2012 Destashing Thread

[eacosper]

I would LOVE to have a yard sale but I live in a neighborhood where they are not allowed. I have all this junk that is not selling at all on Amazon or ebay or craigslist. I'd like to get some $$ from it but it's looking like I'll just have to donate it to get rid of it.

[dreamin_disney]

Originally Posted by bettyann29

This thread really got me motivated over the last few days.. I have one last room, which is the kitchen to go thru and I am completely done with my destashing.. well, sort of.. until next weekend and then Im done..

I went thru my bedroom and cleaned out my closet.. I had a tub of papers that I need to shred, so I put them in my trunk and will take them to my boyfriends house this week and shred them-- I went thru the clothes in my clothes and dresser and found 10 tshirts, 2 casual shirts, 2 dress shirts, 4 pairs of pants that do not fit and a hoodie-- I also got a pair of country boots, winter boots and a pair of heels.. and also filled up a laundry basket of misc items-- cleaned out a small bag of trash and threw that away..

I took pictures of everything that I am wanting to sell and listed 75 items on the Facebook buy sell trade board this morning-- no bites yet.. I still have about 20-30 items and some dvds and cds to relist, which I will do later this evening.. Hoping to sell some of those items by this coming Saturday, but if not, they will all be going into my garage sale on Saturday..

After my garage sale, I will take out what I think is still worthy of trying to sell and the rest will go to Goodwill.. I will continue to try and sell the last remaining items and at some point if they dont sell, I will just either hand them down to someone who might want them or will relinquish them to Goodwill- but Whew! I'll be glad that this is all I have left to do!!

My youngest has already gone thru all of her items and I have them ready for the garage sale.. The only room in the house not done is my oldest daughters, and I will leave her alone as that is her stuff and she will most likely be moving out soon in the future.. so I can deal with 1 room not done..

I did make $9 a few days ago on a few of my items and I have 4 items pending pickup for another $19 -- all of course, going towards my Disney trip next month.. So far in the last 2-3 weeks, I have made a total of... drumroll please... $ 484-- I did buy a shoerack for $5 and I found a fellow FBer selling a brand new pair of Vans that were my daughters size with tags still on for $8, a big monkey for $2 and a full bottle of Victoria Secret Pink for $3-- so my total made is $466-- not too shabby!!

Its nice to make a little money back on the stuff Im getting rid of, but Im really just happy to be cleaning it out!

Your doing amazing! I wish i had some of your energy-lol! I just went back to work so things have slowed down.

Originally Posted by eacosper

I would LOVE to have a yard sale but I live in a neighborhood where they are not allowed. I have all this junk that is not selling at all on Amazon or ebay or craigslist. I'd like to get some $$ from it but it's looking like I'll just have to donate it to get rid of it.

I've had some stuff listed and no one bought, then 3 months later I sold a bunch of stuff in one weekend. dont give up

[dismom9761]

Sounds like it has been a busy weekend! Today I cleaned out a hall closet and got rid of a big bag of trash an got it organized. Frustrating to find school supplies in there that I just bought this past week.

I also started on mine and DH's room Between the closet and my stuff I filled one trash bag of trash. I also filled four garbage bags of clothes to donate/ consign. I am also taking 4 bags of outgrown kids clothes to a friend I still have to tackle DH's side and it's bad. He has lost 60 lbs now but still won't let go of stuff.

Tomorrow will be the boys' rooms. They have grown so much most of the clothes in their rooms need to go. I want to get as much done as I can before Thursday when school/ softball/and football hit high gear

[Forever a Princess]

Originally Posted by Minnie-Mickey

I have trouble purging the sentimental items. I have been purging alot for the past year. Looking around I feel like I have not done anything there is still soooo much stuff. In the spring the boyscouts were having a yard sale, I sent 3 truck loads full of stuff we had in storage. I had to do it quick as it reminded me of days gone by. I love my stuff that brings happy memories but, it is just stuff. I want to make room for present memories. So much stuff it is hard to do. One thing I cant yet do is purge the disney stuffed animals from our trips. I think I have passed along just a few.

I hear ya. Part of the stash in my spare bedroom is my Disney stuffed animal collection. I couldn't part with any of my Disney plush but I was able to part with a lot of my non Disney plush.

Every little bit counts. Keep going!!

[Forever a Princess]

Thank You all for your inspiration!!

I continue to make progress. It's been a busy week. There was a lot of stuff in the spare bedroom that belonged in other places (like closets) in the house.

When I went to put the stuff away I noticed that I had some major cleaning to do in our closets and laundry room.

Cleaning is like a domino effect. It order to clean one space you then need to clean another.

I did so much cleaning in our laundry room. We cleared out some old laptops. (I know, I know how did they manage to get into the laundry room?!?! ). I also cleared out and threw away some old work clothes (not fit for donation).

I also managed to pull a lot of stuff out of our closets. We dropped off another load to the Goodwill and to our storage place this weekend.

I'm currently working on DH's closet. It's a work in process currently.

In the upcoming week I may get to labeling of our storage containers. Part of the cleaning process was to organize and place a lot of stuff into plastic storage containers or storage drawers.

If I label stuff then I'll know what it is and hopefully won't go out and buy duplicates of stuff.

Thanks again for all your inspiration. Keep up the great work everyone. Tackling one small area at a time makes a big difference!!

[Ephany]

Can't believe it's August already, this year is zooming by! We cleaned out the hall closet and can now actually use it for a linen closet again rather than just dumping lots of random stuff on the shelves. I convinced DH to finally throw out some old light fixtures that we'll never ever use (each fixture takes 3 bulbs and they're $16 each ); he was saving them for a rainy day. Another huge bag of shred done, although that feels like a never ending battle. I also went through my school supply stash and touched everything. It now fits easily in one box and I know what's in there so I'm less likely to buy something that we already own.

I've got a huge stack of jr. board games for the younger set that DD's outgrown. Gonna ask DD's 1st grade teacher or the after school program if they're interested before I donate them. We're still slowly adding to the Goodwill pile, although I think I need to do another closet purge. We also cleaned off the bookshelves in the living room that seem to collect everything but books and put everything back where it actually belongs.

Lastly we found a filing system that someone here had recommended and actually bought it instead of just talking about it. We've been collecting all the random important papers in one place and our next big project is to put the system together (and use it). We're getting there slowly but surely. I keep reminding myself that we didn't accumulate all this stuff in one day or week so it'll take time to purge it all.

[bettyann29]

sounds like things are coming along for alot of us..

I only had time to list my stuff for sale on one of the sites and have 3 more.. hoping to do those this evening.. I did list on one the other day and I sold $32 worth of items today for a total of 10 items.. so thats 10 more gone and a few dollars to go towards my disney trip next month!! Im holding 4 of my snowmen for someone to pickup next week so thats another $16 when she picks them up!

Hoping to get rid of some of these things between the listings and my garage sale on Saturday..

Good luck to everyone with their destashing this week!

[lillygator]

I began on my girls room last night, and got rid of two LARGE black yard bags worth of stuff. They are at their grandmas until tomorrow night, so hopefully I can get it done.
I have a ton of gymboree nwt, disney customs and costumes that I am going to get listed this week....hope to make some $$ off them.....then I am moving to the kitchen!!!

anyone have any suggestions on what to keep kids artwork, and papers in?

[Ephany]

Originally Posted by lillygator

anyone have any suggestions on what to keep kids artwork, and papers in?

DD has one banker's type box from IKEA (it was pretty and cheap). She gets to put anything artwork or schoolwork related in there she wants, however she only gets one box. She's taking to photographing the items she's willing to discard so she can still look at them on the computer. Last time I heard her mumbling about creating a slideshow with music as a screensaver so she can still enjoy the pictures, but not have all the clutter. I'm not sure where I read or heard about this tip, but it's been amazingly helpful in convincing her to let stuff go.

[beaucoup]

I haven't been able to do much for a few weeks, but I keep visiting this thread. Keep up the great work. Every little bit helps.

Life has gotten in the way lately. Can't wait for things to settle back down. And I just can't seem to get DH on board to help. He is still just months back from deployment. He is super busy at work with preparing for a move of office. He hasn't had any weekends off. So when he comes home, he is in no mood to do anything really, which is understandable.

[dreamin_disney]

Today I got rid of another 2 pairs of new pants on craigs list.

I also updated my CL postings. This weekend I plan on organzing my spare room . I also have a few more things to post but I need to organize it and take pictures.

DD has to go through her things in her room and I will be inspecting it.

Dh still has his junk/stuff in my dining room floor

I'm getting a good vibe about this weekend and i hope to get A LOT of stuff done

[StephMK]

Congrats to everyone getting rid of stuff & making some extra cash! I have stalled out but hope to get some projects done this weekend.

I have a bag of nice kid stuff that I'm going to either consign or sell and some books/videos that I am trading back to Amazon for credit. All of the bedrooms are done except for DH's closet. I have a stack of books, an old computer and printer, and some misc. house stuff that I plan to drop off this weekend.

Still to do: hall closet, kitchen, garage and basement. My goals for the weekend are the hall closet & front half of the garage. Hoping to get to the back of the garage too but we'll see how fast I get it done.

I love the motivation here because we want to list the house and I need to finish these projects before we can move forward!

[beaucoup]

We have a free weekend off together. I told him he needs to find place to put away everything that came home from Afghanistan because I am just soooooo tired of looking at it. It's been 6 months!

But also have a bunch of honey do stuff to do also. Just been so busy and lots to catch up on.

[Forever a Princess]

Originally Posted by beaucoup

I haven't been able to do much for a few weeks, but I keep visiting this thread. Keep up the great work. Every little bit helps.

Life has gotten in the way lately. Can't wait for things to settle back down. And I just can't seem to get DH on board to help. He is still just months back from deployment. He is super busy at work with preparing for a move of office. He hasn't had any weekends off. So when he comes home, he is in no mood to do anything really, which is understandable.

That's the rub. Finding time to clean out is difficult. When you do get home from work (finally) all you feel like doing is sitting on the couch and watching TV.

That being said maybe I can offer you a tip. Years ago when DH and I were married we combined our households and moved into our home. DH was great about quickly unpacking his VHS tapes and books when we moved in.

However everything else from his apartment sat in boxes for weeks. I would ask him to unpack and "yeah I'll get to it." Finally I got tired of tripping over the unpacked boxes.

I would go through a couple of boxes every couple of nights. On the first pass I would decide what could go and which to save. If I had a question about an item I would place it back into the box. Then I would go present the box to DH. I would take each item out and would give him seconds to say "stay or go."

Unpacking a few boxes at a time was a whole lot easier time wise than finding a large chunk of time to unpack.

Perhaps you could do some initial clean out yourself?? (Maybe). Items you're not sure on place in box or laundry basket. Then present them to DH for his decision.

Good luck and keep going. Every little bit counts!!

[Forever a Princess]

I got a little bit of stuff done this week. I labeled the plastic drawers that I had placed in the hall closet.

The hall closet was one of the closets that I had found time to clean out recently. I was so tired of opening the hall closet to be met by a ton of stuff falling off the shelves etc.

I purged then bought plastic drawers to store stuff in. I labeled the drawers this week.

Feels so good to have things organized. Now I feel like I can find stuff. Being organized should cut down on me buying duplicates.

We also installed new Rubbermaid shelves in the hall closet and one of two needed shelves in the master bedroom closet . Boy the new shelves look great!!

The painters are coming on Tuesday to paint the master bedroom and the spare bedroom. Prior to painting the spare bedroom they will be removing the wallpaper that I didn't get to.

I started taking the wall paper off years ago but never finished. Really I have no excuse for this one.

We'll be busy this weekend taking out our Nephew's nursery furniture from the spare bedroom and also I will continue to work on DH's closet (which is in the spare bedroom).

The house is really starting to look great. I'm so excited!!