So, last night I rented a storage unit. I know, I know. Renting a storage unit is NOT the way to get rid of things. Usually. But sometimes, it can be. Here’s why I rented a storage unit, and why I think it will really help:

• Paying someone for storage is a great motivation to not need the storage.
• I just found out I have house guests coming next week. Normally this causes us to lose momentum because instead of going through things to get rid of them we just throw everything that we’ve been going through in random boxes to make everything appear neater. Now I can keep going with the sorting process.
• I can post things for sale and get them out of the way until they sell. I’m keeping a short time table on this, if it doesn’t sell quickly I’ll reduce the price. If it still doesn’t sell, I’ll donate it.
• We’re also remodeling, so there are some things we want to keep but we need them out of the way while we remodel, so this way I won’t trip over the things we know we want to keep but they’ll still be out of the way.
• What a great motivation to go minimalist! By moving things to storage, we’ll get a much better picture of what life will be like with less stuff.
• I can move some of the maybe items and see if we miss them. I’m planning on doing this with some of the children’s things. If they don’t miss a toy, I can easily get rid of it, but if they ask for something I can easily bring it back home.
• We live in a very rural area, and the storage area is more accessible than our home. It will be a good place to meet people who are buying our larger items.

I’ll try to keep you posted on whether this works or not. What do you think about renting a storage unit as part of moving to minimalist?

Well, a year has gone by, and we’re still in the deep of this decluttering.

I’m finding that it isn’t just a physical journey. This path to ridding our lives of unnecessary things covers emotional and relational as well as physical stuff. I’m not sure that I realized it when we started out, and I’m not sure where it’s going to take us.

I’ve learned that the reason (or just one of the reasons) why this minimalist path is so hard for some (at least for me) –  because of the emotional baggage that needs to be addressed along the way.  That’s the hard part. What baggage?

1. Stuff is stuff, but the emotional attachments we can form about our stuff is what makes the getting rid of so hard. I think this is more of a female response to things. My husband doesn’t have this problem at all, but he’s so very supportive of my baby steps here.
2. There’s a lot of comfort in the status quo. Shaking things up involves addressing some deep introspection, sometimes it gets a bit uncomfortable. Who am I, really? What do I love, really?
3. Creating space can be uncomfortable for some personalities. I’m one of them. If I have 5 minutes of time, I feel that I need to fill them with something productive. If I have 5 square feet of space, I feel that I need to fill them with something useful. I’m working on this.

I’ve definitely made progress on the emotional side of the path to minimalism, though not as much on the physical side as I’d hoped. The realization that we’ve purged so much and still have so much more to do was a bit overwhelming, but I’m continuing on, holding fast to the image and goal of only keeping what is truly necessary and truly loved.

My yard sale was pretty much a bust. Even moving everything to a much higher trafficked yard and keeping it open for another day only netted me $21 and a handful of items gone. But even though we brought all those things back home again ( I know, we could have gone straight to the thrift store), it did something I wasn’t expecting.  By taking these things to sell, I made an emotional break with most of them. There were a few things that I was only willing to part with for the right amount of money (and it was pretty reasonable) but that amount didn’t come in. Which made me realize that maybe those items should stay. The other things – those things that I was just begging someone to make me an offer on – well, some of them can be sold (because cash is cash and $5 in my pocket in return for something is $5 that I didn’t have before), but the rest are heading to a charity our family loves to support.

We still have lots (and lots!) of not necessary things floating around, but we have one solid pickup truck load full of donations that will be out the door this weekend.  And that’s a beautiful thing!

I’ve been working on our decluttering very slowly. I don’t know why I thought this would be a quick project, but I’m beginning to realize that we’ll be at this for a while.

We live in a very rural area, and we’ve had a couple of yard sales here. One was great – lots of traffic, lots of sales. That was a few years ago. The last one was not so great. There were maybe a dozen people and far fewer sales. So when I heard that there was a multi-person trunk sale in a town nearby, I signed up. It was only $15 for a space and it was to support a charity, so it was definitely a win-win. Friday night I spent a few hours gathering some easier to grab things, especially vintage and antique items left over from our antique store booth. The van was full, and early Saturday morning I drove into town with high hopes.

The sale ran from 8:00 – 12:00. By 10:00 we realized (I had met some friends there who were also selling some great vintage items) that this was a huge waste of time. The truth was that the organizers did a great job of gathering vendors, but a lousy job of letting potential buyers know what was going on. The event was in the back of a parking lot with only two poorly visible signs out. I sold a dresser, a light, and a couple of small items. Surely not the van full that I was hoping for.

And here’s the truth of the matter:
Stuff Sucks Time

Instead of spending the first most gorgeous day of the season with my family, I was at a poorly attended trunk sale trying to unload our clutter.  Cash in hand is nice, but it certainly doesn’t compare to making memories with my family.

Even at home, much of my free time is spent shuffling things from one space to another, trying desperately to find some space and peace in our very full, small home.  And I’m really tired of making those kinds of memories with our children. I want them to remember walking in the woods, playing in the creek, roasting marshmallows over the backyard fire. I don’t want their childhood memories to be full of sorting and purging and a frustrated mom who doesn’t know where to put anything.

The sad thing, though, is that the only way to reclaim our time is to get rid of our stuff. And the only way to get rid of our stuff is to go through it, which takes time. So, please, the next time you get ready to bring something home, think about how much time it took you to work for the money to buy it, how much time it took you to shop for it, how much time you’ll spend caring for it, and how much time you’ll spend getting rid of it when you don’t love it any more.

Then walk away and don’t bring it home.

Stop the Time Sucking.

I started sorting through some things in the basement – the very worst part of the house to sort through as we have so many things down there. (I didn’t get very far because we had to leave for an appointment, but the important part is that I did something, right?)

As I was going through the toys, I started setting aside those things that are too young for my children to play with any more, and from there, separating those I would buy again from those that I wouldn’t. My reasoning is that I’ll keep the better ones for grandbabies (we have one and are expecting another soon, plus hoping for many more in the future). And it struck me that this is the complete opposite of minimalism. But it is frugal. Why should I get rid of something that I would, most likely, buy again?

My grandparents lived through the Great Depression, and it had a very lasting effect on them. They saved everything. Plastic bags? Keep them. Rubber bands? Keep them. Scraps of paper and envelopes? Hold onto them and use them before you buy new. Clothes? Remake them if they don’t fit.  That mindset of keeping it until you know for certain that it isn’t needed any more was a big part of them. And I find myself trying to find the balance between that state of mind, and one of complete minimalism – only have what you currently need.

I know that minimalism can also be frugal, but I think there’s a lot of wisdom in not pitching things just because you’re pitching things. I don’t want to get rid of the baby nightgown that almost all of my children wore the day they were born just because I’m getting rid of everything extra. I don’t want to scan in and then throw away all our photos. (Which I talked about here, so I gave myself a pass to keep them.) I won’t get rid of clothes that one child outgrew when I know that another child will be able to wear them in a year or two. Clothes are expensive, even when purchased from thrift stores.

But those curtains that don’t fit the windows in my house? Gone! The extra blankets that are scratchy or threadbare? Gone!  Those baby toys that are classic and almost all wooden? I am so keeping them. Unless I end up moving overseas and can only bring a small amount, those types of things are going to stay in my creative minimalist home.

I’m not too far into this, but I’ve definitely discovered the hardest part for me:

Getting things gone.

Sorting and deciding what should stay and what should go is only the first step. After that, it actually needs to get out of the house. If something is trash, it’s pretty obvious, and I can throw away trash pretty easily.  I can also take things to donation centers pretty easily.

But listing things for sale stops me every time.

Craigslist? I live pretty far away from just about everywhere. Ebay? Take a good photo, decide on a starting price, decide on a buy it now price, make sure I cover my costs for shipping, and then list it. And then when it sells, make sure I have packing materials, make sure I have the right size box, print out the postage, and then get it to the post office.

That’s kind of exhausting.

But as far as I know, those are my only options for actually selling stuff. So I could just donate them, but I could make some seriously nice money if I actually sell some of this stuff. Not thousands, but maybe hundreds. And that’s nothing to sneeze at.

So, I either need to commit to getting things listed (and shipped) as I sort, or I need to just donate it all. Or I could make a separate “stash” of things to sell so that my sorting doesn’t slow down. But that seems rather procrastinator-ish, and I run the risk of things migrating back into what I’m keeping. I know this because I’ve been trying it for a while, but it’s my most favorite way to approach the “get it gone” problem.

I think I need serious help.

I think that at the beginning of this journey, it’s important to know what I won’t touch in my sorting and purging. It’ll save some drama along the way.

• I won’t get rid of all my photos
• I won’t get rid of all my books

Actually, those are the only two I could come up with. On this journey of decluttering and finding more peace, the only two things I don’t want to completely wipe out are pictures and books. These are the things I would grab if the house was on fire (after my husband, children, and pets, of course).

Photos are not replaceable, and therefore won’t be purged. I know I could just scan them in, but I really do love being able to actually hold them and look through them. Well, I love the thought of it, since most of them are still stored in a pile in a very large Rubbermaid tote.  And books? Well, they might be replaceable, but they are much like old familiar friends. I don’t use every single one every single month (or season, or maybe even year), but having them at my fingertips for reference is a thing I’m not yet willing to part with.

So, books and photos. Last on the list of things to get rid of.  Does that mean that all other items are available for sorting and purging? Yes, I think it does.

What items are on your “don’t touch” list?

 

 

We live in a cozy home – not too small, but not very big either. A little smaller than “just right” for our family of seven (five children at home, two are adults living elsewhere), but we love it here.  I’ve been reading all sorts of minimalist blogs, but I haven’t found one yet that talks about how to stay creative in a minimalist lifestyle.  Being creative is pretty important to us. I love to knit and sew and read and garden. My kids love building things (legos), painting, drawing, jewelry making, sewing, creative play, etc. So all those things come with “stuff”.  And on top of all that, we homeschool. And we homeschool with a literature approach. So we have books. Lots of books.

I need to find a way to get rid of all the extra that is sucking up all our time so we have more time to just enjoy living. So this is my journey, and I’m starting today. Care to join me?