Six Days Worth of Decluttering

Every week day in May, Crystal from Money Saving Mom is challenging her readers to find 7 items to eliminate from their house.  In an effort to clear out the clutter from our home, I am joining in.  How about you?


I guess I was too busy de-cluttering last week to actually post about it!  I must admit, I have been taking this challenge more seriously than others in the past and I am LOVING the difference it is making in my house!!!

I started last week out with getting rid of other people's stuff.  I actually packed everything up and shipped them directly to them.  It felt so good.  Some of the items were things I borrowed, others were gifts that I have been meaning to drop off.  I even mailed out a few items to brighten someone's day.  

Since we finally have some summer temps here, it was time to get out the water toys.  This was a great opportunity to get rid of items that were outgrown or in some cases moldy.  Yuck!

Thanks to all the lovely blogs I follow, I frequently get the chance to snag a free subscription to many magazines.  Unfortunately, I don't always have the time to read them.  I went through my basket of magazines and got rid of any that were older than a month and recycled them.  (Maybe if I actually read the SHAPE magazine, I could lose the rest of this pesky weight!) 

By midweek, I was on a roll with the de-cluttering and hit the toy room up.  I was hoping to have better results, but Big Brother kept insisting that he actually played with the each and every toy in the basement.  We were able to get rid of a few toys that were missing parts and a couple of toys that were not longer being played with. 

I was able to sneak in the next morning and grab a couple more toys that my children have outgrown, as well as a few items from our storage room that were taking up space.

Finally, today was by far my most productive day.  I got rid of 16 THOUSAND emails!  No, I did not just hit delete all.  Instead, I did make up a few folders, and then sorted my emails by sender. I was able to eliminate old emails easier this way.  I still have 100 or so emails that are sorted into folders and I will need to make sure that I keep on it!  Also, I will be busy unsubscribing to incoming emails that I no longer read or find the need for. 

Even my Hotmail account praised me for my "clean" inbox.  

Are you doing the challenge? How is it going?