It's been a while since I last did an update on how my year long clear out is going, June in fact. Back then I was relatively pleased with myself for getting rid of 238 items in the three months from March. But I knew there was still a long way to go.
When I looked at my spreadsheet to write this post - and yes, you knew there'd be a spreadsheet didn't you? - well I was almost disappointed, even though the number of things we've got rid of is just about larger than those left to go. It still feels like there's a long way to go, and not much year left.
So the running total for the items I've got rid of is now 1024, which means there's just 992 things to go...
Yes quite a lot isn't it. I've consoled myself by looking at this pretty pile of junk which was in the "junk" search results over on Unsplash.
NOT ALL JUNK IS THIS PRETTY, SADLY
In reality, our junk has been a lot less pretty.
So what's gone?
Since my last update in June, we've got rid of:
- Food languishing at the back of the freezer. Yes, we weren't going to eat it and some of it had been in there for a good while, so there was little point keeping it was there? And now that it's all gone, the plan is to not leave things in there for so long.
- Tea. Yes tea, over the years we've amassed quite a selection of herbal teas. Some from trips away and some we've bought and taken out of the packet to take on holiday. Yes, I am that kind of person that *might* take tea abroad with me, just in case. Of course we don't drink as much as we take and then it never goes back in the box, because we can't remember which is which. And tea bags stored in a plastic bag, doesn't sound the best storage much later on, does it. So that went too.
- Jam Jars. I have a cupboard above the fridge freezer where I hoard jam jars. And all sorts of jars really. I do make chutney and they do come in useful. But even if I made chutney every month I don't think I'd use all the jars I had. So I had a sort through and was more selective about the ones I kept. I've still to make chutney this year too. But that's another story.
- Papers, brochures and magazines. I think these have been breeding. There were loads of them and I'm sure there's still more papers to sort out (and I don't mean newspapers) but just the papers that somehow you amass. And then they breed. Those sorts. There's less now though.
- Clothes. I've had another wardrobe clear out. And the summer clothes I got out and didn't wear, well those have gone to the charity shop. It saved me putting them back into the top of the wardrobe. I'm feeling virtuous here too as all my summer clothes that I did wear, are all washed and back in their storage boxes. And even some of the winter clothes that I got out went straight to the charity bag.
- Earth. Yes earth. Over the summer we got rid of over 75 trugs of earth, and while unusual to include I'm counting them as it was something we no longer needed and makes me feel better about having an eight yard skip delivered. The skip was over half full of earth, and the other reason I'm including it here as it was all hand-lovingly carried through the house trug by trug. And was hard work!
- A shed and greenhouse clearout. Underneath all the soil in the skip, was the junk from the shed and the greenhouse that we had either forgotten we had, didn't know what it was for and even why we'd kept it in the first place. I'm sure we'll be doing that again because these types of places thrive on things like that, don't they?
992 items to go
Yes that's still quite a big number, and I'm not sure where that's going to come from. We've still some clearing out to do in the study, so that could be a big contributor and I probably *should* go through my craft supplies to see what I've deemed potentially useful in the past.
We've still got a lot of old paint cans, some with paint in, some less so, that we want to get rid of. The trouble is how. I know it'll mean a trip to the tip at some point but I'm dreading that. I've read of a old paint collection service and I need to check to see if that operates in our area. We have pots of paint - though not sure how paint-like they'll be - from when we moved in back in 2002. And it makes sense to get rid of them rather than them taking up room in our shed.
And ironically some of the things I'd targeted early on, we still have. We still have the old yellow Dyson that I'm trying desperately to get rid of, but MOH wants to keep to clear up DIY-mess. He promises it'll go at some point, but I'm not sure when that is and I'm fed up of moving it around.
Will we make it?
In reality I'm not sure. It's still a big number, and I'm not sure where it'll come from. But I'm not ready to give up yet. There's still two and a half months to go. Eek!
I'll let you know how I get on. In the meantime if you know how to safely dispose of old paint tins, which doesn't involve going to the tip, please let me know!
