Entry ways

Today I decided to conquer the entry areas.  Moving the ppiles of shoes coats toys and junk was challenging but I got it done in about 2 hours.
Here are the two pictures, before and after.

Rainy day

Just wanted to stay home today but got moving and finally took all that recycling in in the pouring rain.  Also got rid of two bags of stuff through freecycle.
Todays tally
10 bags
three boxes.
Tomorrow to go through the girls clothes and take to second hand store.

Tally so far

Ok so here is the tally so far
8 garbage bags
1 large bin
1 small bin

Recycling challenge

Good results so far!  My minivan is so full of recycling there is barely enough room for me and the kids to fit!

My office

This is my office.  Which also holds the play house which won't fit in the playroom.

Starting pictures

Here are the start out pictures.  I want to make this better!
This is the utensil spinner.  Doesn't seem so bad but I have two stuffed full!

Step one day one

Ok so I decided today what I would do is go through the whole house and collect all the recycling and take it all away.  I will let you know how it goes.

The thing about stuff

There are two kinds of people.  Ones who form lasting attachments to stuff and those who don't.  The two sides have a hard time understanding each other.  The people who don't form attachments don't understand why people can't just throw things away and the others don't understand why they can.
People who hoard come in varying degrees.  From those who can throw some things away to those who can not throw anything away.  The collection of things fills almost a visceral need to surround yourself with things.  Some people can live with a toothbrush and a change of underwear but for people who hoard they do not feel safe or whole until they are surrounded by their things and when some of it goes they feel varying degrees of loss from a sadness to a paralyzing sense of devastation.  It is like they don't feel whole unless tey are surrounded by piles of stuff.
Neither is able to understand the other as they think in completely different ways.  For the non hoarder things are just things they have no attachment to their items.  For hoarders each item has a meaning and personal significance.  This makes it much harder to remove nay of the items from their home.  It is like a piece of themselves goes missing. 
People who don't hoard can cast off things like the wind casts the leave from the trees into oblivion without a care.  For the hoarder each thing is a building block to their identity and sceurity and each removal threatens thier stability.
Hoarders may envy those who can discard anything but to them it is almost impossible to seperate themselves from thier belongings.
So I am guessing by now you can guess where I fall.  So this challenge will be definitely that a challenge to my way of thinking and my attachments to the items in our house.

Beginning

Every year I panic at the thought of Christmas coming.  So many plans so many unfulfilled dreams.  All because I can not get a hold on the clutter in our house. 

I have always been a keeper of things,  Like some kind of disease I just can not get rid of stuff!  As a result we are all suffering and I am in a continual state of stress because of the state of our house.  So this year I am pledging to get it under control so I can relax at Christmas and start the new year with a new vision for our house.  

I have four months from today and I am really going to try to make it happen.

I will be posting some starting pictures and hopefully some completed pictures.

Also I will be keeping a tally of all the boxes of stuff that leave our house.

Wish me luck!