Just saw a cute banner or TW sketch trying to get me to change my closet. Obviously drawn by or for someone who does not clutter, is tidy, put away her first toy before she could sit up.
It shows a lovely rolling shelf set like a hotel porter uses - that part could be useful if you have a retired film star's Rancho de Closet, perhaps accessed by an elevator.
But on those shelves is trouble for us, the genetically non-tidy. And those of us who would simply rather read Robert Crais and deal with the closet later.
Just getting the clothes back in the closet, nicely aired out, is a victory for some of us. Putting the crackers and purple potatoes on the proper shelf after getting them into the pantry is an olympic victory. If the shelf has a drawer, it's getting to be a chore.
Along comes a jolly closet fluffer who puts everything in darling boxes. Well, except the purple potatoes. With lids. A pile-on-the center island future in the making. And you have to put everything down somewhere if there IS no center island, so you can get the d....lids off the cute boxes and put stuff in.
If the closet fluffer needs photos for her website, she will have a graduated stack of boxes for your things, and will tie the stack with a ribbon. This will cut down on clutter because you will never open the stack. Ever. Unless you need those clothes to go to a wedding. Eventually some of us may replace the stuff we've forgotten in the cute box stack.
When the fluffer is checking her makeup, take your stuff out of the stack of boxes and PUT ALL Boxes with Lids back in her car. If a box has a hinged lid you can just flip up, it may work for you. Or not.
While she is alphabetizing your closet, get on your cell and call a guy who will build you some shelves, many of them with tray drawers. Tray what?
A tray drawer is just a tray on slides. It's not a deep drawer. You can put some sweaters in without even opening it. Not thirty in one tray, perhaps.
Toss the catalog with the picture of darling baskets instead of drawers for towels, etc. You will pull out the cute basket drawer to see what's in the bottom, and it will remain on the bathroom floor until I'm (I mean until you're) too embarrassed to leave it there longer. The only basket my bathroom really needs is one to keep the rotten hair dryer from sliding off on the floor and breaking.
Think of all this as the one-move rule. If it has a door, it definitely does not need drawers inside. One thing to do is always enough for us.
Saturday, January 9, 2016
Friday, October 9, 2015
THE URGENT PART OF UNCLUTTERING - Use a timer & please do this now
The recent Fall Prevention day gave me reasons to hate some advice from "authorities " (and I use that word loosely. Too many "do this" generalities from people who perhaps never fell down.
There are, however, life-saving things we can/should do. Now.
Why? Because there might be a day when we let ourselves get a little dehydrated. At least once, I fainted and fell at a major design open house. The EMS made me drink a bottle of water, and I was good to go. If it had happened on apartment stairs - too scary. What has this to do with clutter? Remove some clutter that will give you room for an unopened bottle of water: NEAR THE TUB, in the kitchen, in your purse, upstairs if you have an upstairs, and BY THE BED.
Even clothes can be dangerous, especially the ones on the stairs waiting to go to the cleaners or the washing machine.
If you have stairs, even 3 or 4, take the "stuff to go up, stuff to go down" OFF the stairs. . Get a storage locker for them. Put them in the trunk of the car. Give them to newlyweds. Or just put them in a basket at the top or bottom, NOT on the steps. You can get a prettier basket later. Make yourself do it now, SET YOUR PHONE TIMER. Don't talk on the phone while you move these killers.
(Yes, I can afford to be bossy on that because I don't have stairs.)
I will probably put some of this on HEN BACKTALK as well. More later.
Be safe.
There are, however, life-saving things we can/should do. Now.
Why? Because there might be a day when we let ourselves get a little dehydrated. At least once, I fainted and fell at a major design open house. The EMS made me drink a bottle of water, and I was good to go. If it had happened on apartment stairs - too scary. What has this to do with clutter? Remove some clutter that will give you room for an unopened bottle of water: NEAR THE TUB, in the kitchen, in your purse, upstairs if you have an upstairs, and BY THE BED.
Even clothes can be dangerous, especially the ones on the stairs waiting to go to the cleaners or the washing machine.
If you have stairs, even 3 or 4, take the "stuff to go up, stuff to go down" OFF the stairs. . Get a storage locker for them. Put them in the trunk of the car. Give them to newlyweds. Or just put them in a basket at the top or bottom, NOT on the steps. You can get a prettier basket later. Make yourself do it now, SET YOUR PHONE TIMER. Don't talk on the phone while you move these killers.
(Yes, I can afford to be bossy on that because I don't have stairs.)
I will probably put some of this on HEN BACKTALK as well. More later.
Be safe.
Sunday, November 9, 2014
Review: when boxes are traps, and other experience
Just saw a cute banner or TW sketch trying to get me to change my closet. Obviously drawn by or for someone who does not clutter, is tidy, put away her first toy before she could sit up.
It shows a lovely rolling shelf set like a hotel porter uses - that part could be useful if you have a retired film star's Rancho de Closet, perhaps accessed by an elevator.
But on those shelves is trouble for us, the genetically non-tidy. And those of us who would simply rather read Robert Crais and deal with the closet later.
Just getting the clothes back in the closet, nicely aired out, is a victory for some of us. Putting the crackers and purple potatoes on the proper shelf after getting them into the pantry is an olympic victory. If the shelf has a drawer, it's getting to be a chore.
Along comes a jolly closet fluffer who puts everything in darling boxes. Well, except the purple potatoes. With lids. A pile-on-the center island future in the making. And you have to put everything down somewhere if there IS no center island, so you can get the d....lids off the cute boxes and put stuff in.
If the closet fluffer needs photos for her website, she will have a graduated stack of boxes for your things, and will tie the stack with a ribbon. This will cut down on clutter because you will never open the stack. Ever. Unless you need those clothes to go to a wedding. Eventually some of us may replace the stuff we've forgotten in the cute box stack.
When the fluffer is checking her makeup, take your stuff out of the stack of boxes and PUT ALL Boxes with Lids back in her car. If a box has a hinged lid you can just flip up, it may work for you. Or not.
While she is alphabetizing your closet, get on your cell and call a guy who will build you some shelves, many of them with tray drawers. Tray what?
A tray drawer is just a tray on slides. It's not a deep drawer. You can put some sweaters in without even opening it. Not thirty in one tray, perhaps.
Toss the catalog with the picture of darling baskets instead of drawers for towels, etc. You will pull out the cute basket drawer to see what's in the bottom, and it will remain on the bathroom floor until I'm (I mean until you're) too embarrassed to leave it there longer. The only basket my bathroom really needs is one to keep the rotten hair dryer from sliding off on the floor and breaking.
Think of all this as the one-move rule. If it has a door, it definitely does not need drawers inside. One thing to do is always enough for us.
It shows a lovely rolling shelf set like a hotel porter uses - that part could be useful if you have a retired film star's Rancho de Closet, perhaps accessed by an elevator.
But on those shelves is trouble for us, the genetically non-tidy. And those of us who would simply rather read Robert Crais and deal with the closet later.
Just getting the clothes back in the closet, nicely aired out, is a victory for some of us. Putting the crackers and purple potatoes on the proper shelf after getting them into the pantry is an olympic victory. If the shelf has a drawer, it's getting to be a chore.
Along comes a jolly closet fluffer who puts everything in darling boxes. Well, except the purple potatoes. With lids. A pile-on-the center island future in the making. And you have to put everything down somewhere if there IS no center island, so you can get the d....lids off the cute boxes and put stuff in.
If the closet fluffer needs photos for her website, she will have a graduated stack of boxes for your things, and will tie the stack with a ribbon. This will cut down on clutter because you will never open the stack. Ever. Unless you need those clothes to go to a wedding. Eventually some of us may replace the stuff we've forgotten in the cute box stack.
When the fluffer is checking her makeup, take your stuff out of the stack of boxes and PUT ALL Boxes with Lids back in her car. If a box has a hinged lid you can just flip up, it may work for you. Or not.
While she is alphabetizing your closet, get on your cell and call a guy who will build you some shelves, many of them with tray drawers. Tray what?
A tray drawer is just a tray on slides. It's not a deep drawer. You can put some sweaters in without even opening it. Not thirty in one tray, perhaps.
Toss the catalog with the picture of darling baskets instead of drawers for towels, etc. You will pull out the cute basket drawer to see what's in the bottom, and it will remain on the bathroom floor until I'm (I mean until you're) too embarrassed to leave it there longer. The only basket my bathroom really needs is one to keep the rotten hair dryer from sliding off on the floor and breaking.
Think of all this as the one-move rule. If it has a door, it definitely does not need drawers inside. One thing to do is always enough for us.
Wednesday, July 2, 2014
No, This is the Easiest Way to Cull Useless Clothes
I was wrong in March. I think you secretly know that the fastest way to decide whether to keep any garment is to ask: What if my first love came to the door?
(The real truth is I'd just as soon see my incredible studio alternations guy from Burbank, CA, than my first love. I think. Maybe. No.)
This has to be your firsts real love, not that guy from high school who was mostly worried about why you didn't seem as skinny or passionate as some others.
Close your eyes and just hear the bell ringing. Picture him standing there. How does he look now?
No, first put your job interview suit in a safe place - you might be tempted to junk it, cause you know it would leave him cold.
Now the recycle bag.
There goes the denim skirt (you really need a denim skirt) that is cut to add 20 pounds and several years even in the front view.
Those black tweed pants that wrinkle in front after 20 minutes. That too-big jacket-looking thing that can't be altered into a smaller summer jacket. That pullover top that's scratchy - how can you look like someone's lost love if your top itches?
Unless you're reed-thin, get rid of all tee shirts with writing unless they're advertising his favorite band. (You do remember his favorite band, right?)
It is okay to get a teen ager to help with this--just don't tell him or her about the first love part.
And junk half the clothes with rayon or acrylic - you're likely to feel pretty warm when you open the door to your memory HugBunny.
If you can't visualize your handsome prince at the door, just open the closet and look at each item: Would I want to be wearing this if J walked into the restaurant? If he walked into the library? If he came to the house to check the electricity?
Will this outfit remind him of our school days? Or remind him of his mother?
And what if he's turned out to be a slob? Well, at least you'll look so good he may stop at the barber shop on his way to WeightLoss, Inc. and the florist.
I think I may need a bigger recycle bag.
(The real truth is I'd just as soon see my incredible studio alternations guy from Burbank, CA, than my first love. I think. Maybe. No.)
This has to be your firsts real love, not that guy from high school who was mostly worried about why you didn't seem as skinny or passionate as some others.
Close your eyes and just hear the bell ringing. Picture him standing there. How does he look now?
No, first put your job interview suit in a safe place - you might be tempted to junk it, cause you know it would leave him cold.
Now the recycle bag.
There goes the denim skirt (you really need a denim skirt) that is cut to add 20 pounds and several years even in the front view.
Those black tweed pants that wrinkle in front after 20 minutes. That too-big jacket-looking thing that can't be altered into a smaller summer jacket. That pullover top that's scratchy - how can you look like someone's lost love if your top itches?
Unless you're reed-thin, get rid of all tee shirts with writing unless they're advertising his favorite band. (You do remember his favorite band, right?)
It is okay to get a teen ager to help with this--just don't tell him or her about the first love part.
And junk half the clothes with rayon or acrylic - you're likely to feel pretty warm when you open the door to your memory HugBunny.
If you can't visualize your handsome prince at the door, just open the closet and look at each item: Would I want to be wearing this if J walked into the restaurant? If he walked into the library? If he came to the house to check the electricity?
Will this outfit remind him of our school days? Or remind him of his mother?
And what if he's turned out to be a slob? Well, at least you'll look so good he may stop at the barber shop on his way to WeightLoss, Inc. and the florist.
I think I may need a bigger recycle bag.
Friday, June 27, 2014
FOUR MAGIC WORDS CUT CLUTTER?
What if dealing with our stuff is as simple as doing two things?
Start something
Finish something
Of course, joining a gym so you can lift Fred's junk out of the hall isn't the type of Start I had in mind.
I don't want you to quit your job so you have time to Finish tearing everything out of the garage in search of the tax records from 2001.
I've seen the lists. I've made the lists. Lists like:
Finished coloring my hair
Finished my mani/pedi.
Finished washing the bedding.
But my stuff was still all over the place.
As I've mentioned before, a wise and talented man (who got very prosperous, by the way) told me to make my bed. Just make my bed. No explanation. Years later I heard the reason: Making my bed is finishing something. It reminds me how simple it can be to finish something. Something like opening the box marked T, discovering the tax files, chucking them in a file cabinet.
My latest list looked like:
Start buying and using pants and skirt hangers that actually work
Start looking for some hangers that don't dump things on the floor
Start putting books to return in a small bag so they won't be everywhere
Made me much happier about my clothes, the car interior, and getting dressed. BUT:
We only have to start one (1) thing: Just one thing off a start list.
We only have to mark off a tiny section of the cabinets and start removing junk.
Great habits start with one Start.
Thursday, June 26, 2014
CLOSET BREAKTHRU or, hanging solution for difficult clothes
Went to WalMart to return the exercise mat with the "carcinogens" label.
Found my dream footstool (read Rubbermaid plastic stepstool.) Note to self: sometimes you have to go to a store where women work. Guys don't understand concepts like: No, not a step ladder.)
But on to the other solutions: first a little dish that clamps on the side of the round bin in my top drawer. This little thing will corral all the ear plugs, miniature bottles of calendula cream, and lip balm. Or the earrings, when I'm too sleepy to walk over to the little jewelry box.
Big finish:
They have the hangers I've always dreamed of and didn't have the sense to invent. There is a rubber (okay, it's probably just non-slip plastic, work with me here.) line across the top edge so the necks of my knit tops don't stretch out every few minutes. The have (oh, this is too wonderful) a tiny line of rubber between shoulders so a scarf will stay anchored there. And more! There is also rubber along the bottom that I think will keep my long, black knit skirt from rolling into a ball in the corner of the hanger or on the floor.
They look feminine enough and the price, my friends, is right.
Found my dream footstool (read Rubbermaid plastic stepstool.) Note to self: sometimes you have to go to a store where women work. Guys don't understand concepts like: No, not a step ladder.)
But on to the other solutions: first a little dish that clamps on the side of the round bin in my top drawer. This little thing will corral all the ear plugs, miniature bottles of calendula cream, and lip balm. Or the earrings, when I'm too sleepy to walk over to the little jewelry box.
Big finish:
They have the hangers I've always dreamed of and didn't have the sense to invent. There is a rubber (okay, it's probably just non-slip plastic, work with me here.) line across the top edge so the necks of my knit tops don't stretch out every few minutes. The have (oh, this is too wonderful) a tiny line of rubber between shoulders so a scarf will stay anchored there. And more! There is also rubber along the bottom that I think will keep my long, black knit skirt from rolling into a ball in the corner of the hanger or on the floor.
They look feminine enough and the price, my friends, is right.
Monday, April 21, 2014
CAN'T FACE THE CLOSET? Make molehills out of mountains
Okay, what am I talking about? Maybe you never been accused of making mountains our of molehills. As you can see, it just means exaggerating, blowing things out of proportion. Maybe your closet looks to you as if the entire women's department of a giant store has fallen out of a truck.
You want it fixed now, but you'd rather go to the dentist. And you're a girl who's been told, possibly by me, to finish what you start.
So divide up that mountain of clothes. Make a Section One. I knew a very smart man who did his closet six inches at a time (and he liked clothes.) Knot a red ribbon around the clothes pole six inches from the door, or eight inches from the left wall.
You will need a large bag. Don't skip the bag. It's useless to make a pile of clothes you don't want and then put the pile back in the closet until whenever. The rule is DON'T PUT ANYTHING BACK IN.
If you can't make up your mind about last year's orange top, have your friend Coco keep it for you. It's kinda like how to avoid overeating. If we keep food by the tv, we keep eating it. And If that pair of dreary slacks doesn't need ironing, you grab it every morning, and think you need it. But if you have to go to Coco's house to get it, you'll know it's not worth the trip.
Anyway, with only six inches to do today, you can take everything out and even try it all on--someplace where you can see the back. If you can't see the back at home, wear it to Macy's or someplace and look at yourself from the back in the fitting room.
When you've sent the maybe clothes to Coco's, and the rejects to the charity bag, put your shoes on and take your favorite, but wrinkled outfit to the cleaners. The better care you take of it, the more you'll value it, and yourself. If it's midnight, put the outfit on a chair by the front door for the cleaner's tomorrow.
Now you've finished something! And maybe even found a blouse you'd forgotten about, to wear tomorrow.
You want it fixed now, but you'd rather go to the dentist. And you're a girl who's been told, possibly by me, to finish what you start.
So divide up that mountain of clothes. Make a Section One. I knew a very smart man who did his closet six inches at a time (and he liked clothes.) Knot a red ribbon around the clothes pole six inches from the door, or eight inches from the left wall.
You will need a large bag. Don't skip the bag. It's useless to make a pile of clothes you don't want and then put the pile back in the closet until whenever. The rule is DON'T PUT ANYTHING BACK IN.
If you can't make up your mind about last year's orange top, have your friend Coco keep it for you. It's kinda like how to avoid overeating. If we keep food by the tv, we keep eating it. And If that pair of dreary slacks doesn't need ironing, you grab it every morning, and think you need it. But if you have to go to Coco's house to get it, you'll know it's not worth the trip.
Anyway, with only six inches to do today, you can take everything out and even try it all on--someplace where you can see the back. If you can't see the back at home, wear it to Macy's or someplace and look at yourself from the back in the fitting room.
When you've sent the maybe clothes to Coco's, and the rejects to the charity bag, put your shoes on and take your favorite, but wrinkled outfit to the cleaners. The better care you take of it, the more you'll value it, and yourself. If it's midnight, put the outfit on a chair by the front door for the cleaner's tomorrow.
Now you've finished something! And maybe even found a blouse you'd forgotten about, to wear tomorrow.
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