Making the impossible possible – decluttering!

When you’ve spent 20 years using a closet for basement or attic storage, it seems like decluttering it is an impossible feat. With Adore Your Wardrobe course 1 I was supposed to take all the clothes out of my closet and go through them piece by piece. Well, since none of my clothes were actually IN my closet, I fudged on that assignment. But I decided it was time to put my Big Girl Knickers on and tackle this Monumental Task!

There are steps to decluttering. And step 1 was to actually gain access to the closet. Did I ever mention that my entire bedroom has become the place to dump things that have no home? So the first step was to find a place for the 2 air conditioners sitting on the floor in front of the closet door so I could open it.

CHECK.

I tend to use under bed storage a lot. Especially for things that I want to avoid getting ruined in the basement (flooding issues at times). So under one son’s bed they both went. Fortunately, when I moved the bedrooms around when my girls moved out in December we now have a much less cluttered boys room and could therefore FIND the underside of a bed!

Step 2 – emptying the Den of Horrors!

Well, maybe it wasn’t that bad… but maybe it was. Here are the pictures so you can decide.

Yep… it’s pretty bad. And trust me, it was much worse than these pictures show!

Also, my closet is really odd. The floor is actually very small and there is a portion of it that slants up to the wall. You’ll see it in the After pictures. I’m not sure it it’s part of the old roof when part of the house was added on, but it is strange. So the top part of the closet is larger than the bottom part.

Inventory and designation.

Anyway, I had 2 absolutely filled 39 gallon trash bags of trash. Plus a very large laundry basket of stuff to donate (after I washed it all). Fortunately, thanks to Adore Your Wardrobe AND Trim Healthy Mama, only 1 dress found in the closet was usable for me. I had bought this more than 16 years ago, before I found out I was pregnant with my youngest, and never wore it. But it fits and may be my special Valentine’s dress for my date with my husband! The rest either was too large (HOORAY) or was just not a good fashion fit for my body type and was destined to be gone.

I also found the random bags of partially crocheted something (along with extra yarn), craft items given to me decades ago when the children were little, hats crushed beyond recognition, purses that were falling apart (why didn’t I ever throw them out before) bent hangers, wigs I never liked but never wore (still with tags on), numerous sewing kits, and ALL the small suitcases/travel duffelbags (I put all 11 of them inside a larger suitcase and gave my sons strict instructions to remember where I put them all so I can find them the next time someone travels).

I now had a messy bedroom and an empty closet. An hour’s work to reassign homes to the things belonging to children (plus the 2 box fans in there), pack a box for shipping to my eldest daughter, take out the trash and put the donate basket in the laundry room for Monday’s laundry.

The last hurrah was emptying clothes from the bursting dresser, hang them on my nice new hangers I had bought for the boys (OK, I stole them from the boys) and put my husband’s shirts, sweatshirts and slacks away plus my 1 work dress (I don’t wear it out anymore, but on cold days when I’m just staying home, it’s warm and comfy, even if a little too big) and 1 dress top. And here is the final result.

Do you see the boards going diagonally up in the last picture? That’s the floor/bottom wall.

This has been my Monumental Task of decluttering. Silly I know, but I’m super excited and pleased. I was spurred on by my friend Sarah at Early Bird Mom who has been sending out encouraging emails to declutter our homes. And though I’m not doing the portions of the home she is assigning us, I’m doing what MY home needs. Every email reminder I get reminds me to get to work on something.

And I’m finding that order brings rest. Who’d-a-thunk-it?

What is the project YOU are working on to bring God’s order to your home and rest to your spirit?

My Menu

Tuesday starts my 60 Challenge with T-Tapp and my personal 60 Day Challenge with THM. My birthday comes just 11 days after these challenges and I am pushing to be in the BEST physical health of the past 2 decades! My battle cry is: 60-days to 60-years FOR EXCELLENCE! I would LOVE your prayers for my success.

Here’s my menu for the week (I know it is a duplicate of last week, but I may be doing quite a bit of repeating for this challenge), plus please feel free to download my FREE, fully editable, Month at a Glance menu planner, my Weekly Menu Planner and my new Snacks planner.

Monday: Joseph’s FP lavash pizza w/side salad (FP cookbook pg 215)
Tuesday: deep S style salad w/boiled eggs (S cookbook pg 189)
Wednesday: Wonder Wraps stuffed w/chicken and veggies (S cookbook pg 204)
Thursday: creamless creamy chicken (FP cookbook pg 78)
Friday: deep S style salad w/fish (S)
Saturday: crispy salmon w/broccoli (S book pg 283)
Sunday: succulent citrus fish bake (E book pg 286)

All Scripture quotations are taken from the NASB.
Unless otherwise indicated, photos from pixaby.com

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