves and especially our children – we will need to evaluate what we are still using.

In addition to this, I think one of the biggest reasons people feel like their homes are still cluttered despite decluttering, is because of the inflow. Things come into our homes organically – if nothing else junk mail, and kids’ papers. But we may also be contributing to this through our shopping habits. Think about how easy it is for something to come into your home. Especially if you do online shopping. You can shop from the comfort of your sofa, or even your bed. Within a few clicks you are done and the item is on its way directly to your front door. Whereas if you want to go through the decluttering process you must set aside time to evaluate your items, make decisions, sort the items, bag or package up the item for donation, drive to a donation center, or go through the steps it takes to sell an item online – taking a photo, writing a description, etc. It is actually much more difficult to get rid of items than to acquire them. This is something to keep in mind while shopping.

I have shared about my no spend year back in 2019, and this really opened my eyes to my spending habits. I am so thankful for that experience as it has helped me to be far more intentional about what comes into my home. Related to this, in order to keep the inflow in check, I do not purchase new things for each season – like new decor or new clothes. I like to curate my collection of decor and wardrobe intentionally and purchase items that speak to me. I may add some new items for a particular season, but I don’t shop for each new season.

In addition to this, is how easily we accumulate things because of free items or sales. I have learned that it is okay to say no to free items if it is not something I will love or use. It took time to learn, but now I am much more particular about what is allowed in my home.  I have also learned not to get sucked into a good deal. Just because something is on sale or seemingly a good deal, doesn’t mean I need it or it will be useful to me.

Something else that will make an impact in your decluttering process is accepting that it’s okay to have open spaces in your home. Now, I recognize that this may not resonate with everyone – I know some people are maximalists and like every nook and cranny to have something in it, well maybe this blog post is not for you anyway! Once you get to the point where you have open spaces, then you may be seeing the difference in your home on your decluttering journey. Sometimes we feel the need to fill the space back up, and obviously this is going to be counterproductive if you are getting rid of items just to fill the space back up again.

If you are on a decluttering journey, I hope these ideas were helpful to you. It’s really not enough to just declutter our spaces. We must change our spending habits as well in order to truly make an impact. I know for me, I just got tired of the cycle of stuff going out, stuff coming in. Slowly but surely I am seeing more open spaces in my home. It has helped greatly with my anxiety levels, not feeling overwhelmed with stuff in my space and just not having to take care of as much stuff as I once did. I am still working on it! I am thankful for the space I have now for other things to flow into my life, as Peter Walsh says.

Here is the YouTube video I made in conjunction with this post!

10 Questions to Ask Yourself When Decluttering Sentimental or Holiday Items

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Today I wanted to talk about decluttering sentimental items, and in particular holiday decor. Decluttering sentimental items can be such a difficult thing! Holiday decor can have an added layer of difficulty because of the sweet and fond memories wrapped up in the items. I always encourage people to start with an easier category when beginning their decluttering journey because momentum is the key. It’s a whole lot easier to declutter items that don’t have a sentimental attachment. Starting there will give us the confidence in our decision making process as we gain momentum with decluttering. If you are in a place where you are ready to tackle decluttering sentimental items, but you are struggling, I have ten questions you can ask yourself as you make these decisions.

The first question you can ask yourself is: Am I going to use it again? If you didn’t put it out this year, how likely are you to put it out next year? Oftentimes if we do not display something from our Christmas bins one year, we are not very likely to display it the next year. And even less like the next year, or the next. I know it can be difficult to be realistic with ourselves when it comes to sentimental items, but really evaluate if you are going to display items in the future. 

If you’re not going to display the items, the second question you can ask is: are these items worth just storing away in a closet, attic, or basement? I am all about displaying or discarding. For me, when things are out of sight, they are out of mind. Be honest with yourself if the items are important enough to just have stored away in a box somewhere.

The third question to ask is: Am I believing in my  fantasy self? This term refers to having items in your home that you think you will one day use because of who you wish you would be. You have a desire to follow through on ideas you have, but the reality is you probably won’t. Maybe you’re keeping old Christmas cards to use for a future craft project, or you have some other craft materials to make things that you will actually never make, or maybe you have a lot of holiday decor with the idea that you will put it all out but the reality is you don’t have the time or bandwidth during the holiday season to do so. Again, being realistic with yourself is the key. Ask yourself how much you really need to have on hand. How much will you actually use?

The fourth question you can ask yourself is: is this meaningful to my children or family members? Think about if your children or family members would want these items when you are gone. I know this is a bit morbid to think about, but it is a good way to help make these decisions. If you missed my previous blog post (or YouTube video) regarding Swedish Death Cleaning, you should check it out for a more in depth explanation, but this mindset has helped me when making decisions especially regarding sentimental items. The basic idea of Swedish Death Cleaning is recognizing that one day when you pass away your children or other family members will have the responsibility of deciding what happens with the belongings you left behind. It is already an emotional time dealing with the loss of a loved one, but there is the added burden of going through their stuff. Therefore this question of will your family members find these items meaningful is valuable.

An adjacent question you can ask yourself with regards to your children or other family members is: can I pass anything along to my children or family members now? While you are still living it is a great time to ask your family members what items are important to them. You may find that what is important to you may not be important to them, or vice versa. It may be easier to let go of sentimental items if you know they are going to be cherished by family.

The sixth question you can ask yourself is: will this matter to me one year from now? Five years from now, or ten years from now? Thinking about sentimental items in terms of the future can help you to make those decisions. You may want to hold onto items for now and that’s okay. It can take time to let things go. In a recent video on my YouTube channel where I was going through my Christmas decor to declutter, a friend asked me if I was emotional going through my kids’ childhood items (my three children are now young adults). I honestly was not emotional. It took time, but I am starting to get to a place where I am accepting this life stage. It takes time to transition for sure, but when you’re ready to let go, you’re ready.

The seventh question you can ask yourself is: is this item something I could take a photo of to have the memory? Sometimes it’s enough to have a photo of the special item, and this takes up far less physical space since photos are now digital. This is an especially great technique for larger sentimental items.

Another question you can ask yourself is: how much Christmas clutter am I okay with having displayed in my home? Everyone has a threshold of how much stuff they can have around them. Studies have shown that clutter can contribute to feelings of anxiety and overwhelm. For some people that threshold is higher, but really evaluate your threshold. If you like a lot of holiday decor and you have the time and energy to put it all up, then by all means keep it all! But if the reality is you have way more than you feel comfortable displaying then it’s time to evaluate what you can part with. 

The ninth question you can ask yourself is: do I have the space to store what I want to keep? Physical boundaries can be a great way to limit what you keep. It can be helpful to give yourself boundaries by having a certain number of bins for your holiday decor and only keeping what fits in the bins.

The tenth and final question you can ask yourself is: Am I keeping items because of guilt? Sometimes we keep sentimental items or holiday items because they were gifts given to us. It can be very difficult to let go of items given to us, however it doesn’t seem sustainable to keep every gift ever given to you. I am sure the person who gave you the gift would not want you to keep the item simply out of guilt and might rather you pass it along to someone who can use and enjoy it!

Well, I hope these ten questions were helpful to you to process through making decisions when it comes to decluttering sentimental and holiday items. This time of year as we get out our holiday decor and set it up is a great time to think through these questions! Happy decluttering, and happy holidays!

Here is the YouTube video I created in conjunction with this blog post if you would like to check that out.

7 Tips to Avoid Decluttering Burn Out

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Have you decided it’s time to get serious about decluttering your home? Are you tired of the piles, not being able to find what you need, and just the stress of clutter? Today I wanted to share with you 7 things you can do to avoid decluttering burn out. Sometimes when we decide we are fed up with the clutter and want to do something to change it, we can quickly get burnt out! 

Often people try to do too much, too fast, causing this decluttering burn out. In light of that, my first suggestion is to do a little at a time. I know at first it can be easy to pull everything out of a space konMari style and want to tackle everything all at once, but I suggest you resist the urge to do this. It is better to do a little at a time so you don’t get easily overwhelmed. I would start very small – maybe a single drawer or cabinet. Usually starting small like this gives us motivation to choose another small space, and then another, until we have gone through every space in our homes! Another idea adjacent to this is to set a timer. It can feel less overwhelming to work on projects like decluttering when we know there is an endpoint.

My next tip is to have a decluttering plan. For anything in life, when we have a plan set in place it makes everything go more smoothly. When we have a plan, we also have that feeling of there being an endpoint. {{Although I will say, as long as items are still coming into your home – even as gifts, freebies, or things your kids bring in, decluttering is a constant process. You just eventually get to the point where it’s not as overwhelming.}} What I like to do is choose one room in my home per week to deep clean and declutter throughout that week. Going through spaces in this way breaks it down into more manageable tasks.

My third tip is to make a game out of it! Making a game out of any task that isn’t fun can make it fun! I like to play the Minimalism Game, however this may be overwhelming to some people. With this game, you choose one item to get rid of on day one, two items on day two, three items on day three and so on throughout a month. So you end up donating things for 30 days, equaling over 400 items! Another game you could play is have every family member take a trash bag or box and see who can find the most items to donate. I am sure there are so many great decluttering games out there which you could Google for more ideas!

My next tip is to take breaks. If you feel a burn out coming on, take a few weeks or months where you aren’t focusing on decluttering. Sometimes we just need to take a break from it to recharge and feel ready to go through things again.

Another thing you can do to avoid decluttering burn out is to not start with sentimental items. These items can be very difficult to declutter and slow your process down. By starting with a space with items that you don’t have sentimental attachment to, you get the momentum you need to be successful at decluttering.

My sixth tip is to celebrate your successes. Celebrating along the way can also help with the momentum. When you acknowledge the progress you have made it can inspire you to keep working at it. An idea that I have seen is to take before and after photos. Sometimes we forget how far we have come! Having those photos can remind you of how much progress you have made!

My last tip is to invite a friend or a professional to help you! Sometimes you just need someone there to help you talk through why you should keep or get rid of items. Having another pair of eyes and someone else’s input can be really helpful. Also, this can also make this process less painful and more fun!

Well, I hope this post was helpful to you and that you are inspired to start decluttering your spaces today!

The Real Secret of Tidy People

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I think I have figured out the real secret to being a tidy person. I have a whole blog post sharing how to keep your house tidy. These habits are easier to develop if we adopt this secret of being a tidy person. In my other blog post I share several habits you can cultivate to become a tidier person. Dealing with things immediately instead of setting them down to deal with later, having a cleaning routine that makes sense so you can stick to it, enlisting the help of other family members, and having a place for everything are all great habits that can help you to stay on top of clutter accumulating. But the real secret is the final tip I shared in that post – DON’T OWN A LOT OF STUFF!

The real secret of being a tidy person is that they don’t have extra inventory in their homes. They don’t keep things just in case. They don’t want to manage a lot of inventory. I think I came to this conclusion as my kids got older. Now that all of our children are adults, even though currently they are all living with us, I realize that there is a lot less stuff I need to manage. When they were younger there were toys, school papers, and sports equipment. Now that they are older they manage their own things.

In addition to that, over the past 7-8 years I have been pursuing minimalism. It is definitely a slow process for me decluttering my home and learning new spending habits, but less inventory in my home equals less to put away, clean, and organize.

I have a friend who openly admits she is not tidy. I would consider her a maximalist. She loves ALL the things! And I think that is totally fine! We are all different, and that’s what makes the world a beautiful place! I can go over to her house and appreciate all of the things she has surrounded herself with, but I personally could not live this way. If you’re someone who loves all the things, that is okay. But just know that the more you own, the more difficult it will be to be a tidy person. It comes down to what you value and what you can handle.

I am very affected by my external environment. My guess is you are too since you are reading this blog post and wanting to learn the secret to being tidy. Clutter and extra stuff around me definitely affects my anxiety and my mood. When my external environment is chaotic, I feel a bit chaotic in my mind as well. Everything we own takes up our energy and time. The less we own, the less we have to manage, the easier it is to keep a tidy home.

The more I simplify our home, the more I really see the benefits of living with less! Easily being able to tidy your home is one of those many benefits. I hope this post was helpful for you today!

Digital Organization

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Today I wanted to talk about digital organization. I have had this topic idea to share for quite some time, but have hesitated to share honestly because I feel like this is a space that I am the worst at keeping organized and decluttered. Much of our lives are now digital, so there is definitely a need to keep things organized and minimized. I will share with you what I would ideally do to keep this space under control, but I’m confessing that this is a struggle for me!

So first let’s talk about photos. This is one area that is so difficult to stay on top of! I’m pretty sure that currently as I write this I have over 5,000 photos on my phone! This is definitely something I need to deal with and learn to better stay on top of. A long time ago when digital cameras were first available, I was really good about removing the photos off of my camera, and putting them both on my computer and on a hard drive. As my kids got older and my schedule became chaotic, I found it difficult to keep up with this and eventually lost about a year and half worth of our family photos. Thankfully I was able to recover some of them as back then I used a website similar to Shutterfly to share photos with my extended family. This is definitely something I would suggest – to use an app that automatically backs up your phone’s photos. I personally use Google photos for this purpose. You can also use the Cloud, although I believe they cap the amount of data you are allowed to have stored there unless you pay an additional fee. 

I recently learned about a thumb drive that can connect directly to your iPhone in order to dump photos onto it to clear off your phone, and that is what I plan to use to save my photos in another location.

If you have time to organize your photos, I like to organize mine chronologically and will create folders for each month, putting the year first, then the month to keep it all chronological. That way it is easy to find the photo you are looking for. However, Google photos has a search mechanism which works wonderfully for finding a photo of a specific person, location, or thing.

Next let’s talk about computer file organization. First, I like to use external hard drives to keep minimal files on my computer as this helps it to run better. Creating folders with like files helps to keep things organized. Everyone will have different types of files, so you will have to determine what makes sense for your specific files. Perhaps having separate external hard drives for different types of files would be wise. Maybe you have personal files and work files.

Evaluate which programs or apps you have on your computer and determine if there are any that are unnecessary and uninstall those. In general, it’s good to have a regular habit of decluttering files and photos you no longer need.

Next I wanted to address email. I would suggest having a daily habit of deleting emails. Staying on top of emails will prevent that overwhelming feeling of having thousands of emails in your inbox. In addition to that, unsubscribe to emails from companies that you no longer need the information or are no longer helpful. I also suggest streamlining your email. Sometimes it is necessary to have more than one email address, but evaluate how many is really reasonable to have. It is far easier to keep up with just a couple email inboxes than several! 

The next thing I wanted to address is passwords! Keeping track of all of the passwords you have for all of the websites you use can be an overwhelming task. Every website seems to have different specifications on what the password can be. I think it is important to find a password storage tool that is easy and safe. I use NordPass to store all of my passwords, making it easy to access at any time, and I don’t have to worry about remembering all of these different passwords! Every site has different specifications for your password, and honestly it’s more safe if you use different passwords for different sites.

I of course also wanted to address your phone! The digital clutter we have on our phones can be overwhelming. As I mentioned with your computer, it’s a good practice to make time to declutter your phone regularly. Evaluate which apps on your phone that you actually use and delete any that you are not. Categorizing your apps into folders will keep your home screen looking less cluttered, and it will make finding them easy. You can categorize them into folders based on type (like social media, photography, finances, ect.) I like to do it according to color – Home Edit style, because I find this more visually pleasing. This may seem inefficient, but your brain quickly learns where to find each app.

Adjacent to our phones is social media. First, evaluate which social media apps you really want to spend your time on, and delete any that aren’t serving you! You can also declutter the people you follow on each social media platform, only keeping around the people who are helpful. If there are people who make you feel sad or upset about your life, or just create more mental health issues, I would suggest hitting the unfollow button!

Using a digital calendar can be really helpful for reminders and to access your calendar from anywhere. I like to use both physical and digital calendars. Keep your calendar up to date by setting aside time each week or each month to update all of your appointments and commitments. If you need to also keep track of other family member’s schedules, I  like to use a different color for each member of the family.

Lastly, I wanted to share that using sites like Google Docs and Google Sheets can help to keep things organized as well. There are functions within these sites/apps that allow you to create folders in order to keep things organized. You can then access these files easily on your phone through the apps. It also makes it easy to share files with others. I like to keep recipes in a folder in my Google Docs to access while I’m cooking!

Well, I hope this post gave you some inspiration or helpful information for you to get your digital space decluttered and organized today!

12 Tips For Packing To Move

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In today’s post I wanted to share with you some tips for moving! I thought summer is the perfect time to share these tips as a lot of people move during the summer months. I have been married for 26 years, and we have three adult children now. Over the course of our marriage we have lived in 4 states, 6 different apartments and 2 homes, so I have experience with packing to move! I hope these tips are helpful for you for a future move, or if a move is not in your near future you can pass this along to a friend or family member that might benefit from these tips!

{{1}} The first tip is to pack all non essential items well in advance. I always liked to pack non essential items even a couple months in advance to get this out of the way. When we begin the packing process, we don’t realize just how many belongings we own. At first it seems like it won’t take long at all to get everything packed, but the deeper into the packing process you get, you realize that you have A LOT of stuff and it is time consuming. Some examples of non essential items are home decor, throw pillow and blankets, picture frames, books, and holiday related items. 

{{2}} My next tip is to color code labels to match the rooms they belong in. This tip is especially helpful if you have movers moving your belongings, but even if friends or family members help they will know which room each box goes to very quickly. You can even have a color sign in each room to indicate which boxes go in which rooms. 

{{3}} Another tip is to use towels and blankets to pack fragile items. Using towels and blankets to pack fragile items will be efficient since you’re packing both items, but protecting the fragile items. Obviously you will want to take special care to wrap really fragile and special items with bubble wrap or newspaper.

{{4}} Speaking of newspapers, save newspapers to wrap breakables. If you don’t get newspaper you can buy non printed newspaper from moving stores. Using the non printed newspaper is nice for things like dishes and drinking glasses so they don’t get dirty from the printing.

{{5}} Another great tip is to ask local grocery stores or big box stores for boxes. Instead of purchasing new moving boxes, you can go to local grocery stores or places like Target or Walmart to ask if they have extra boxes you could take. They often have leftover boxes from unloading inventory and are happy to give them to you. Sometimes these boxes aren’t quite as sturdy as the moving boxes, so you will want to be careful with what you pack in them. 

{{6}} My next tip is to declutter, donate, and sell anything not worth moving. It is best to use the opportunity while you are packing things to move to declutter and donate or sell anything you are no longer loving or using. Depending on how much you have, this can be an overwhelming task and too time consuming to do in conjunction with packing to move, but it is wise to just leave behind anything that is no longer serving you.

{{7}} Next, have paper goods on hand for the last few days leading up to the move and the first few days in the new place. It is nice to have paper plates and bowls, and plastic cups and cutlery the last few days before a move so you don’t have to worry about doing dishes. In addition to that, then you can get your kitchen packed and ready to go! And it is nice on the other end, moving into a new place knowing you have something to eat on when you arrive without having to unpack.

{{8}} Something else that really helped me was to have a box or bin filled with all moving essentials – packing tape, sharpies, labels, scissors, AND know where it is (have a designated location for it). Often during a move everything is a bit chaotic. It’s easy to misplace things or not know where things are because everything is getting upheaved. If you have a designated bin for all of the moving essentials, and you know where it is located (maybe in a central location in the home), then it’s easier to keep track of those things and know where they are when you need them.

{{9}} The next tip some people may not think about, and that is to carefully label the last boxes. We often are just throwing a bunch of stuff together towards the end. Indicating in detail what is in the box will make it easier to know what is in it. In addition to that, write “last box” on them clearly so you know that it is a box you will also want to unpack first!

{{10}} Another tip I have is to enlist help. You can teach your children to pack! Most kids are excited to help with the packing process. You can allow them to pack their own things and give them ownership. Maybe a friend or family member can come over and help you pack or unpack as well. Working with friends and family is always so much more fun than working on your own!

{{11}} My next tip is to unpack essentials first. Maybe this is an obvious tip, but it can be overwhelming arriving at your new place and feeling like you don’t know where to start. Starting with bedding, bathroom essentials, and kitchen essentials is a great place to start. You will also have those last few boxes that you labeled “last box” which you will likely need right away as well. If you’re anything like me, the coffee will be the first off the truck!

{{12}} My final tip is to take breaks! Packing for a move, and moving in general is really exhausting, both physically and emotionally. Be sure to listen to your body and take breaks when you can. 

Well, I hope this gave you some tips that will be helpful for your next move! If you’re interested, you can check out the YouTube video I made in conjunction with this post!