Decluttering To Do List UPDATE

December is always a really busy time for me between the holiday hullabaloo, my birthday and work deadlines.  I knew I wouldn't get much done until after Christmas and I was right.  Unfortunately, I got sick a few days after Christmas and that lasted pretty much until February.  While I was sick, clutter started to accumulate again, not to mention that I still had donations to get out, recycling, etc.  Luckily, most of that was just surface clutter that I was able to clear out quickly once I was feeling better.  Plans with a friend to come over and scrapbook, was the impetus I needed to get the lingering donation boxes out and tidy things up even more.

While I was sick, whenever I could, I started working through the GINORMOUS pile of memorabilia.  I knew this was stuff that would take more time to go through so it was set aside while I went through the general decluttering progress in November.  Happy to say that I've been through pretty much the entire original pile of memorabilia.  Unfortunately, the pile grew again as I started going through the craft room.  Sentimental clutter is my main weakness, with future clutter a close second.  I wish I could just dump it all but I've lost so much in my lifetime that keeping the memories are important to me.  That said, I do have a plan to limit the amount of emotional/sentimental clutter AND to keep it from getting out of control again.  So far everything I have kept is neatly organized and almost all of it is in chronological order.

I made a HUGE dent in the craft room mess.  Knowing I had a scrapbook date with my friend Gwen helped a lot but also just wanting to justify the expense of having an extra bedroom and the cost of all the items in it.

• Living Room
• Holiday Closet - Mostly done.  I went through everything except my boxes of ornaments, which I will do Christmas 2016.
• Futon
• Under
• Dining Room
• Jewelry cart - plan to tackle this after I get the rest of the craft room done as I hope to find a home for it in there.
• Bookcases - no plan to tackle these until this summer (closer to move date)
• Craft Room
• Piles in front of closet and bookcase
• Side table
• Closet  - So my closet was completely full of tubs of stuff from floor to shelf.  I found three tubs full of kitchen stuff in there!!!  Half of what was in there is now gone and there is room to store stuff that has been housed in my living and dining room.
• Shelf - IN PROGRESS - only two boxes on the right side haven't been gone through but all their contents was already organized so I'm okay with that for now.
• Right side
• Left side
• Bookcase - IN PROGRESS - two shelves were completely cleared and now house some organized items.  All other shelves are somewhat organized but still need to be gone through at some point.
• Cabinet
• Top - IN PROGRESS - went through it all but that was before I had an organizational plan so will need to go through it again.
• Inside
• Desk 1
• Top
• Drawer
• Underneath - This was HUGE.  This is pretty much where all my scrapbooking paper was.  It's all been completely organized according to Tiffany Spaulding's four section system.
• Desk 2
• Top
• Drawer
• Underneath
• Table
• Top
• Underneath
• Right side 
• Drawer - this used to be my dining room table and the entire contents of this drawer is for dinner parties.  Even though it's completely illogical to keep this in here, I'm going to continue it for now.
• File cabinet
• Shelf
• Drawer
• Top

This list doesn't even fully do justice to the mess that was my craft room.  I seriously could not get in the door because of the boxes and piles of crap everywhere.  I took pictures so I could visually document my progress and as a reminder to never let it get like this again.  I still have piles/boxes of things around the room, but they are all categorized (not organized).  Basically, as I went through each little pile of stuff, I sorted it by category.  So all my paints are together.  All my stamps are in one place, etc.  Basically, everything was a mess and disorganized.  So much so you could tell I couldn't find supplies for a project so I went out and bought duplicate stuff.  UGH.

Using Tiffany's system and some of my own ideas, this will not happen again.  I still have a LONG way to go before I've gone through everything in the craft room, let alone fully organizing it and getting it into shape; however, where it is now is a GIANT step forward!!!