Woo Hoo!!! So much is gone, more to do, though

It started as a project to get my back bedroom cleared out and made into a bedroom for my sons to sleep in at Christmas, and it's taken on a life of its own. I had two rooms that were pretty much unusable, due to years of accumulated clutter. Couldn't walk through my garage at all!

Well, over the last two months, I've given or thrown away at least half of that clutter. The back bedroom is now a bedroom again, with two twin beds, made and ready for Christmas. The "junk room" is now halfway cleared out, and I can walk easily in it. All the boxes stacked up against the wall in my bedroom are now back in the junk room where they belong.

I've stopped pretty much decluttering, because I have so much more to do before Christmas, but this house is so much nicer I can't stand it!

My LR is now my LR again, and my DR is well on its way. I got rid of the treadmill that had been in the LR for years, unused. Sold it for $20 and now it's GONE! FINALLY got to rescue my antique rocking horse from the junk room and put it back into the LR. After today, my DR will be done, and ready to serve it's true purpose once more.

How did I do this? I got down and dirty with it. I had a yard sale, and sold NOTHING but some plants, so I just offered the leftovers up for free, and got rid of them. Offered some other stuff up for free, but no one came to get it, so I gave it all to Goodwill and the no-kill animal shelter thrift store. I had been hanging onto a lot of this stuff for years, thinking I would sell it, but I finally had to admit that it had to go. It was hard not to go through it and keep things, but I resisted temptation, and didn't do it. I sold some of the better things on Craigslist.

Since I had to stop to get other stuff done, I was at one point just throwing stuff into "keep" boxes to be gone through after Christmas. I'll be tossing out lots more stuff then, and giving more away. I haven't even started going through boxes stashed in closets or the attic yet, and one son asked me not to toss anything he had left here out until he had gone through it.

I'm thinking I'll have almost as much to get rid of when I finally go through that stuff. All in all, I threw out or tossed away 5 huge black yard bags full of junk, and gave away enough to fill an SUV and then probably enough to half fill one again.

I'm a true hoarder, ladies, so it can be done. You just have to make your mind up, and do it a little at a time if necessary. I started by sitting here watching t.v. with a box or bag of old papers on one side, and a black trash bag on the other, sorting and tossing as I went along. I just kept telling myself to just "keep moving"...sometimes just tossing one little thing at a time until it was done.