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Your house is in shambles. It seems that you don’t have a place for anything. Every room is jam-packed with clutter. It’s time to organize your house. Not only will your home look better but also it will make you feel better. You can do almost any room in one day.
Before you start there are things you will need to get: trash bags or containers, several boxes or the big plastic storage containers, pen and paper, masking tape or labels, and a permanent marker.
Now, use your masking tape/label and marker and label one “give away”, mark one “charity”. If you are a person who likes to have garage or yard sales, make a box and label it as such.
Your best bet is to pick one room to start with. Let’s say we start with the living room. OK, look around. What do you see in this room that you really don’t like and that your room doesn’t need? For most of us it will be a little knick-knack that great Aunt Sally gave us, for others a picture hanging on the wall. If it’s your big pieces of furniture and you can afford new pieces right now, than use those. Decide right now which pieces go and which stay. Make sure the furniture is in good shape before deciding to donate it or if not, call your local waste removal company to find out when they will pick up large items. Look in the yellow pages and call all of the charity organizations to see which one will come and pick up the furniture. You might want to go through every room in the house in order to have a list of the pieces you will want to donate. When you donate to the charities, you will get a receipt for a tax deduction but at the same time, you will be helping someone less fortunate than you are.
Think back, has anyone in your house ever said they liked that piece? If yes, use a piece of tape or label, and put their name on it and set it in a box, which you will have marked, “give away.” If you can think of no one, put it in your charity box.
Next, go to each item in your living room. Go to each object, pick it up or touch it. Do you really need it? Decide what to do with it. Knick-knacks are nice but after awhile, they seem to mysteriously multiply and start to take over. Some pieces you are keeping for sentimental reasons and you won’t want to part with. Other pieces you really never liked or they seemed appropriate at that time but truthfully, do you really need some little object to remember the important people or occasions in your life? No you don’t. All you need is your brain and that’s kept in your head and not in the living room. If you’re really afraid of forgetting something important to you, write it down in a journal. Words can express more than any object.
If you’ve filled a few boxes and are not ready to start on another room yet, take the boxes to wherever they are meant to go. If you are saving the things for a yard sale, put the boxes in a basement or attic or deserted corner until you’ve finished all the rooms.
When you’re finished with the living room and you have decided to give to a charity, you’ll need to start the next day on another room. If you have to wait for a weekend day, you’ll still need to set stuff aside.
Take it one room at a time, one day at a time if you have to. Don’t rush yourself or you’ll still have lots of “stuff” cluttering your house.
When you get to your bedrooms and your clothes you’ll need to do a couple of things. When you are ready to do your dresser drawers, take all articles out of each drawer and put them on your bed. Go through each item separately.
When your dresser drawers are finished, let’s tackle the closet. Push all the clothes to the right hand side of the closet. One by one, pull out the item, look at it. When was the last time you wore it? If it’s been over 1 month, put it in the charity box. If it’s a seasonal item, take one of your plastic boxes and label it with the proper season code (winter, summer, etc.) fold and place inside. Okay, the next item is a pair of pants that fit you before and you’re waiting to get into again when you lose weight. Put them in the charity box. You don’t need them right now and when/if you lose the weight you can go out and buy yourself a better pair of brand new pants. Do this with all the clothes you are waiting to fit into.
“Oh there’s that dress I’ve been saving for a special occasion.” Here I’m going to give you a little piece of advice. Don’t save that dress for a special occasion because that occasion may never come. Think of every day you live and breath as a special day and wear that dress whenever the mood hits you.
So now you’ve finished your house. You’ve gotten rid of the items that no longer suit you. Your house is a little emptier but looks better. You’ll find with all the little knick-knacks gone and all the little extras no longer in the way, that your house will be easier to keep clean and dusting will be a breeze. Now don’t go out and buy things to fill up your house again. Fill up your heart instead.
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