Inspired to declutter! and other weekend accomplishments

[abendgules]

purple_peril has a knack for inspiring others!  She's decluttering, and is bravely talking about it too.

While my own decluttering this weekend was limited to cleaning, I've found a fascinating amount of info on da Intawebs about hoarding and OCD, that I wasn't aware of.

I bring this up partly for myself. I've done a lot of decluttering in my time, but I still find it hard hard hard and emotionally draining, and it makes every house move an ordeal. But I also raise it because of the hoarders I know in the SCA, and in similar circles. 

Either smart, creative, and thoughtful people are more prone to it, or there's something offered in our Society that appeals to somewhat obsessive personalities. :-)

Very clear and easy to read article
http://understanding_ocd.tripod.com/hoarding1_why.html

A cheery and very human self-help site - includes forum 
http://www.squalorsurvivors.com/

General useful info, but not as personable 
http://www.ocfoundation.org/hoarding/index.php

This weekend, I settled for much-needed vacuuming, and some laundry towards filling a charity bag with clothes.

This was still too much activity for my grumpy rib muscles.
I'm still pondering the best use of SCA t-shirts. If I save them for a quilt,  or even a rag rug, I think I'm just putting off a decision to part with stuff. (Incidentally, you can use nalbinding to make rag rugs. Should be more info in the nalbinding Yahoogroup if anyone's really interested. I made one hooked-rug pillow in my yoof, and swore: never ever again. Ugh.)

I'm not very good at making non-SCA items: the closest I've come recently is this fabric-scrap crazy quilt, and even it's lagging somewhat!  

Past experience speaks: I carted around pieces of lovely lovely fabric for years in Canada, promising I'd make nice work clothes for myself. Hah. So far I've only succumbed to that temptation (buying mundane fabric) once since moving here, and sure enough, the skirt is still waiting to be finished...maybe this summer. Even finishing quickie broomstick skirts was a challenge! 

So I know that me making mundane-use stuff is unlikely. I'm happiest when my SCA stuff qualifies as usable every day (like canvas bags, and furniture, and woolly socks).

Other weekend accomplishments:
Finished blocking and lining the small knitted pouches, and lacing them with drawstrings.
Almost finished the recut linen shirt - just a bit more work on the new neckline!
Assembled several strips and sections of linen and cotton for quilt backing
Another few rows on the Baby Project of Doom - I'm now into new territory, having made it past the point that I ripped out previously - result!

The front and back sections of the quilt are now started, and are so far pretty different sizes. I need to double the width of the front panel, and make it longer, to come close to the back. I'm hoping to have enough enthusiasm to actually make it double-bed size, but even a big lap quilt would be an accomplishment. 

I want to try to keep up my momentum - I don't really want to be hand-stitching wool through the summer.

This evening's goal - start a sampler for Eleanor of Toledo style socks at the pub stitch n bitch.

Comments

[sismith42.livejournal.com]

1. Are rag rugs period (or perioid-enough)?
2. If you started the project now, and carried on with it as and when you had another dead t-shirt, wouldn't that count as a work in progress, and not a pile of putting things off? ;-)

[xrian.livejournal.com]

Part of it, I think, is that de-cluttering involves making all those dratted DECISIONS about whether to keep something, where to put it, et cetera. I find that very tiring, and some days one just doesn't have that much brain power.

Where I usually get stopped in my own tidying efforts is when I know I want to keep something, but haven't the faintest idea where I ought to put it because it doesn't have a defined "place."

I do get a sense of progress, though, with my "clutter box" system. I try to keep a current, at least partly empty clutter box in my living room (under the work table) and that's where "things that don't belong here, but I can't or don't want to put them away properly right now" go. When the box gets full, it gets closed up and put in the garage (after a quick look through to determine nothing truly vital is in it).

Then periodically I'll go through the current cluster of clutter boxes and pull out, for instance, all the fabric scraps, sort them, and put them where they should go. Or all the electrical-gadget-related things. Or all the "desk things" like pens, pencils and so forth.

This is surprisingly effective: the various additions and subtractions pretty much balance out, keeping the total "clutter box" population at about 6 or 7. (Though admittedly, papers and mail have another, entirely separate set of clutter boxes....)

And one thing I like about this system is that when something is missing, I have one well-defined place to look for it in. If I've been picking up the house at all regularly, the chances are very good that the Missing Thing is not going to be in the back of a drawer or a corner of the bookcase, it will be in one of the Clutter Boxes.

(Works for me, anyway....)

[dubhease.livejournal.com]

I'm trying to figure out what to do with concert t-shirts that I can't bear to part with but would never wear (shrunk over the years, and nothing says "I'm old" like wearing a shirt with tour dates in the 80's). I'm thinking about cutting them into squares and doing a blocked padded message board. If you come up with any great ideas, let me know.

I'm in decluttering mode too.