I suppose that makes sense. OTOH, your car is still clean, and now you have a way to set another goal. Like, “Tonight while watching TV or a movie, I will sort out one bag of stuff from the car.”
I don’t know, but I think that’s how I’d tackle it. Only instead of TV, I’d put a timer on and loud music.
One step forward, two steps back. I cleaned out my closet and got rid of everything worn out, unwearable, or not me anymore. Yay! Now it’s all sitting in a huge pile in front of my door waiting for me to do something with it. Boo.
I got the enormous pile of books/magazines/crap in the bedroom cleared out and organized. Yay! Yesterday my apartment’s maintenance guy brought me two bookcases that another tenant had left because I mentioned to him once that I needed shelves. No place to put those; they’re sitting in the middle of my dining room. Boo.
Bookcases don’t have to hold books, you know. I have two inside my closet (ordinary double, not a walk in) one against each of the short sides. The one on the left holds shoes and the one on the right holds purses and plastic shoeboxes with scarves and such.
I also created a ‘pantry’ in the basement by arranging three bookcases to form a ‘u’ shape in one corner – holds TONS of cans and those pot and pans you only use every couple of months.
A neighbor fitted out one entire wall of her bedroom with bookcases that come just below her window sills. She uses them to hold baskets, the baskets hold anything all sorted out and hidden from sight so they don’t look cluttered. I’m tempted to use that idea in our living/dining room. Silverware, tableclothes, videos, books, on and on…
Oh, believe me, I know. The reason I don’t have anywhere to put these bookcases is because nearly the entire interior perimeter of my apartment is lined with bookcases and shelves, all holding everything from books to knickknacks to god knows what.
It’s true that I don’t have any in the junk closet, though…that could help sort things out tremendously, and save some important things from squishage.
Well, the carpets are nearly dry. All the stuff from the bedrooms is now in the living room, but that’s a good thing! I’m not putting anything back unless it has to be there, so I’ll get rid of some more stuff. The back of the house looks great all empty, I love it. (As long as I look at the floors and not the shelves or desks, which are piled high…)
I’ve been in the throes of house envy for the past couple of days. I love my house, I do, but I would like something slightly larger–or maybe just more rooms. So someone on the Dope linked to a website of home plans, and I fell completely in love with this one. It’s exactly what I’ve always wanted. However, there are only a couple of photos, so really you have to look at this one which is practically the same house only for disgustingly rich people. What makes me laugh is that it’s the “Not-so-big House”–but it’s 2700 sq. ft., which is pretty dang big by my standards!
Anyway. I have to take care of what I have, and I’m not getting a new house anytime soon!
Also remember that bookshelves don’t have to go up against the wall. I know one bibliophile who put six bookshelves back-to-back in pairs and put those endwise against the wall - creating his own private library at the end of his living room! Got six shelves in the space that two would have taken up against the wall.
I haven’t gone to those lengths, but I do have a long living room - so long that if I put the TV at one end and the couch at the other, the TV would be too far away for comfy viewing. So I put the couch in the middle of the room and put a long short bookshelf (the same height as the couch) behind the couch, facing the other way. What would be wasted space behind the couch is now home to about 150 paperbacks. The top of the bookshelf holds the rear speakers of my sound system.
Hubby-thingy got the ceiling fan out of the “spare” living room and hung in bedroom since I requested one.
hubby-thingy installed a garbage disposal in the kitchen <3 He spoils me =)
He also changed out almost all of the window blinds.
The 2 youngest pretty much got their rooms clean… I mean, we can see FLOOR! Only a couple touch up areas (closet, primarily) remain.
A lot of too-small clothing ready to be donated… just needs to be delivered. soon.
One of my New Year’s Resolutions was to get more organised. I think I’m doing OK. So far, I’ve done the following:
To make laundry/ironing/sorting easier I’ve just taken 90% of my clothes and stuffed them into a big laundry sack currently gathering dust in a corner of my bedroom. I retained the best 10% and have them neatly arranged in a cabinet.
I’ve started making ‘To Do’ lists every day. I always make sure that the first 2 or 3 things on the list are as simple as possible. That way, once I’ve quickly polished off the first couple of chores I’m more enthused about doing the more labour intensive stuff.
I’ve downloaded one of those free personal organiser thingies for appointments and stuff.
I’ve internalised a little after-work routine which I force myself to perform immediately after getting home from work (just simple things like: Hang suit up; put cufflinks away; sort out suit, tie, and shirt for tomorrow; put wallet, keys, and workpass by bedside cabinet etc…). I find this particularly beneficial for two reasons. Firstly, I find spending a little time after a difficult day going through a bunch mindless rote actions with meticulous precision quite relaxing. It clears your head and the stress just evaporates when you’re not looking, so to speak. Secondly, it means I can chill out safe in the knowledge that I don’t have to do any fiddly organising for the next day.
I’ve still got a long way to go before I reach the point where I’m able to live an organised, orderly life without consciously forcing myself through all these routines, but I think I’m off to a decent start. Hopefully I’ll be able to carry these routines on forever.
Forgive me for abandoning you all? I’ve been doing…stuff. I’m so tired when I get home that I can’t bear to do more than the absolute minimum, which is
walk the dog
cook dinner
clean the kitchen
fix lunches
collapse.
I had better intentions for the past 3-day weekend, but they didn’t materialized. I’m disappointed in myself, 
but at least the shopping and laundry got done, and the kitchen got thoroughly cleaned again. 
I’ve done a few things in the past week. Not too much because I’ve had some sinus issues and haven’t felt too great but I got a corner of my living room cleaned up. I went through a basket of stuff that belonged to my mom and put it in the garage sale pile. I also did some dishes and a few loads of laundry.
I had an old particleboard file cabinet that was falling apart and only had a few old files in it. I took the remaining files out of and put them in a small rubbermaid container with some silverfish bait, I will go through and shred it later. Then I took apart the file cabinet and tossed it out. Well, it’s actually on the porch, I want to check and see if I can take it to the recycling place, it might be mulchable since it’s basically compressed wood chips, if not I will probably break it down more and throw it in the trash.
I also took some broken down boxes, old magazines, phone books and plastic bottles to the recycling center. Unfortunately we don’t have curbside recycling pickup but there’s a place I can take that stuff that’s only several blocks away. The boxes were mostly all from work (I break them down and throw them in my car until I have enough) but I had a few in my house that I thought I was going to use but decided to get rid of for now since I can always get more later. The plastic bottles are part of my garage clutter because I throw them out there until I get enough to be worth filling up the car and driving to the recycling place. Although it feels good to get rid of stuff and reduce clutter it feels even better if I can help out the environment a little in the process.
My sinus problem seems to have become bronchitis, I’m hoping it clears up by the weekend so I can get more done when I have more time off.
I bought some really cheap organizational stuff at Ikea today and managed to go through some files and some other stuff. I ended up with a garbage bag of stuff to toss (including some stuff that I had to force myself to toss but it was easy after I realized I hadn’t used these things or wouldn’t need to use them EVER–I was just being a packrat), plus another shopping bag full of stuff to be shredded.
Baby steps, but it’s something…
Over the last couple of weeks:
Got the laundrey down to a managable load amount and a regular schedule to keep up on it.
Got the SO’s kids to help out with folding and putting away their clothes & towels as well as new bedding for them (their ‘treat’ for cleaning up their rooms!)
Put trash can in SO’s oldest son’s room in hopes that he will take a hint and clean up his room.
Cleaned up SO’s table of books, mags, and mail. No - I did not snoop and read his stuff but I did throw away a lot of junk mail, cleaned off all the dead ants, and stacked his books with the rest of them (until his bookshelf is done).
SO: put up a shelf in the kitchen to put small appliances on when not in use. Also put up a shelf in the laundry room to put soap, dryer sheets, fabric softener, bleach, etc on.
Finished replacing siding onside of home.
replaced kitchen floor vent cover.
Put hooks on truck frame, fixed windshield wipers & inspected his Mom’s minimal working stovetop. I think he’ll have her stovetop fixed sometime this week.