Junk Selling for Fundraiser Update

This is a picture of a meal that my friend Hritika and her mother prepared for us in their little rented room in the village of Aaru Bari just outside of Kathmandu, Nepal.

For a few years now, I've been doing some fund-raising for my friend's education fund. She is now seventeen years old and graduating in a few months from high school. She will be going on to a public health/nursing program most likely.

All the funds raised have come from selling accumulated clutter and junk--some from my own home but the bulk of it from other people's donated cast-offs that have been stored in my basement and then sold on Craigslist. Thanks to everybody who cleaned out their closets and donated.

From May 2008 until the end of January 2011, the amount raised comes to $3781, including one garage sale which earned just over three hundred dollars.

With my mother's cash donations, the total in this fund is now $4436.

This is clutter put to good use!

The Bedroom Closet was Next...

BEFORE PHOTOS




Although the closet in the hallway drove me to tackle it first, its clean-out inspired a chain-reaction and the bedroom closet became more organized at the same time.












































AFTER PHOTOS






This was mainly due to the bedroom closet becoming a spill-over place for things which truly belonged in the hallway storage but wouldn't currently.


It's unfortunate that once a closet is overcrowded, there is very little incentive to keep it tidy and I found myself ignoring the general higgledy-piggeldyness that resulted over time. Some clothing item would slide out of a basket or be left piled on the chest of drawers at the back and there it would remain.

But when something is uncluttered, there is a sense of how nice it looks and you want it to STAY that way.

As in, "MMMMMMM, flat, clean surfaces....."

I have to call this just PHASE ONE as the closet is still too cluttered. Too many clothes! (And this after actually removing twenty-five hangers worth of clothing and taking them to a clothes trade. I came back from the clothes trade with five items but it was still an improvement. I'm very glad I sold the extra hangers on Craigslist as I certainly didn't want to fill them up again.)

Also, there are some boxes on the floor with contents that I can only describe as "Miscellaneous". I'd like to see them disappear soon.

Still, I now have two relatively organized closets.

Hall Closet of Doom Clean-Out

BEFORE PHOTOS

















It was time for a major closet clean-out. An overhaul. A crap intervention, if you will. I was having trouble reaching the laundry chute. You know there's a problem when you are leaning into your closet space because there is NO floor, and using a long stick to poke mis-aimed stray socks down the chute.



This is the main storage closet upstairs, just outside of the bedrooms and across from the bathroom. Every time I went to get a towel and saw the mess, it made me twitch. But the thought of pulling everything out and spreading it around my tidy bedroom made me want to take a nap.

It most recently became a way-station for the holiday chaos of unwrapped presents and tissue paper and miscellaneous things pulled from my flea market boxes that were potentially presents. There were a bunch of empty toilet paper rolls awaitng their destiny as home-made Christmas crackers. There were souvenirs from our recent trip to Greece and Egypt waiting to be distributed.



But here it was the end of January, and the mess was no longer so Christmas-y. The underlying clutter of old school binders, fraying towels, unused bed linen, Halloween decorations, gift bags, board-games, and old D&D manuals remained.

I could close the door and go have my nap...or I could do something about it..

Once I got started, I realized the bedroom closet had many of the things that belonged in this closet and if I could somehow clean out the hall closet space, it could start a chain reaction and make space in my bedroom closet too.

First I pulled everything off the top shelves and wiped them down. I spread all the mess out in my bedroom (a cringe-worthy action as I have a really tidy bedroom, er, aside from the inside of the closet). But it was easier to with empty shelves.

I got Jeff to come and decide whether he wanted any of his school binders or books. An enormous stack of paper was relegated to the recycling bin, and the remaining books moved into the library.

The board games were organized and put in a small pile.

AFTER PHOTO


The gift boxes and gift bags were corralled onto one shelf.

Unworthy towels were placed in the trunk of our car to be delivered to the SPCA.

I had been keeping one sad-looking sheet because I JUST bought it, but it pilled up in its first wash. That got chucked. An old pillow followed suit.


A lot of items were relegated to the garage sale pile in the basement, which made room for some of the duvets and blankets to be brought out from the bedroom closet.

Sea-grass baskets that used to hold, um, stuff now hold extra towels, table-cloths, and pillow-cases.

There was now room for all three of our suitcases!

But best of all, we can SEE the laundry chute. :)