Lets me bring you up to date with the project. The history of my decluttering, 2007-2015, is summarised in post no. 2569 on the TMF Decluttering board:
In December 2007 I sold a fully furnished three-bedroomed holiday house, sans the furnishings and a loft full of junk which all landed in my own small house.
Having deluttered that lot to some extent, in September 2008 I sold that house and moved to a tiny two-bedroomed rented bungalow. I had to get rid of loads just to fit us in.
In March 2010 I bought my present home, a small three bedroomed bungalow. Its hard to declutter entirely before a move, because you don't know what will suit the new house, so some of it has to be done afterwards. Work troubles and illness delayed that, but in 2011 I made a good start.
In 2012 I fell ill again, and then Dad fell ill and in 2013 I inherited my parents' lifetime possessions, the entire contents of a large detached house, double garage, shed etc. What a setback. It was worse than clearing my own stuff.
Having mostly cleared his house, in 2014 I found a buyer for it. In my house I set to to clear my garage. Before completing the sale of Dads house I had to clear out the oddments of furniture that were still there and the last vanload of stuff from the outbuildings. It didnt look much where it was, but it does in my small home. With building work imminent, I am getting started again.
That decluttering thread ends with most of my remaining house contents going into store during the building work. I have managed quite well without them. Now they are back
![Sad :-(](./images/smilies/icon_e_sad.gif)
I am opening them very gingerly, I can tell you. What the heck is all this stuff i have done without for a year? I mentioned yesterday that I would sort out the bedding first, so that is going on in the background. I am washing and drying pillows and duvets and so on, preparatory to winnowing the stock down to a minimum.
Today I have advertised an air cooler on Freecycle. I was pleasantly surprised this summer to find that with the removal of the glass porch at the front of the house I have lost a significant heat store. It got tremendously hot in there on sunny summer days and then presumably released the heat slowly into the house all evening,. I have a large open porch now, like a long loggia (not with arches) on the front of the house, relatively shady. So no need to cool the house at night.
Also advertised a cat carrier, the one that came with the little cat that passed away
![Sad :-(](./images/smilies/icon_e_sad.gif)
I have put two rather battered (by TJ) bedside tables in the car to take to the recycling centre. While they were in store the new next door neighbour offered me some from his previous house that are better, so I am keeping those instead. Illustrating Thoreau's assertion that there is never a need to buy furniture, everyone has an attic full they can pass on to you.
On to the boxes. I started on one in the kitchen and the first thing that came out was an empty Robinson's squash bottle. What a ridiculous thing to store! It didnt seem so ridiculous to keep it in the first place, it case it came in useful, but a year in store has certainly shown that it didnt.
I noticed just now that a lidded rectangular seagrass box has appeared near my desk. Packed full, when I opened it, of old copies of Investors Chronicle and Which, dated just before the move into store. When on earth did I think I was going to read them? I have a new pile of much more up to date unread magazines now. Maybe one day, when I finish decluttering, I shall have time actually to keep up with reading them each week.
So I thought would start posting about this again, for some moral support. The clutter is neatly corralled at present, mostly in these boxes. I have a one-off chance to get rid of it as it comes out.
T