2016 Destash - The more things you own, the more they own you

[comicguy]

Finally used up all the hotel mini soaps that were under the bathroom sink!!

Is it me or do they not last very long??

 

[Alexle2007]

Finally used up all the hotel mini soaps that were under the bathroom sink!!

Is it me or do they not last very long??

They definitely don't last long. I donated all of mini soaps and bottles of the bath products to a Cold Weather Shelter (150+ items) when my son's school was doing a drive. Since it is only an overnight night stay with no storage, they greatly appreciate the small bottles. I did keep all of my Disney products which still occupy a whole drawer in the bathroom.

 

[OhMari]

My handyman came back this week and did the tile back splash in the kitchen that I have neglected way too long. Used up:
1 box of tile
1 box grout
1 box of tile adhesive
1 container of adhesive liquid

While the tile was being done I was able to straighten out the pantry
donated 2 boxes of pudding (cook kind)
donated 2 cans of cream style corn (the labels are so close to regular easy mistake)
trashed 2 opened expired boxes of baking powder
trashed 2 expired can goods

Every little it helps!!

Can I ask how much it cost in total to do the back splash. When we built our home last year, our contractor wanted another $4,000 and we said we would do it our selves. Guess what, it has been a year and we still have not done it. But I am wondering if they were on the mark, or way expensive. It sounded expensive at the time.

 

[Debbie]

They definitely don't last long. I donated all of mini soaps and bottles of the bath products to a Cold Weather Shelter (150+ items) when my son's school was doing a drive. Since it is only an overnight night stay with no storage, they greatly appreciate the small bottles. I did keep all of my Disney products which still occupy a whole drawer in the bathroom.

I donated all mine to the women's shelter in the fall....and that included a lot of Disney items. Does anyone remember the ones that would stack and there'd be a Mickey drawing on the sides? The only thing I kept were my H2O products from my December cruise, which I gave to my girls/mom for Christmas in their stockings. I had some that I had ordered for myself, but now I've discovered that H2O won't deliver to Canada anymore, so I am out.

 

[GaSleepingBeautyFan]

Can I ask how much it cost in total to do the back splash. When we built our home last year, our contractor wanted another $4,000 and we said we would do it our selves. Guess what, it has been a year and we still have not done it. But I am wondering if they were on the mark, or way expensive. It sounded expensive at the time.

Mine had a mural to go behind the stove with alot of cutting involved of the tile surrounding it plus a 6 foot long 3 foot deep area and then the 4 foot long, 3 foot deep area on the other side.

I also had the tile put in the little half bathroom and the little entryway from the garage into the house and all of that was 2,000.00. They had to put down cement board in the half bathroom and little entryway since those had never been tiled before and didn't have it down.

Maybe I just got lucky because the guys had a cancellation and needed to fill 2 days so they gave me a great price since I had all of the tile and they could do the project immediately?

It was just done a week ago and I love it!

 

[GaSleepingBeautyFan]

So on to my update - today I went through all of my summer clothing and now have 2 full giant green garbage bags of clothing to donate tomorrow. I went through my fall/winter too as I was packing that at the same time I was pulling out the summer.
I was ruthless - I need to get it out of the house before I freak out that I am getting rid of too much. LOL

 

[comicguy]

Can I ask how much it cost in total to do the back splash. When we built our home last year, our contractor wanted another $4,000 and we said we would do it our selves. Guess what, it has been a year and we still have not done it. But I am wondering if they were on the mark, or way expensive. It sounded expensive at the time.

The Handy Man Charged 25/hour took 3 hours (very reasonable for someone that does odd jobs on the side of his full time job) We did not go with anything top of the line, just tried to do a small update to the kitchen before it gets remodeled in a couple of years. I think materials were about 150 dollars total

 

[comicguy]

Recycled 4 CFL's (Lowes)
Dropped off 2 raffle prizes to people that won them
Recycled 2 printer ink cartridges (Staples)
Brought envelope of Box Tops to school for the person that collects them

Just a little bit each day

 

[CheriePenguin]

I donated all mine to the women's shelter in the fall....and that included a lot of Disney items. Does anyone remember the ones that would stack and there'd be a Mickey drawing on the sides? The only thing I kept were my H2O products from my December cruise, which I gave to my girls/mom for Christmas in their stockings. I had some that I had ordered for myself, but now I've discovered that H2O won't deliver to Canada anymore, so I am out.

I remember the stacking ones!! Back in 2005 we stayed at Wilderness Lodge and I remember taking a picture of the boxes, (soap, shower cap, etc.) stacked together showing the full Mickey picture!

I've been lurking and reading this thread to inspire me. Tons of piles and boxes and bags of stuff that needs to be gone through. I'm just so bad at getting rid of things - especially throwing things out. I try to donate or rummage sale sell things in decent shape that we won't be using/needing, but so much feels like it has sentimental value, or else "I could use this when... or I might need that someday." And my boys are ages 11, 9, and 4, so I'm trying to keep things the younger one can still use. We're the end of the line in the boys' clothing, books, etc. in the family, so it all seems to collect with me.

I try to keep up making baby steps - just seems like even when I spend an hour or two weeding through things, I don't make any noticeable difference.

 

[Alexle2007]

After 10 years of my kitchen valances hanging in my pantry waiting for the rods to be hung, I finally accomplished that task yesterday. Also, did some cleaning of the pantry and have 2 boxes to donate and dropped off 2 bags full of plastic bags to Walmart but there is still more to be done. I was addicted to buying Pfaltzgraff at one point and have several boxes of new items that have been sitting in there for over 10 years. Pretty sure that is a sign that they can go.

 

[Debbie]

I remember the stacking ones!! Back in 2005 we stayed at Wilderness Lodge and I remember taking a picture of the boxes, (soap, shower cap, etc.) stacked together showing the full Mickey picture!

I've been lurking and reading this thread to inspire me. Tons of piles and boxes and bags of stuff that needs to be gone through. I'm just so bad at getting rid of things - especially throwing things out. I try to donate or rummage sale sell things in decent shape that we won't be using/needing, but so much feels like it has sentimental value, or else "I could use this when... or I might need that someday." And my boys are ages 11, 9, and 4, so I'm trying to keep things the younger one can still use. We're the end of the line in the boys' clothing, books, etc. in the family, so it all seems to collect with me.

I try to keep up making baby steps - just seems like even when I spend an hour or two weeding through things, I don't make any noticeable difference.

I think that the way the Marie Kondo goes about with the categories instead of the rooms helps one to see just HOW much stuff we have! Then it becomes easier to hold each item and decide if it is one that I want/need to keep. A lot of $$$ has gone out my doors, but I am happy that it will be going to good. And I benefit with some calm.

After 10 years of my kitchen valances hanging in my pantry waiting for the rods to be hung, I finally accomplished that task yesterday. Also, did some cleaning of the pantry and have 2 boxes to donate and dropped off 2 bags full of plastic bags to Walmart but there is still more to be done. I was addicted to buying Pfaltzgraff at one point and have several boxes of new items that have been sitting in there for over 10 years. Pretty sure that is a sign that they can go.

 

[PollyannaMom]

Just found this thread, and am signing on. I probably won't do anything major 'til summer. (I'm a substitute teacher, so I'm off then.) But I'm collecting tips now.

I save too much for two different reasons. Some of it is sentimental. Some is because I find it very easy to imagine a new use for something.

I have read the Marie Kondo book, and it worked for my closet, but I'm not totally committed to it. - A) I can't do it all at once, like she recommends. I just do not have the stamina for that, and will need to spread it out a bit. And B) I can't realistically keep only things that "bring me joy." I have a lot of things I use all the time, not because I like to, but because I have to (most of my kitchen comes to mind ). Overall, though, I think she has some good ideas, especially about letting go of things that have served their purpose to you and can go on and serve someone else.

A few questions:
1- What's your favorite hiding spot?
2- What do you hide, that you KNOW is useless, but you can NOT seem to give it up & toss it out?
3- How do you just "let go" of the things that mean so much (kids drawings) but really need to go?...

1 - Under beds. When DS rearranged his room, I found an entire under-bed storage bin of cassette tapes!
2 - Too many Christmas decorations. - I haven't even opened all the boxes the last two years. Why are they still in my attic?
3 - I second taking photos! You can make them into the screensaver on your computer, or get one of those digital frames, and that way they are all still displayed - rotated for a few seconds/minutes at a time, and you can toss the originals.

...I'm struggling with how to best move some vintage dresses out of my house. I have an emotional attachment to them so I want to make sure they go where they'll be appreciated. I don't want to fool with eBay but I live in a small town. I guess I'll look into surrounding areas to see if there are any good consignment shops.

You may have already taken care of these, but in case you put it off, or anyone new is in the same position, I recently heard about a collection of dresses to be given to girls who could not otherwise afford to go to their high school proms. I would be able to let dresses go for that!

 

[CheriePenguin]

I think that the way the Marie Kondo goes about with the categories instead of the rooms helps one to see just HOW much stuff we have! Then it becomes easier to hold each item and decide if it is one that I want/need to keep. A lot of $$$ has gone out my doors, but I am happy that it will be going to good. And I benefit with some calm.

Thanks for the welcome! I've seen lots of mentions of Marie Kondo on here, so I just requested her books from our library (long hold list for them).

I haven't been completely unsuccessful on the cleaning up and out front. We redid the boys' rooms early this year which included lots of reorganizing and discovery of old stuff to get rid of. I did get through several bags of stuff in my room - some of which I discarded, some recycled, some reorganized (unfortunately some was determined keepers with no set home yet, so it will ultimately have to be gone through yet again). I reorganized the arts & school supply sorts of stuff that was being stored in an old broken dresser in the basement (had re-purposed the dresser for storing that stuff when it broke and wasn't able to be used in the boys' room anymore) and bought 2 new plastic drawer things for them. Got rid of many bags of plastic bags - found several stores with bins for collecting them. Donated a bunch of books to our library before their book sale (and a few to a nearby "little library"). Donated bags of clothes, household stuff, old kid stuff, etc. to Easter Seals, Salvation Army, and Goodwill. And there's a twice a year baby/kids rummage sale that I participate in - lots of tagging to do before the spring one in early May (the kids are helping price the items that were primarily theirs, and then they get the proceeds). [Unfortunately, we end up buying stuff at that rummage sale too, but hopefully much less than we get rid of there!]

So with all those bags full of things gone, how come I don't notice much of a difference?!

Oh well - keep chipping away at it and taking baby steps I guess.

 

[BernardandMissBianca]

I tossed some scrapbook supplies today and tossed a traditional album that I converted to digital and had printed, they take up so much less room!

DH has been working in the garage while repairing DS19's car, I'm still trying to get him to toss stuff quickly but he's starting to let things go a little at a time, I guess that's better than nothing.

He's out of town this week, I really need to try to get something sorted and cleaned while he is gone.

 

[comicguy]

2 Boxes of Misc Robot parts moved over to our Robotics Center
2 boxes of Elastic Launch Glider Kits moved over to Robotics Center for summer camp
1 Roll of sting to Robotics Center for summer camp

A little but each day does make a difference

 

[kathy884]

Unbelievable, I gave my son a $15,000 budget for renovating our basement, and purchasing furniture, etc. and told him that I would let him keep 10 plastic storage bins worth of his stuff in the unfinished area. I told him too, he could keep anything else he wanted too, but if so we would be building a storage closet as part of the remodel. He wanted all 480 square feet and no storage closet and got rid of tons of stuff (about 20 plastic bins worth of stuff went to the Salvation Army) -- toys, stuffed animals, nicknacks, and vacation souvenirs. He did keep a full 10, though, the limit that I gave him, so I'm afraid that it's not intrinsic motivation to get rid of things.


My former pack rat son is going for the Better Homes and Gardens uncluttered look for his basement hang our area for sure.

 

[comicguy]

20 Plastic glad ware w/ lids to yard sale pile
2 broken glad ware containers to recycle bin
12 plastic glad ware tops with no matching containers to the recycle bin. How does this actually happen??

Kept containers w/ screw on tops as I use them to freeze soup

Another 34 items out of the house

 

[OhMari]

20 Plastic glad ware w/ lids to yard sale pile
2 broken glad ware containers to recycle bin
12 plastic glad ware tops with no matching containers to the recycle bin. How does this actually happen??

Kept containers w/ screw on tops as I use them to freeze soup

Another 34 items out of the house

I swear plastic ware are like socks, it magically disappears.

 

[DawnM]

We thought we were moving. I don't think we are now.

But in the process I got rid of 10 years worth of homeschooling materials, three SUV loads of clothes, books, CDs, DVDs, extra dish sets, extra tupperware, and a full set of pots and pans, and more.

I was able to donate quite a bit to the refugees here in our area who have very little. I love giving things to people who I know will use them, want them, and appreciate them.

I have more to go through, although it is slowing down now that we are considering not moving.

 

[kathleen27]

I have not made much progress this year, but have donated about 7 small bags of books, clothes, household items. Also sold a few items. This weekend I finally got some motivation to deal with my desk. Filed all the loose papers, shredded, tossed, and recycled. Feel much better to have it all organized. Have a little bit left, but 90% done. They were out of sight, but every time I needed something I had to really search for it and it was getting frustrating. Considering how much paperless stuff I do online, I don't know how I still have so much paper.

Out of town this weekend, but the following weekend I am getting serious and starting a major clean out. Spring goals around the house are to declutter, finish some remodeling projects, and do a ton of yard work. My daughter's graduation is in June, and I'd really like to get a lot done by then, since we will have out of town family over.

12 plastic glad ware tops with no matching containers to the recycle bin. How does this actually happen??

I just noticed when I packed my lunch the other day there were a lot of square covers but only a few containers. I definitely need to go through the kitchen storage. Containers and covers just disappear in my house. My daughter takes them to school, and I don't think they always make it home.