LB's Big Clearout

Last weekend was quite a productive one in a couple of ways.  I was busy at work and managed to get quite a few things done, despite shortages of volunteers and LB was busy at home sorting through everything in her bedroom and doing a mighty big declutter.

I was surprised when I got home on Saturday night to see that she'd amassed 5 black bin bags full of rubbish and a big trug full of items to donate. I was pretty impressed, but as always I do like to go through the black bags and make sure she's not throwing away things I might want to donate or keep. 

Having done so, I was pleasantly surprised to see that there was actually very little to pull out and donate instead. She's obviously more careful these days and thinks more about whether things can be reused or sold on, which is good.

I did, however, pull out some of her old school books and magazines.  The magazines I mostly recycled as they were really old, but a few Beano and Dandy comics will get sent to the CS as they can be quite popular.

The half-used school books that she didn't want to keep, I have removed any blank pages to use as scrap paper for writing shopping lists. Here's a picture of the pile before:

And after:

It took a while to get through it and I've still got paper from the last time LB did a mass declutter and I did the same thing, but I just can't tolerate perfectly usable paper going into the bin. It should last me for years.  I just clip a bunch onto a bulldog clip and use it on a daily basis for list writing, then keep topping up as it gets used up.

There were a few other school books that I insisted she keeps, as they may be useful for revision later and a few others I kept for sentimental reasons, but the majority were decluttered.  The bin bags were be taken to the tip on Tuesday and her bedroom looks so much tidier and bigger now with so much taken out of it.  She did a really good job.

On Monday this week, I wasn't able to make it into work, as LB was unwell and OH was out at an appointment in the morning, so I spent the day going through her pile of items for donation.  I sorted them into three piles; Recycling, CS and Give & Take and stored them in the spare bedroom.  There's lots of books, a few items of clothing and toys/other items. 

I haven't totalled up how many items she's decluttered yet, I might do that job this weekend as I'm not working and there's another Give & Take tomorrow, so it should really help to boost my donated total this month and probably almost get me to the target for the year.  She's done me proud this year, as she has really decluttered a lot over the course of the year. I'm just happy that she's beginning to understand that less is more in many ways and I hope it will help her in the future.