Last week I started my annual declutter of the house. It’s something I’ve done every November before the deluge of Christmas gifts arrive into the house, but with college it was delayed until now. In recent years we’ve manage to knock the Christmas deluge tradition on the head, but the annual declutter continues.
When I started this process it was an uphill struggle. I just couldn’t make a dent in the amount of ‘stuff’, and decluttering was more of an exercise in reorganising than rehoming.
Thankfully after 5 years of low-waste living I’m really seeing the difference. Having successfully rehomed hundreds of items and refusing entry to new ones, I can now see the bottom of drawers and the back of cupboards.
I won’t lie. It hasn’t been easy. This is because I have a mindset of ‘rehoming’ rather than ‘getting rid of’.
- I refuse to donate anything that isn’t brand new to charity shops, because I know that things that look ‘second-hand’ often get dumped.
- I refuse to bin something that is still functional, even if I can’t find a new home for it.
- I refuse to bin something that is repairable, even if I don’t currently have the money/skill to repair it at the moment.
Part of me wishes it was easier to rehome things in Ireland. People seem very reluctant to buy second-hand items online, which can make the process unbearably slow. But I think making it too easy would have it’s drawbacks.
Knowing how hard it is to rehome things has made me much more cautious about buying things in the first place. Over Christmas I decided I wanted a lovely yearly planner by Badly Made Books and I went to far as to put on in my virtual shopping basket, but I didn’t complete the purchase. I knew I had a few half-filled notebooks in my bedside locker and told myself I could only buy a new notebook or planner when I’d used them up.
If you’re in the process of decluttering you might like my articles on
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Thanks for reading and have a happy sustainable week. You can catch up with me on Facebook and Instagram between now and next week’s newsletter.
E
living lightly in ireland 
Hi I’ve just read your latest email very interesting i have trouble getting rid of things especially if they have semtimental value so i created a think about it later box so can sit down with the items and really decide if someone else could use it. I really need to go through my attic but leaving that till the cold weather is over. Best wishes Pennyxx
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That’s a really good strategy. I tend to declutter in waves. The first time I declutter there are probably things I keep ‘just in case’ but as I pass through the room again and get more comfortable decluttering I’m happier to release more and more stuff, but only to the right person. I find it much easier to give something to someone I know will appreciate it. Donating items to a charity shop not knowing who will get them or if they will be binned is too hard for me.
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