Tag: minimal

Plot Twist! Minimizing, Moving and Falling In Love

Donna Joy

Happy Monday and welcome back to me!

I recently moved and it’s been a bit of a whirlwind deciding to sell, staging and selling my house, finding a place to live and all the crazy and changes that come with moving.

image from New City Moving

I recently had friends over for dinner in our new apartment and one of them looked around and asked, “Oh! Did you choose this place because it feels like a treehouse when you look out this window?”

I laughed.

I “picked” this apartment because it was the ONLY place with the main qualification I was looking for: keep my daughter in the same school.

(OK, so full disclosure: there was also a house for rent in town. for THOUSANDS a month above my budget. umm… no.)

This apartment was not exactly love at first sight.

The showing was rough – it was cramped, stained, cluttered, dark, and the current tenants were there when I went to look at it, so I couldn’t even view one of the bedrooms.

Speaking of bedrooms, it has half the bedrooms I previously had.

Half the square footage overall actually.

That part shouldn’t be a problem, though, I thought. I mean, I literally spent months chronicling my massive decluttering efforts here, even pretending to move at one point.

Why, I’m practically a minimalist! (she said, dripping with sarcastic self-awareness)

It turns out, pretending to move as an emotional exercise and actually.downsizing.fifty.percent.of.your.living/storage space are apparently two different beasts.

But I love a good challenge, and my COVID casualty jobs have not yet returned, so I decluttered and prepped like it was my job.

I gave items to people I thought would truly need/love/want them. I listed so many items on our local swap and sell sites that I had one woman who used to just stop by on her way home from work just to browse what I was putting up that day. I hosted a garage sale. (This time with planning and signs and everything!) I filled my driveway with items and posted “free” notices.

And after a couple weeks of purging,

     releasing,

          selling

               and gifting,

the moving van showed up.

The moving men began packing items and loading the truck, making small talk as they packed.

When one asked where I was moving, and heard it was a two bedroom apartment, they surveyed my inventory and kindly offered to let a few items get “lost” in the move or fall off the truck to help us fit. 😉

Not a great testament to my decluttering efforts. 

But I shudder to think of what the process would have been like if I hadn’t started the minimizing process this past March.

So here we are, sitting in our new-to-us home, surrounded by builder’s beige and feeling a little like I’m back where I was 20 years ago, moving into an apartment complex. Except this time I brought a couple kids, a lot more furniture and a slightly different design aesthetic (not that my proudly apple-stenciled kitchen, frog-stenciled bathroom and flower-stenciled bedroom weren’t the height of fashion in the late 90’s).

It’s been a couple weeks since the moving truck left (after it delivered ALL our remaining stuff)  and you know what?

I’m falling in love.

Everything is different and a chance to create a space that works for us. And I love creating. 

I don’t intend to live here for very long, and when it’s time to leave I want to: 

Not spend a lot of time and money returning this place to it’s original state.

-and-

Get my security deposit back.

-and-

I still want it to work for our family and feel like home in the meantime.

So I’m pulling out all the creative solutions I can borrow, copy and dream up to create a functional home we love in the time we’re here, uncovering what really matters and what’s really real along the way. 

Follow along for what’s worked, what hasn’t, tips and ideas, before and afters, and lots of messy middles, because that’s where I tend to live (in design, in life, whatever).

and check out updates on Facebook and Instagram here.

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Week 6, Day 6: In Case of Emergency

Donna Joy

This week, I scheduled a technician for some work at our house. 
As I thought through where they would need to go in order to get their job done, I mentally started a checklist: Make sure they can safely get to the fuse box. Can they easily reach the other systems they need to access to get the job done? Where else might they need to go?
A picture frame may need to be moved away from the fuse box, a rug may need to be rolled out of the way on the day they arrive, but in general, every access point I thought of was accessible.

No one would walk into my house and consider me a minimalist.

But if we had to have emergency services of any kind, I wouldn’t be distracted by needing to get a lot of things out of the way.

The daily work of decluttering and uncovering is not only benefiting how we live in our spaces each day, it’s also serving as preparation for emergencies and unforeseen circumstances.

There’s a welcome peace in knowing that. 

Week 6, Day 4: “How Could I Keep it”

Donna Joy

A few years ago, someone left me a message left me know a building full of antique stores near me was closing up and getting rid of all their remaining inventory, free for the taking. By the time I heard about it and drove over, people were carrying the last remnants out to dumpsters. I parked my van and began making trips from the basement of the building to my van and back, racing against the dumpster fillers.  There was no time to evaluate, so I beelined for the items I thought I could most use, mainly old scratched records, antique books and vintage boxes. I pulled away from the complex a little while later, covered in dust, my van bursting with treasure.


Later, when I experimented with selling repurposed creations, I used a number of the damaged treasures I had rescued for upcycled projects like wreaths, bowls, and plate stands. Most of the rest of the items have sat collecting dust in my basement since the day I brought them home.

As I went through some of those collections today, I found myself repeatedly saying, “oh, this so cool.” 

I realized what I meant was, “how could I get rid of something with so much potential to be used in a new way, or displayed in a great space, or appreciated for it’s rich history?”

But they were stuck on a shelf, in my unfinished basement.

So, what if “but they’re so cool” meant instead:

“how could I keep something with so much potential to be used in a new way, or displayed in a great space, or appreciated for it’s rich history?

The tiny change in words was a huge shift in my mind set. I’m not appreciating or using those items while they sit on my shelf, and I can give them to someone who might.

It was so freeing. 

90% of my unused vintage records, bins and other “treasures”? buh-bye.

Room to breathe, joyful spirit and clear shelves for my newly sorted kids memory boxes? hello!

Image Contents: a few of my favorite vintage treasures. An Ella Fitzgerald record and file card box which have homes in my living room, so they’re staying; a letterpress tray and vintage music encyclopedias which do not, so they’re heading off to their new homes.

Week 6, Day 3: Onions, Old Habits and Grace

Donna Joy

Even though minimalism experts like Joshua Fields Millburn  and Joshua Becker talk about their  decluttering process taking about three-quarters of a year, and other experts describe decades-long journeys, I figured six weeks should be enough time to get my house to clutter-free-a-place-for-everything-and-everything-in-its-place status. I mean, I’m not a hoarder. I don’t have a storage unit. My basement is a disaster, but I can park in the garage. Usually.

When I started, I felt I landed pretty squarely in the “normal” range of clutter, on the scale I made up. In my head. Based basically on my house not looking like either an episode of Hoarders or a minimalist magazine cover. 

So today, six weeks into my decluttering journey, when I went to put a few things away and realized they didn’t have an easy permanent home, I was frustrated at myself. And when I gathered up a few things in a tote to “deal with tomorrow,” I felt guilty and ashamed. Hadn’t I just learned the lesson of “do it now” yesterday?

When am I going to reach the point of everything having a home and automatically putting it there?

Then I remembered two things. First, the “onion method.” Different people have different versions of what this means, but the concept always revolves around layers. Sometimes the layering is in a single decluttering session – like yesterday when Dana K. White’s method started with trash and the easy peasy stuff, then kept going through harder items.

Sometimes uncovering the layers happens over time.

A month ago,  I decluttered my reusable grocery bags. Today I went grocery shopping and realized, since I’m not stocking up on grocery items as heavily, I’m shopping for less, and therefore don’t need as many bags as I had narrowed it down to a few weeks ago.

I started with what I thought I needed, then was able to peel back more. 

The same thing is happening in the rest of my home. As I enjoy the benefits, see how I’m actually living, and build up my decision-making muscles, I’m often decluttering things as I come across them, and sometimes intentionally going back to spaces I know can function better with less. 

I also realized everything not yet having a place for everything and putting a few things in a tote for tomorrow is not failure. There’s grace in the process. After all, I have a whole other week before my self-imposed deadline. 😉

Image Contents: an image of Shrek saying, “Onions have layers, Ogres have layers. You get it? We both have layers!” Because I can’t talk about onions having layers with Shrek and Donkey busting into my head.

Week 5, Day 6: More Photos

Donna Joy

One of the things I was looking forward to in this journey was gaining more of an awareness of what I have. It is so easy for me to live disconnected in so many areas – I don’t grow my own food, I don’t make my own clothes, life is increasingly virtual – especially this past year. The act of going through my possessions is bringing a level of awareness of what I own but it is also breaking through disconnection in other ways.

Going through my photos forces me to see what I have in a different way. It reminds me of the variety of experiences I’ve been able to have, from the births of my children, to bowling with friends on a random trip to Illinois; Singing in choirs from churches to Carnegie Hall to more outdoor adventures than I could remember; weddings, funerals, parties and memorials. It reminds me of relationships that have spanned decades and relationships that have come and gone, or changed significantly. It reminds me of the thoughts I had at the very beginning of this blog:

“The transformation from dust and to dust is not limited to just our literal birth and death, it is found in every season of our lives. In every season there are cycles of creation, dust, waiting and re-creation.”

Some photos were reminders of the dust, some were reminders of the cycles of creation I see in my relationships. I loved reaching out to a few friends and family members this week, sharing with them some of the little memories I found. I loved sitting with my child at the end of a long day, reminiscing and laughing at old school journals and projects.

And I love that there is still room my photo boxes. There are seasons of recreation still to come, and more photos to be taken.

Image Contents: A throw-back photo of the author and her favorite childhood dog (a Great Dane), posing like horse and jockey.

Week 5, Day 4: Donation Garage Sale Part 2

Donna Joy

There are experts who will tell you never to have a garage sale. (You end up storing stuff to wait for it, you never get a good return on your time, you waste time and money prepping for it, etc.)

There are experts who tell you to definitely have a garage sale. (sell EVERYTHING on your path to get out of debt, get rid of your stuff and make a little cash doing it, etc.)

I have typically been closer to the first camp. I’ve hosted a couple garage sales in the past, but they’ve always been fundraisers for specific organizations or causes I care about. For those, I gathered help, made a plan in advance for the leftovers, set up refreshments manned by adorable little bakers and lemonade servers, merchandized the inventory and advertised extensively.

This was the first time I’ve ever said, “hey, I should have a garage sale, right now, in the middle of the afternoon, while I’m home by myself and haven’t told anyone to advertise.”

A few things I learned anyway:

-It.is.exhausting. Even just the set up/tear down process of dragging everything out, dragging everything in when it got dark, dragging it back out the next day, dragging it to the garage or curb or car trunk after. Then comes getting rid of the leftovers, not to mention any time manning it.

-It is typically a horrible return on investment. Granted, some of the fundraisers I’ve had in the past brought in a very significant amount of money donated, and this one today most likely would have been much more profitable had I scheduled and advertised ahead, employed help, etc. 

-If you tell someone you are having a garage sale, 99.9999999% of the time, they will offer you their own items to bring to sell. Or they’ll just drop them off at your house. when you’re not there. on your driveway. in unmarked bags. with no contact info. 

-At least one middle aged or older man will drive by the garage sale and ask “well then, how much for the garage?”

-people will come by and say, “this is so nice, I can’t believe you’re just getting rid of it” and you will have to decide how much you want to tell a complete stranger about your journey to less stuff while standing with masks on talking across a lawn. Or the version from people who know you, “I can’t believe you’re getting rid of THIS!” (that comment from friends was usually referring craft items.)

After hosting my, uh, pop-up sale (does that make it sound more modern, inviting, and trendy than “last-minute garage sale?”) I confirmed garage sales are not my jam.

I loved getting to see some friends and neighbors I haven’t seen in at least a year. I loved gathering donation money from it. I loved getting rid of stuff. But it was 2 days of work I wasn’t planning on doing and I still have lots of stuff left to donate. (Plus two unidentified bags of donations.)

If you are getting out of debt or saving for a specific goal, go for it. Sell like it’s your job. 

If you’re just trying to get rid of stuff, just get rid of your stuff.

For me, getting rid of (the rest of) my stuff is going to mean a little tour of donation centers over the next couple days and I can.not.wait to come back home after it’s all delivered and assess how everything looks and feels. 

Week 5, Day 3: Breaking News

Donna Joy

We interrupt our regularly scheduled programming for an important update:

Today I had an epiphany.

Like, a this-is-life-changing-while-also-super-obvious-why-didn’t-I realize-this-earlier-I-even-wrote-a-whole-post-about-it, kind of epiphany.

I am not motivated by shame.

I am stressed by shame.

I am physically afflicted by shame.

I am not motivated by shame.

And yet somehow, when I started this journey, I thought the most helpful and motivating thing for myself would be to keep every single item I am removing from my home in one place, so I could see the impact all together. (Read: so I could sit at the end of the challenge and wallow in a big old pile of shame clutter and hope those shame surges would motivate me to not bring so much stuff into my house in the future.)

Here’s what actually happened:

Everyday I put more and more donation items in my son’s bedroom (while he is away at college).

I balanced bags on top of boxes on top of bags. 

I got multiple piles in and started thinking about how I need to go back and re-organize what’s in there, since I realized partway through, I will likely give different types of items to different organizations.

I spent a significant amount of time with the back of my head clogged with thoughts about how I needed to Organize.The.Clutter.I’m.Giving.Away.

Let that sit a second.

Every time I go in the give-away room I’m stressed at trying to find a place for things, to the point that some things have lingered in other rooms instead of going straight to give-away because I was avoiding going in there. 

Then yesterday I decided to move some furniture around in my living/dining room.

As I walked into the rearranged room today, I caught my breath at how beautiful and peaceful it was.

I instantly wanted to do more and have that feeling in the rest of the house. 

That motivated me.

It made me feel free, lighter, peaceful. 

Right then I decided to immediately get rid of as much of my donations as possible. 

I walked outside and stuck a sign on the front yard, along with a post in my local swap and sell group that I was having a “donate what you can, if you can” sale, along with a donation link to my favorite non-profit.

It was late in the day for an outdoor “sale” and very last minute, but even so, a number of items now have very happy new owners and the non-profit has a little more money than they did yesterday. 

There are still lots of things left, so I plan to put the remainder out for one more day. Then I’ll box anything left back up, deliver it this week, and let the house and myself breathe a little deeper and feel a little freer. 

Because it turns out, being able to breathe a little deeper and a little freer is what really motivates me. 

On Wednesdays We Reflect: Week 4 Reflections

Donna Joy

My stuff talks smack about me.

(in case you’re confused about the difference between smack talk and trash talk, here’s a helpful tutorial from Kelly Kapoor)

I open up my cabinet and the Instant Pot taunts me: “how many times have you really pulled me off this shelf and used me?”

I open my closet and clothes scream, “hey there, chubby, you don’t think you could actually wear me, do you?”

I open a drawer in my craft dresser, and the watercolor pencils say, “woah, remember the last time you tried to use me? You were soooo bad at it!”

Everywhere I have clutter, there is a voice emanating from it. And they’re rarely kind:

“quitter”

“worthless”

 “idiot”

“slacker”

“slob”

“loser”

“hack”

And those voices aren’t just mean. They’re loud. Loud enough to drown out other voices I want to hear and need to hear. 

Some of my things actually have beautiful voices. I love fresh flowers and I usually keep a few small arrangements in different rooms of my house. Sometimes it’s just a few sprigs of pine or wildflowers from the yard, sometimes it’s a bouquet from the grocery store, but those flowers typically sing reminders to me that there is beauty in the world.

I don’t want to drown out those beautiful voices. 

I also don’t want to drown out the voices that truly help me become a better person.

But clutter doesn’t make me become a better person. Clutter doesn’t speak encouragement or motivation, it speaks shame. And voices of shame rarely motivate us to grow. In fact, researcher, author, and speaker Brené Brown defines shame as,

“the intensely painful feeling or experience of believing that we are flawed and therefore unworthy of love and belonging – something we’ve experienced, done, or failed to do makes us unworthy of connection. I don’t believe shame is helpful or productive. In fact, I think shame is much more likely to be the source of destructive, hurtful behavior than the solution or cure.” (you can find more of Brené’s work here)

I hear the watercolor pencils tell me I am flawed every time I open the craft drawer. I feel the shame of unworthiness when my closet is filled with clothes that don’t fit. 

As I declutter my home, I am realizing how powerful those voices can be, even when I don’t realize they’re speaking to me. They can create shame patterns that spiral into the hurtful and destructive cycles Brené acknowledge. 

There are a lot of voices I need to listen to, like the voice that tells me I am wonderfully made, fully and beautifully loved.

I also need to listen to the voices that help me grow – like the voices of loving friends, or the fresh veggies calling out to be chosen over the leftover soda bread. 

It’s one thing to silence the voice of an underused Instant Pot, accessory or craft item. It would be a whole other thing to try to silence the voice of an upside-down budget by shredding your bills instead of paying them. I’m not advocating for shirking responsibility but reminding myself that it’s ok to remove voices that speak unnecessary and destructive shame from my life in order to clear space for what is really necessary and beneficial in my life. 

Anyone want a barely used Instant Pot?

Week 4, Day 6: Forming Habits and Muscles

Donna Joy

Today I took a break from slogging through a few disaster zones in my basement and came upstairs to empty the dishwasher.

<pause for a moment of gratitude for a working dishwasher>

As I put a clean measuring spoon back in its holder, I noticed a couple sets of measuring spoons already there. My daughter and I love to bake, and I have kept a few sets of measuring spoons on hand for years so we can measure out multiple ingredients without having to pause to wash measuring spoons in the middle of a recipe. But while I am incredibly happy to have a working dishwasher again, the last few months without one helped remind me that it actually is possible to wash all your dishes by hand, especially if you need a quick turn-around. Who knew? 

I stacked up my favorite set of measuring spoons (the only ones narrow enough to fit in some of my spice jars) and removed all the others: Thank you for your service, buh-bye. As I turned back to finish emptying the dishwasher, I realized what had just happened.

The process of evaluating those measuring spoons was practically subconscious and completed before I realized what I was doing. All of the decision-heavy, time-consuming, slow work of decluttering each space and category of my home has been building decluttering muscles and forming habits in me. 

Wax on, wax off, paint the fence, and wash the car – all along I’ve been reducing my tolerance for clutter and building not just declutter muscles, but decision-making muscles.

NOTE: This was where I was going to insert a calm picture of our charming pink dinosaur holding our only remaining set of measuring spoons. But someone used…quite possibly every baking tool we own while creating carrot cake cupcakes and cream cheese frosting tonight, and they are all currently strewn about the kitchen. (Did I mention how thankful I am for my new dishwasher?) We’re all about keeping it real here, folks.

Week 4, Day 5: Candles, Wallpaper, Party Supplies, and a Big Goal.

Donna Joy

Today I walked into the basement to face a few hidden areas of “what do I stock up on” and decided on a big audacious goal for the day.

The Goal:

Empty this cabinet!

Ok, so as my friend pointed out, emptying the cabinet is not really a big audacious goal. But emptying it and dealing with all the stuff so it doesn’t just become relocated piles of clutter could be. 🙂

The cabinet pictured housed decorations left over from a few events I’ve planned, shelves of candles and holders, an entire shelf of rolled paper like shelf liners and removable wallpaper that jumps out at you if you dare open the cabinet doors as well as some random gift items – a wreath I made for a professional pre-covid but they haven’t been back in their office yet, reusable containers I use for wrapping treats, etc.

While addressing that cabinet I also took a pass at this basement cabinet filled with party supplies. I got overly excited and started emptying it before I remembered to take a “before” picture, so here’s a “during” shot:

Party supplies used to have their own armoire (aka the Party Dresser) up until recently, so this was already an improvement, but after these few weeks of practice I was confident I could clean out enough to make room for whatever I kept from the other cabinet.

A few thoughts from the process:

I have a lot of candle holders. I love candles in my home and for events. But I probably don’t need several dozen votive holders. I don’t plan events like I used to, and I wasn’t using a lot of votive holders at the last few events I did anyway. Buh bye. The floating candles that were an awesome deal? I don’t have a pool, pots of water for floating candles would probably just attract mosquitos outside and I’d likely set my hair or the house on fire if I tried to use them in the tub. Buh bye. The rest of candles got evaluated also, and the keepers got divided between the party cabinet and a drawer upstairs near the dining room table, where I often have tea lights burning. You know, instead of going down two set of stairs to retrieve tea lights every time they burn out.

The removable wallpaper I was keeping for covering the stair risers? I could use it to…wait for it…paper the stair risers! After decluttering, I only had about thirty minutes before needing to drive one of my kids to an appointment, but in just that time I was able to make decent progress on that project, too. I kept the rest of the roll in case I need to replace it once I get around to fixing and painting the trim, but I love how it’s coming!

After relocating the rest of the drawer liner and the paper I expect to use soon to a recently cleaned out drawer in my craft dresser, I was able to fit all the other keep items in the one party cabinet, leaving the tall cabinet…drumroll…..TOTALLY EMPTY!!!

I’m so excited to have another space cleared out! Check out Instagram and Facebook for the after photos!