Day 27: Declutter and Clean up the Laundry Room

Read the previous entry in this series:  Day 26: Magazines/Books/Bookshelves or start at the beginning with the Introduction: 5 Ways Clutter Costs.

Let's see.

I tossed an old rug. I moved things and swept and found my dryer balls (yay!) and the phone (double yay!). I got rid of a pair of pants, a sweater and countless stained and/or otherwise unwearable items. (H&M recycles clothing in any condition, so the crate and barrel bag is for them.)

Oh, and I did loads and loads of laundry.

see all that stuff under the table? That'll all be cleared out on or by Saturday.

Can I say I am looking forward to the end of this month? I will be glad to be done.

Read the next entry in this series Day 28: Excavting the Purse.

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Day 26: Declutter Magazines/Books/Bookshelves

Read the previous entry in this series:  Day 25: Finish Up and Unfinished Project or start at the beginning with the Introduction: 5 Ways Clutter Costs.

Magazines are something I like to keep on top of--I have a bad habit of hanging on to them just a little too long.

Usually, I take a before and after shot for you, but the magazines were all over: some in the dining room, most in the bedroom--some on shelves and some in baskets. So, I took a shot of the ones I've decided can leave the house.

That was quick and easy.

As for the books and bookshelves: I can't even.

On top of this box are the books I decluttered from the white bookcase yesterday. Inside the box are books I decluttered from the library landing some time ago.

I want to try and sell my books before I donate them. It's a huge endeavour--and I've been putting it off for along time.


Read the next entry in this series Day 27: Declutter and Clean up the Laundry Room. (Oh dear).

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Day 25: Finish up an Unfinished Project

Read the previous entry in this series:  Day 24: Craft Supplies or Tools, Your Choice or start at the beginning with the Introduction: 5 Ways Clutter Costs.


I remember the first time I realised that unfinished projects counted as clutter. All of a sudden, it felt like I had permission to do them. They no longer had to wait for that mythical day when everything was done and I just had all this time on my hands. Almost immediately, I embarked on an extravaganza I called the anti-procrastination project. In 2013, every day for the month of May, I did one thing I'd been putting off. I felt pretty good by the end of the month.

Sort of how I felt when I finished this project.

from 2010 to 2015

This is the upstairs hallway. This bit of wall and the linen closet sit between the two bedrooms. (If you're interested in the evolution of this space and my other hallways, check out A Retrospective 2: Passageways: Entry ways, Hallways and The Stairs.) I took down our family pictures this summer so we could paint.

While that project dragged on and on, Jenny Komenda posted something about picture ledges and vintage Martha Stewart.

Hey, I have picture ledges, I thought. At least, I hoped I did. Who knows, I may have decluttered them by now: I'd last used them in 2007 in the dining room.

But, I found them and dumped them in my bedroom.

Those are the pictures sitting on the chair just inside our bedroom.

Then, someone else mentioned that picture ledges were the "new" gallery walls--and I was sold. Plus, it's a great way to handle pictures especially for old walls like ours.

It took me about a half hour--most of the time was spent trying to find the right sized drill bit. It took an extra set of hands to help me, though. My husband helped me with the first shelf and my son with the second.

Ta da!

I pulled out about a dozen books or so I knew we didn't want anymore. I can't help it.

I know the whole thing isn't centered on that wall--but that's OK: put that bookshelf any closer to the right doorway and I start to feel constricted getting out that door.

I'm not sure how I feel about the mix of black ledges up top and white bookcase below. What do you think?

Read the next entry in this series Day 27: The Laundry Room. (Oh dear). Oops, that should have been Day 26: Declutter Magazines/Books/Bookshelves

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Day 24: Craft Supplies or Tools, Your Choice.

Read the previous entry in this series:  Day 23: Your Choice. My Choice: The Top of my Desk or start at the beginning with the Introduction: 5 Ways Clutter Costs.


I have been wanting to organize my painting tools for ages.

During the great basement clean out of 2013 we moved the painting cabinet over to the laundry room area--but kept the tools over in the workshop.

As we've been doing projects and using our paint supplies, I have been piling them up in the laundry room, near the paint cabinet which is the big white thing in the picture below.

Here is the same area from another angle:

This morning, before I left to go painting at my Mom's, I just went in with two goals. 1) remove everything not related to storing paint and paint supplies and 2) group like with like.

So, in the Ikea unit, I removed the soil that was in one tub and put in the spray paint. In another area, I moved out the dead plant, put the Santa hats away, replaced a useless table with a newly emptied storage unit, that sort of thing.

It was remarkable how clear it was. This was the area for paint supplies--and nothing else. Easy peasy.

We have a leak from the bathroom upstairs, so the bucket of water needs to stay there for a bit.

There is more to be done, but it's good enough for now.

Read the next entry in this series Day 25: Finish up an Unfinished Project.

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Day 23: Your Choice. My Choice? The Top of my Desk

Read the previous entry in this series:  Day 22: Saying Good-bye to a Piece of Childhood or start at the beginning with the Introduction: 5 Ways Clutter Costs.


No pictures, today.

There's a reason for that.

I had planned to spend the whole day working at my Mom's. I had planned to sand my last coat of mud on the drywall, wash the walls and ceiling, and prime. I was not going to come home until I had finished all of it.

But it didn't work out that way.

My husband and I had a leisurely morning. I even slept in until 10am. We were just packing up to go to my Mom's when my daughter called and wanted to come home from school. I'd just finished mentioning that we'd have to fetch her before we left when the phone rang again, and this time it was work, asking me to come in for the evening. I agreed. I probably shouldn't have.

We hit another snag at my Mom's and after sanding, had to mud again, ever so slightly. Holes in the walls needed to be filled--deep holes which wouldn't be dry for hours. I started washing the walls and realised I had totally underestimated how long it would take.

And what with traffic and all--we had to leave well before I'd completed my list.

I had planned to work on my basement this evening. I have been looking forward to getting down there and sorting things out. But with work--that would be impossible.

So, I thought about the smallest thing I could possibly do to keep myself moving forward, to keep up the decluttering momentum--and I decided to do the dead obvious: clean off the desktop. And then I thought of the easiest way to handle the whole writing of the post thing, etc.

And so, no pictures.

I hope you don't mind.
Sometimes you really just need to declutter complification from your life.


Read the next entry in this series Day 24: Craft Supplies or Tools, Your Choice.

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Day 22: Saying Good-bye to a Piece of Childhood

Read the previous entry in this series:  Day 21: Collect All the Digital Pictures or start at the beginning with the Introduction: 5 Ways Clutter Costs.


Sorry this is late. I've stretched myself a bit thin doing both this project and working on my Mother's dressing room for the One Room Challenge at the same time. Today is the day we're to declutter cds, dvds, and other media.  I think I interpreted "other media" a bit too broadly given we have "magazines/books/bookshelves" scheduled for Day 26.

The long and short of it is: I took all my Nancy Drews--from Book 1 to Book 50, all but one or two published in the 70's, to a donation centre this evening.

Here's the story.

I believe I bought them all with my own money I earned babysitting in the mid-70s. (I charged $0.75/hour, and after a year, I upped my rates to $1.00/hour.) At 11 and 12, I was absurdly young to be in charge of other people's kids. But I was reliable and available. I kept records. I remember I earned $300.00 in one year.

Anyway. I never intended to keep the Nancy Drews. They travelled from Yellowknife to Edmonton because my Mom packed them up and brought them. Later, when I left home, they went to an outbuilding at my stepfather's farm. When I moved back to the city where my Mother lives--and where I am now--she offered up these slim yellow volumes like they were bars of bullion. I took them and stored them in the basement until I gave them to my dughter when she was ten.

They stayed on the shelves in her room for several years until she asked me to remove them about a year ago. She hadn't read them but she still thought she might. So we moved them to the shelves on the library landing.

Yes, those two shelves of yellow. Those books in the boxes are a few I decluttered. 

But she didn't read them.

A couple of months ago, I boxed them up as part of my project to repaint the stairwell and landing. But rather than put them back, I offered them to my daughter's friend who had expressed interest in reading them. I separated them from the others, boxed them up and put them in the hallway for her.

But, she said, no, she didn't have room for 50 slim gold volumes about the girl with titian hair and a girl friend named George. To clear the decks for Thanksgiving, I had my son take them to the basement.

Are you beginning to get the feeling these are the books that will never leave?

I was.

So, tonight, I had my husband help me carry them out to the car.

And off they went.

They really are gone.

I'm fine with it. Though I really did like that graphic band of yellow (with navy!)  they made there on the shelves.


Read the next entry in this series Day 23: Your Choice. My Choice? The Top of my Desk.

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ORC Week 3: Coming Out of the Closet, No Wait, It's the Closet Coming Out!

I'm beginning to get a bit frantic--there's a lot of work ahead of me still. And we just discovered that we will have to re-do the old subfloor in the old closet area to make it level enough for vinyl planking. Shoot me.

But the studs are down!

I rented a sawzall and I used a sledgehammer and a crow bar and in very short order, they were gone. Things were delayed, however as I couldn't figure out how to get the headers out without damaging the drywall.

It changes the feel of the space utterly. In fact, Mom walked in when I was done and said, "Oh wow. It looks like a room!" A room five feet wide by thirteen feet long! But, yes, a room. Not a hallway.

I wasn't able to get back to Mom's for a few days--so I spent a lot of time looking at mirrors and ceiling lights and rugs and things. More about that next week! I also made up a rough sketch of where I thought things might go.

A few days later, I rented the sawzall again and we went back at it with gusto. Yep, I enlisted my husband to help, thank heavens. There was no way I could lift that sawzall over my head and control it at the same time!

We put in a new 2x6 too to square off the new outside corner. (The old closet was thirteen inches deeper than the "room." I put the ladder in the first picture above to show that.) It was bowed from top to bottom--and the stud we were attaching it too was rounded--we had to go back for shims to get the two to play nicely with one another. More time gone.

Yeh, I think there's some squirrel damage. And man, were these cheap 2x6's--or do they all splinter like that?

Ta da! A blank canvas, so to speak, for drywall.

Cross your fingers that goes well--I have never drywalled before.

Punch List:

Empty out every last little thing

Take down remaining shelving

Tear down closet   Done! Yay!

Repair dry wall and rebuild closet bit

Prep and paint walls 

Tear out carpet
Fix sub-flooring

Lay down new flooring
Buy new light fixture(s)

Install new light fixture(s)
Sew window valence
Install drapery wall for privacy and doorway

Find a bench/make one
Cover the bench
Buy one pax wardrobe

Assemble 3 Pax Wardrobes

Install closet rod(s)

Install shoe shelves

Figure out Jewellery storage/display

Move clothes back in.

If you'd like to catch up:
Week 1: Creating a Dressing Room from Chaos
Week 2: Down and Out or is that Out and Down?

Here is the link to all the other ORC Guests doing amazing things.