With just a few days until The Holiday Weekend, you are probably going slightly insane. Travel plans, or major entertaining plans, or big party-going plans, or big Kahuna of a Christmas program plans rapidly approaching, like a (almost) head-on collision.
The most important way to declutter your holiday stress is to spend time alone, in a quiet, calm, and uncluttered place.
If you do not have such a place in your own home, well it's time to create one.
Some people simply need a soft chair facing a peaceful scene (poster, painting, window). Others, living with noisy or needy people, may require an entire room to themselves.
Determine your needs: a chair? a desk? a room? your car?
Next, take a trash bag and spend only five minutes (yes, just five) picking up junk in this area. Take the trash out.
Follow that up with a clutter purge: take another trash bag or cardboard box and declutter things that are getting in the way of your peace. Old notebooks, carton of oil paints you never use, jar of candy you won at the white elephant exchange at work last week, a spare phonebook (how many does one household need? ONE PHONEBOOK!), stack of Christmas CD's you haven't gotten around to listening to, or the parka you spent too much money on that you haven't worn since you bought it four years ago. Out they go. (Try to donate, recycle, or give away to someone else before you just trash those things.)
Finally, take a damp microfiber cloth and clean off the hard surfaces in your special place. Sweep or vacuum the floor. Light a scented candle or spray room deodorizer in it (one or two sprays won't kill you).
You should now have a place of your very own in which to destress. And it smells pretty too.
If there is too much clutter in there, or you truly have no time to do anything I suggested, then simply find a quiet church and spend a half hour sitting still in the sanctuary, absorbing the peace around you.
You can declutter your own space once the madness passes.
Have a blessed and Merry Christmas season!
Monday, December 20, 2010
Wednesday, December 8, 2010
CHRISTMAS TIPS 2010
The hectic Christmas season has descended upon us, and I have a few tips to save you time and sanity this month.
1. Instead of winding your Christmas tree lights around and around the tree, visually cut your tree in half vertically, and wind the lights from bottom to top, covering only the left side first, then the right side. (What a cool tip! I didn't invent it; I just heard about it.) Saves time and frustration, especially if you have a big tree. Or don't put up a tree this year and just enjoy everyone else's for a change. You can skip a year (or two, or twenty). You can still celebrate the birth of Christ without a decorated tree, you know.
2. If you haven't stored your summer clothes yet, and if you live where it's cold and snowy (like me), now is the time to throw out the worn, torn, dirty, or ratty summer items, and then store the remaining warm weather clothes somewhere away from your cold weather clothes. This will make room in your closet and dresser(s) for winter clothes and boots. More room means fewer wrinkled clothes, without your typical morning tug-of-war as you aggressively extract a long sleeve blouse from the crammed clothes hanging rod. Plus, you'll have more room for hiding Christmas presents in your closet.
3. Don't give clutter. Clutter is stuff that won't be used or enjoyed by the recipient. That pretty much describes 90% of the stuff on your shopping list. Pitch the list in the trash and start over. Think of only NON-CLUTTERING gifts: consumable gifts, really useful gifts, and things the recipients have actually expressed a desire to own.
4. It's kinda late to start early, so don't beat yourself up about not being so organized this Christmas, with your card list, or gift list, or (lack of) twelve dozen cookies cooling on your countertops. The traditions that Americans have created to celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ are astoundingly complex. And most of them were set when women stayed home all day, caring for kids and (a small) home, without working outside jobs, commuting in maddening traffic, battling the daily onslaught of advertising messages to "buy buy BUY!,"or having to deal with the insanely complex life we call "the new millennium." Meh. Let it go. Jesus is more concerned with the state of your heart and spirit than with the state of your door wreath or gift list. Time to declutter your life of unreasonable expectations: the ones you have of yourself.
Have a blessed pre-Christmas week!
1. Instead of winding your Christmas tree lights around and around the tree, visually cut your tree in half vertically, and wind the lights from bottom to top, covering only the left side first, then the right side. (What a cool tip! I didn't invent it; I just heard about it.) Saves time and frustration, especially if you have a big tree. Or don't put up a tree this year and just enjoy everyone else's for a change. You can skip a year (or two, or twenty). You can still celebrate the birth of Christ without a decorated tree, you know.
2. If you haven't stored your summer clothes yet, and if you live where it's cold and snowy (like me), now is the time to throw out the worn, torn, dirty, or ratty summer items, and then store the remaining warm weather clothes somewhere away from your cold weather clothes. This will make room in your closet and dresser(s) for winter clothes and boots. More room means fewer wrinkled clothes, without your typical morning tug-of-war as you aggressively extract a long sleeve blouse from the crammed clothes hanging rod. Plus, you'll have more room for hiding Christmas presents in your closet.
3. Don't give clutter. Clutter is stuff that won't be used or enjoyed by the recipient. That pretty much describes 90% of the stuff on your shopping list. Pitch the list in the trash and start over. Think of only NON-CLUTTERING gifts: consumable gifts, really useful gifts, and things the recipients have actually expressed a desire to own.
4. It's kinda late to start early, so don't beat yourself up about not being so organized this Christmas, with your card list, or gift list, or (lack of) twelve dozen cookies cooling on your countertops. The traditions that Americans have created to celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ are astoundingly complex. And most of them were set when women stayed home all day, caring for kids and (a small) home, without working outside jobs, commuting in maddening traffic, battling the daily onslaught of advertising messages to "buy buy BUY!,"or having to deal with the insanely complex life we call "the new millennium." Meh. Let it go. Jesus is more concerned with the state of your heart and spirit than with the state of your door wreath or gift list. Time to declutter your life of unreasonable expectations: the ones you have of yourself.
Have a blessed pre-Christmas week!
Sunday, November 28, 2010
WHAT'S HANGING OVER YOUR HEAD?
How many storage areas do you have? Aside from closet spaces, do you have a garage, attic, off-site rented storage unit, barn, outbuilding, tool shed, old van packed to the headliner with junk, a nice little detached potting shed, or an "office" perhaps?
Next question: what are they full of? (You don't have to answer that out loud.)
Whatever the contents of your storage, much of the stuff you have stuffed in there is there for one reason: you are not currently using it.
Certainly, every household, except the most extremely minimalistic ones, requires storage for things used at different seasons ("seasonal storage"). Tents, coolers, float tubes, and waterproof radios are definitely summer time gear. Christmas lights, evergreen garlands from the craft store, and jingle bell door hangers sit in boxes in the garage until it's time to ring in the holiday season.
Those are seasonal "fun" items that simply need to be stored until the right time of the year rolls around for their use and enjoyment. But most of the stuff in storage is not being used, and it probably won't be. At least by you.
The real question to ask yourself about the things in your storage area(s) is: do I like this stuff enough to justify keeping it all year? Hard question to answer because you have a bunch of conflicting emotions and reasons for keeping all those items.
Do you know how to tell if you like something well enough to keep it? Simple. Pick one item in storage, and really look at it. Now ask yourself:
What is my emotional state while I'm looking at that thing?
If you're not feeling any positive emotions, such as happiness, delight, refreshing anticipation, pleasant memories, or peace, then OUT IT GOES.
The things in our lives should bring us only positive emotions, not negative ones. You don't have to keep things that you don't want! They're just stuff. Get 'em out of your life.
And if they're damaged in any way, well it just makes the decision even easier: OUT!
Here's a real life example:
A reader recently asked me what to do with the following items in her attic: bedding for out of town guests (used two to three times per year), travel mementos to be scrapbooked (she doesn't like to scrapbook), craft supplies she likes but rarely uses, and artwork that she likes but tires of after a few months.
She can now apply the above question to each of these items, and determine her emotional state when looking at each one. We all intuitively know what we like and what we don't like; our reasoning just gets in the way sometimes.
If my insightful new technique is not enough to REALLY get you motivated to deal with your stuff in storage, here are a few ways I would personally handle the things in my reader's attic, if I were her. (And consider the symbolism of stuff stored in the attic: hanging over your head, oppressing you with undone tasks, heavy burdens on your brain.)
For the futons, I would invite my guests to sleep on my sofa rather than clutter up my precious storage space with rarely used futons. Donate the futons to a battered woman's shelter. Or buy an air mattress that comes with its own electric air pump. They take up very little space in storage.
Throw a scrapbooking party for myself and ask my friends to help me make a travel scrapbook. I can share my adventures with friends while they help me do something I don't like to do, but that I want done. Friends make anything fun. Two hours later and it's finished! (And you'll think fondly of not only your travels but of the friends who helped you put the pages together each time you look through your scrap books.)
Or pay a stay-at-home mom turned scrapbook consultant to do it for you. Any scrapbooking store owner will have a list of people willing to help. It might cost a couple hundred dollars, but the results will be worth it, and you'll be helping a local family stay afloat in these tough economic times. Or buy pre-made travel scrapbook pages on ebay, and just paste the mementos in. Easy.
For craft supplies, as long as I love the things and use them (even once a year!), I would get rid of all the other stuff in storage that I don't like. Then I would make lots of room for the crafty things I do like. I would make sure that I have all the necessary tools and supports to enjoy my craft supplies, such as proper lighting, sufficient work areas/tables, and cute storage shelves, bins, and baskets.
Finally, for artwork I tire of, I would rotate not only the wall art every few months, but its placement in my home. One month the print from Provence would be in the dining room, the next month I might move it to the foyer or spare bedroom, and the third month I might put it in the attic until next year. And if I got really sick of it, I would use the frame for something else, or give it to a friend who helped me put my scrapbooks together, or repaint the frame, or donate the print and buy new artwork. Hey, we buy fresh flowers every so often, why not fresh artwork?
I hope you are inspired to create the storage areas of your dreams, and clear out what's hanging over your head!
Many blessings on you!
Next question: what are they full of? (You don't have to answer that out loud.)
Whatever the contents of your storage, much of the stuff you have stuffed in there is there for one reason: you are not currently using it.
Certainly, every household, except the most extremely minimalistic ones, requires storage for things used at different seasons ("seasonal storage"). Tents, coolers, float tubes, and waterproof radios are definitely summer time gear. Christmas lights, evergreen garlands from the craft store, and jingle bell door hangers sit in boxes in the garage until it's time to ring in the holiday season.
Those are seasonal "fun" items that simply need to be stored until the right time of the year rolls around for their use and enjoyment. But most of the stuff in storage is not being used, and it probably won't be. At least by you.
The real question to ask yourself about the things in your storage area(s) is: do I like this stuff enough to justify keeping it all year? Hard question to answer because you have a bunch of conflicting emotions and reasons for keeping all those items.
Do you know how to tell if you like something well enough to keep it? Simple. Pick one item in storage, and really look at it. Now ask yourself:
What is my emotional state while I'm looking at that thing?
If you're not feeling any positive emotions, such as happiness, delight, refreshing anticipation, pleasant memories, or peace, then OUT IT GOES.
The things in our lives should bring us only positive emotions, not negative ones. You don't have to keep things that you don't want! They're just stuff. Get 'em out of your life.
And if they're damaged in any way, well it just makes the decision even easier: OUT!
Here's a real life example:
A reader recently asked me what to do with the following items in her attic: bedding for out of town guests (used two to three times per year), travel mementos to be scrapbooked (she doesn't like to scrapbook), craft supplies she likes but rarely uses, and artwork that she likes but tires of after a few months.
She can now apply the above question to each of these items, and determine her emotional state when looking at each one. We all intuitively know what we like and what we don't like; our reasoning just gets in the way sometimes.
If my insightful new technique is not enough to REALLY get you motivated to deal with your stuff in storage, here are a few ways I would personally handle the things in my reader's attic, if I were her. (And consider the symbolism of stuff stored in the attic: hanging over your head, oppressing you with undone tasks, heavy burdens on your brain.)
For the futons, I would invite my guests to sleep on my sofa rather than clutter up my precious storage space with rarely used futons. Donate the futons to a battered woman's shelter. Or buy an air mattress that comes with its own electric air pump. They take up very little space in storage.
Throw a scrapbooking party for myself and ask my friends to help me make a travel scrapbook. I can share my adventures with friends while they help me do something I don't like to do, but that I want done. Friends make anything fun. Two hours later and it's finished! (And you'll think fondly of not only your travels but of the friends who helped you put the pages together each time you look through your scrap books.)
Or pay a stay-at-home mom turned scrapbook consultant to do it for you. Any scrapbooking store owner will have a list of people willing to help. It might cost a couple hundred dollars, but the results will be worth it, and you'll be helping a local family stay afloat in these tough economic times. Or buy pre-made travel scrapbook pages on ebay, and just paste the mementos in. Easy.
For craft supplies, as long as I love the things and use them (even once a year!), I would get rid of all the other stuff in storage that I don't like. Then I would make lots of room for the crafty things I do like. I would make sure that I have all the necessary tools and supports to enjoy my craft supplies, such as proper lighting, sufficient work areas/tables, and cute storage shelves, bins, and baskets.
Finally, for artwork I tire of, I would rotate not only the wall art every few months, but its placement in my home. One month the print from Provence would be in the dining room, the next month I might move it to the foyer or spare bedroom, and the third month I might put it in the attic until next year. And if I got really sick of it, I would use the frame for something else, or give it to a friend who helped me put my scrapbooks together, or repaint the frame, or donate the print and buy new artwork. Hey, we buy fresh flowers every so often, why not fresh artwork?
I hope you are inspired to create the storage areas of your dreams, and clear out what's hanging over your head!
Many blessings on you!
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