52 lists in 52 weeks// week 43

Last year for my birthday I made my annual goal list (24 before 25). I made some loftly goals, but one of them included decluttering my home.

This week I started reading The Happiness Project. I'm only a few chapters in (and am already in love with it), but one of her chapters talks about decluttering her home. In fact, it helped improve her happiness.

So I got to thinking.....even though I've started decluttering, I honestly have barely touched the surface. Now is the perfect time to start. And trust me, Steven agrees. One problem with our living situation is that this has been my home for over 5 years and his for only 1. I've had it decorated the way I've wanted and let's face it, since I'm a control freak, I've kept the apartment pretty much the same. Granted, I did try to get rid of girly stuff (like flowers and posters), but it still looks my place, not ours.

So I went on pinterest. I searched for organizing and decluttering tips. I checked out tons of photos. And books. And websites. And lists.

What I came up with was that this is do-able. I just need to do it. I need to organize my organizing plan and slowly get to it. One task at a time.

The result of all this research are all of these links below (and my own personal organization goal list).

Psst..... have you figured out what the weekly list is??


list 43: What's on your declutter list?


This modern lady blogs all about being a "woman with a plan and routine". She gives tips to her system and how she made it work. It's not just on organizing your home either, but rather organizing your entire life. It gave me a lot of good ideas!

Want a declutter calendar that sends you tips everyday on things you can do to help your system work better? She has a blog too.

There are also some awesome looking books on decluttering that I found on amazon. You can see them here and here.

Then there's "project simplify". Her blog feature lasted for 5 weeks and gives photos and tips. She breaks it down into rooms and "hot spots". It's seriously inspiring.

And lastly, the 21 day challenge. This blogger divides each day into specific spots to clean out and organize, which makes it all a little easier and do-able.


So here's my decluttering list:
1. finish cleaning out the garage.

2. clean out my closet (again).
Like Gretchen mentions, sometimes you need to go back to a place you already cleared and decluttered and see what you might have either overlooked or changed your mind about.

3. work on the bedroom.

4. work on the living room and dining room.
I'm combining these spaces only because they flow into each other and are small since we live in a condo

5. work on the kitchen.

6. combine some things from the house in storage containers in the garage.

7. work on the storage unit outside our condo.
This area is really small, so it ended up being the home of unwanted things that ought to just be thrown away. So no time like the present.

8. take unwanted things to be donated.
Sounds like a duh thing, but honestly there's a point to it, 2 actually. One is that so often I put things in a pile to be donated, but it takes forever to get there, so hopefully this will speed up the process. Two, it's nice to add easy to do and check off items to my to-do lists. That way I don't have a ton of items that take lots of time and energy. I feel more accomplished if there are some I can check off quite easily (especially at the end).

9. something to remember during the whole project: it's okay for the place to look bare.
Maybe this sounds silly, but to me it's something I battle with.
Steven prefers clean, spacious and almost bare looking.
I've always lived in a home where the walls were covered with paintings, and there wasn't a lot of bare space. It also didn't help that when my mom's parents and brother died, we inherited all of their things (including antiques that we didn't have the heart to discard). Because of that, I've always decorated my place likewise. Cluttered. If a wall didn't have a poster or painting, it looked weird and naked. If a drawer or shelf didn't have anything on it, it was awkward looking and needed to be changed.
So I'm trying to change that idea. I'm trying to be okay with bare and uncluttered, because I think it will make me feel less stressed and happier. And I know that's how it will make Steven feel.

10. try new organization idea and techniques. (because i can't leave my list at just 9.....)
something that works better than what I have now.


What does your list look like???

xoxo
kel
And for more organization tips and ideas, you can check out my pinterest.