Having sorted out my own shoes, it was time to tackle everyone else’s.  Our hall was a riot of shoes all over the place.  Everyone just came in and took them off which was great for the carpets but not so good from a clutter point of view.  It also made the hall look smaller than it is.  Having hidden them all when a neighbour came round, she remarked that the hall seemed bigger than usual!  So the shoe problem really needed to be resolved.  I had used a temporary solution as mentioned last week – putting all the shoes in two Really Useful boxes.  This had he ..read more

A few years ago, we had a serious shoe storage problem.  Between all 4 of us, we must own over 30 pairs of shoes.  And most of them were in the hall.  In desperation I had put about half of them in a couple of Really Useful Boxes (my favourite storage boxes) to be accessed as needed.  Of course this did not look good and the shoes were not put back in again once used.   I researched shoe storage on the Internet and have found that there were loads of options available from cheap shoe racks to high tech wall hanging shoe cupboards.  However finding something that w ..read more

Once you have decluttered, you need to get rid of your stuff as quickly as you can. I always try and throw away as little as possible as so much is still usable.  Clothing and other items can go to Charity shops or be sold on Ebay or a car boot sale.  But what about other things that are more difficult to recycle but still useable like redundant juicers or furniture.  For these kind of things, I tend to use Freegle.  There are also Freecycle groups and others that do the same thing.   Freegle and Freecycle Freecycle started in the US in 2003 and since then has spread ..read more

  We all have those items on our to do list that remain determinedly undone.  Day after day you think ‘ I really must do x or y’ and yet by bedtime you haven’t managed to do them.  Often this is because the tasks are seen as boring or as things that will take hours to do.  I have all kinds of favourite excuses such as : I ran out of time I really will do it tomorrow.. I’m too tired I’ll have a cup of coffee and then I’ll do it If only I had got up earlier I was putting off a number of small tasks recently until I suddenly remembered some good exam advice I was given year ..read more

It’s Spring Clearing week so here are 6 ways of getting rid of the stuff you have cleared without adding them to landfill. Car boot sale – there is more about car boot sales in an earlier post but in summary, these are great places to make a bit of money out of your clutter. You can’t charge that much but if you take a load of stuff you should emerge with a profit. Don’t forget the bacon sarnies and flask of coffee!   Charity shop – the obvious one but always useful and there is usually one convenient for dropping off bags of stuff. I always take in anything that didn’t sell at a car b ..read more

You know you want your house to be a clutter-free zone where you can find everything without stuff falling on top of you, where you can walk from room-to-room freely, where an unexpected guest doesn’t cause total panic and where you don’t have to spend 3 days tidying and cleaning before the in-laws visit.  But somehow you just never seem to get round to doing anything about it. Why? There are usually several reasons: It is too large a task – it will take ages and I just don’t have that kind of time I wouldn’t know where to start, there’s just too much I will have to buy loads of storage ..read more

Are your mornings really stressful with everyone rushing around at the last minute, running out of the door with forgotten PE kits and work bags, arriving at school with no time to spare?  If this sounds like you, it may be time to take a long hard look at your morning routine.   Sit down with pen and paper and work backwards.  For example, if you have a school run, write down when you need to leave the house in order to ensure that you arrive calmly and panic free.  Then work out how long it takes to get everyone up, washed, dressed and breakfasted and work backwards to g ..read more

I know, the very word ‘ROUTINE’ sounds dull and boring.’ I am a carefree spirit’, you say, ’a creative, I don’t do routines’. Or similar.  But the fact is that we all have routines, whatever we choose to call them.  Most people generally get up at the same time each morning, eat breakfast, wash their teeth, catch the bus or train etc.  Whatever you want to call it, it’s a routine.   When you are busy, it can be easy to forget things in the morning rush or the evening exhaustion.  That’s when routines come in to save your sanity.   Following them each day will ..read more

One person’s clutter is another one’s treasure and EBay can be a good way of cashing in on items you no longer want.  I last wrote about Ebay 5 years ago so thought it was worth an update. Since I last used it a few years ago, Ebay has changed in a couple of major ways: It has become a lot more commercial with many more professional sellers and EBay shops. There is still room for personal sellers but you do sometimes feel that you have a bit of a disadvantage compared to businesses. Ebay now charges fees on POSTAGE & PACKING as well as on the winning bid price. (see Fees section belo ..read more

Christmas may be on the horizon but you can still get rid of your unwanted stuff and make money at a car boot sale as they are great for when you have had a major declutter and have a large volume of sellable stuff. Last year, I had my children’s old bikes and scooters plus clothes, books, CDs and DVDs. This year, I didn’t have any higher value items but I did have 2 black bags full of clothes from all the family, costume jewellery and books and DVDs. So as a veteran of 3 car boot sales, here is what I have learnt:-   Finding a Car Boot Sale in your area Good old Google works ..read more