REDUCING THE STUFFS

As a minimalist by nature, most people think I don’t have enough “stuff” to necessitate getting rid of anything…but we can all fall victim to accumulation. Not-to-mention I have a fiance who comes with many years of living at the same property.

We did have some large successes cleaning, clearing out and organizing our basement storage area, our outdoor garden shed, and our garage. It’s funny how you initially dread these activities (well, some of us actually LOVE donating things or throwing crap away!), but once you start to see a little progress, it’s easy to keep the momentum going. After we completed those areas, we moved on to clean out our office closet and the storage area in our guest room. That led me to “find” some items I hadn’t seen in a while, which then led me to reorganize our spaces much more efficiently.

Next, I moved on to my bathroom and kitchen, as I didn’t feel they were working as well as they could have. I used the trick of asking myself when I’ve used various products and anything untouched in over a year went into a pile.

I’m also a sucker for travel sizes of personal care products. Every so often I’ll pass on products to others who may want to try something new, or I’ll commit to using my mini shampoos, soaps and various other beauty products until I’ve thinned out the herd. This also means that I don’t have to buy any large-scale products for a few weeks (saving us money) and I get to make room in my “travel” drawer at the same time.

ONLINE SELLING

Through our efforts with decluttering, reorganizing and prioritizing, we identified a few items with a fair amount of value that we decided to sell on Craig’s List. Considering that many people are looking to shop online (now more than ever), we were able to sell our items pretty quickly. It’s worth a try, considering that just donating items don’t bring in any compensation.

GROOMING

Since working from home, I’ve been getting used to spending more time on health and beauty aspects. I know that sounds counter-intuitive in a way, considering that I’ve been teleworking in yoga pants every day and only washing my hair as needed, but the lack of wearing makeup, fixing my hair, combined with getting more sleep, has made my skin and hair look amazing!

These days, I’ve been painting my own nails, deep conditioning my hair regularly, flossing my teeth daily (which I usually forget when I’m in a hurry to get to bed), deep cleaning my face before applying face masks, and exfoliating from head to toe. I even learned to use an electric trimmer to cut my fiance’s hair. None of this costs much money…just a little extra time during the day…that I now have. Plus, at $20 a cut, we are set to save about $340 for the year if I permanently cut my fiance’s hair!

It has definitely been a year of purging…but with not much to do but stay inside for months, I’m not upset with the results. We have managed to do a few years of projects in 6 months, and it feels amazing. And with all the uncertainty surrounding us, I was very happy to make money selling some things that no longer served us, and saving money in various ways! Always looking for the bright side of the situation…