Last words on the daily decluttering challenge

Once you start postponing, you'll lose track. This is exactly what happened to me. I started bundling up the daily challenges and eventually forgot about the bundles too. In other words I completely failed April's challenge of daily decluttering every nook and cranny of the house.

As it happens, my friend was in the town during April and wanted her IKEA canvas back that I had been storing for her for years now. Talk about law of attraction. Once you start moving items forward, the rest follows.

The good news is that:
1. I watched a documentary called Minimalism and it really did inspire me to tackle the ever-growing pile of stuff in the house and question every new "need" for stuff.
2. I managed to get rid of a lot of stuff. I donated to King's Day Sales, I took things to the recycling centers where the items are sold for a small profit, I took some great books to small miniature libraries around the city and I simply cut four cargo bike's full loads of things from our house.
3. I have now a better understanding where I can find things around the house. When you cut the amount, the rest isn't hard to remember. Who knew!
4. My children and husband Miles were super easy to get on the bandwagon. I think we were all are somewhat having a similar feeling of suffocating in material possessions at this point. Kids still have sooooo many toys, but I didn't ask anyone to give up anything they liked and we still managed to give up so much.

One of the first loads to the recycling center.

Last week Miles took the kids to his mother's for the first time without me. I had four days of quietness and I managed to clean things in the house I didn't even realize needed cleaning. The family was utterly surprised when they got back home, but on the next day it all seemed like no one ever had heard of the concept of cleaning... Right then and there I decided not to sweat the small stuff and simply be happy it's at least somewhat easier right now to tidy things up when everything has its place (more or less at least).

This is a miniature neighborhood library that is found a lot in the Netherlands. You can bring a book, borrow one or trade one. I often find good ones in these, which I return once I'm done. I also dispose good books that I have to these.

So even if I failed the daily challenges in the end, I was busy with the concept of decluttering every day of the month, which in the big picture is a win situation for myself. Now looking forward to the May Gratitude Challenge!