Clutter Busting / Fall Cleaning

I've never been much into Spring cleaning. While Spring is my 2nd favorite season, it is far, far behind Fall. I'm an Autumn cleaner/declutterer. It is my time to muck out and renew mentally and physically before Winter sets in. This year it is doubly important with this major move and household consolidation finally nearing completion.

I'm driving Mom & Hubby nuts as one of my main strategies is that only one box can be brought INTO the house at a time. When it is completely unpacked and PUT AWAY, the next box comes in. It has really been working because the house is presentable (don't look in my lovely, large walk-in closet or the craft room/office yet - they are non-public areas for now anyway). The kitchen was usable the very first day because of this strategy.

I'm trying to stick to the credo of "If it doesn't have a place, it needs to go". It's making me review my priorities as to what is really important and what are just things/possessions. The sheer amount of STUFF that we have accumulated over the years is overwhelming and almost frightening. I am trying to be ruthless in disposing of things and finding new homes for those that still have life left in them. The boxes for getting rid of stuff are starting to fill up.

One of my favorite strategies when unpacking (or doing my Fall cleaning) is to have several boxes labeled and ready for the various destinations as well as a bunch of trash cans. Because of the recent move, I have several more boxes going out than usual, but you'll get the idea. These are the boxes I am currently sorting into, you can use as many or as few as suits your needs:

YARD SALE/EBAY (Since we are basically combining three households, we have a lot of items that are duplicates or things that just need to go away cuz they're ugly, sorry Hubby but they are!)

GIVE AWAY (I actually have some of these broke down into who they're going to: Ant, C&C, animal shelter, donate, etc.)

STORAGE/KEEP (Things such as holiday decorations, re-gifting, photographs, etc.)

TRASH (self-explanatory I hope)

I've always heard a lot about the emotional aspect of physical clutter in our lives. Since we've moved into this new home, I am really starting to understand what they are referring to. We aren't living as slaves to our possessions anymore. I can open closets without wearing a hardhat. I don't have to dig through ten boxes to find one of my many glue guns. The house feels light and open and I really think that is contributing to how happy we are here.

Weekend Recap

We had a really nice visit with Hubby's folks along with my Ant and my Mom's best friend. They were all here at different times so it was like a revolving door, but it was nice. Mom enjoyed all of the chaos for her birthday celebration. Dad actually came over for birthday lunch and breakfast the next morning. (Those of you that are familiar with Pops know that he is a bit of a hermit at times and likes to stay at the ranch.) I made Mom the spice cupcakes from Gramma's recipe and they were a hit as always.

We had a special guest in our yard for the celebration as well. This beautiful egret has decided we have a pretty good place to hang out. He spent quite a bit of time perched in the top of the tree by our gate.

I spent Saturday going through boxes in an effort to make room in the garage (for more boxes that we still have to get over here one of these days.) I was pretty tickled to find a lot of crafting goodies that I haven't seen in ages. They got packed away before Hubby moved in so it was a lot like Christmas. Hubby spent the day with Dad working on the fences and gates at the ranch.

Sunday was spent out at the ranch with Dad and cattle sorting again. Beautiful day to spend out in the fresh (country) air and sunshine.

I hope you all had a great weekend. I am working on a post about my decluttering strategies that I hope to have up later this week.