Loving Your Clutter

"Clutter" is a buzzword that seems to be everywhere these days! You can hardly look at a magazine cover without seeing something about it! It seems the entire nation is decluttering! I am sort of happy about this because I find a lot of items at the antique stores and thrift stores these days that I think were victims of a decluttering frenzy! Okay, if you are laughing, you should be!

Honestly, though, I, too, have been trying to declutter. There is something about clean countertops, a clean expanse of floor, and a neat-looking home that brings a sense of peace. However, I seem to thrive on a certain level of chaos and I must have some clutter in order to survive! I like my collections of "stuff" and I intend to keep blowing the dust of off them as I walk by them from time to time!

By the way, if you are going to declutter, don't think you can do it in a day! I made the mistake of going on a decluttering rampage a couple of years ago when the buzzword first hit the scene! My goal was to declutter about 7 years' worth of clutter and do it that day. My husband came home to a house that looked like a UPS loading dock! Our marriage survived the day, but I will NEVER do that again!

Let me share my big basket idea! It is what I do with daily clutter!

Lynn's Big Basket Idea! I know the goal is to declutter, but with 4 children, there are constantly "things" coming into the house that just cannot be thrown away. I keep a big, pretty basket in each room of the house that receives heavy traffic. The "things" that are left lying around taking up space get put into the big basket! This keeps the room neat and makes it very handy to find things, such as lost sunglasses from the kindergarten "prize box," erasers that accidentally fall off pencils, CD ROMs, or whatever! The baskets can be cleaned out on a weekly or monthly basis to get rid of things that are no longer needed!