Everytime we are blessed with a child, our home gets a revamp.Once the 1st trimester blahs go away, my new burst of energy almost always leads to the re-organising and de-cluttering of the home. This nesting mode often makes my dh very wary since he is the one who has to haul the furniture around the house. Our previous 2 homes were single storey apartments, so moving cupboards/shelves/beds around wasn’t too bad. However, our current home is a 2-storey apartment. So moving the heavier and bulkier furniture up and down is going to be a challenge! Any one wants to volunteer their dhs?
One of the 1st things we did was to prepare to move our 22mth old toddler to the girls’ room. Upgrading her to a toddler bed was the 1st step. Soon, she’ll move in with her 2 older sisters. Now that is another story since she is one gal who hates changes!
De-cluttering is a major exercise when the nesting instinct hits. All of a sudden, the clutter and messiness of the house gets to me and I start thowing out stuff and do really deep cleaning! Ahh! As if the baby cares, eh? But I take advantage of this feeling to get stuff out of the house! Afterall, we need to make space for one more body in the house!
How do I de-clutter?
My modus operandi is to attack room-by-room. In this case, I attacked the rooms on the lower floor 1st. The balcony with the toy shelves was the 1st to be dealth with.
Then the study. Each child gets his/her own shelf. All their school books/files and pencil cases go into that shelf. Completed workbooks are placed in a box to be filed away for at least 1 yr before being thrown out.
The kitchen was next. Thankfully, not much clutter has accumulated in the cabinets as I had done a very thorough job when we moved. Everything that did not get used or did not match were given away or thrown out.
The main source of “clutter” in the living room is the bookshelves. Not much can be de-cluttered there as that’s where we store our referral books and curriculum.
I then tackle the 3 bedrooms as ONE entity. The boys’ room contains 2 bookshelves of children’s fiction books, 2 boxes of puzzles(already purged) and our photo albums. The girls’ rooms houses a linen cupboard (only the children’s bedsheets and pillowcases) and a chest that holds their old clothes. So there’s actually very little to de-clutter. The biggest item is clothes! Simply because there are 7, soon to be 8, of us in the house. Even if each of us only had 5pieces of clothing, that works out to be a lot of clothes to keep!
How do I decide what stays and what goes?
Toys – toys that are not played with will be either thrown out or given away. This includes board games. Even “educational” toys. Gasp! Yep. I get quite heartless. There are toys/games that I feel are good but if no one is playing with them, then it has become clutter. I might as well bless someone with them. As we have been blessed, so should we be a blessing. Those that I really, really like and think I can convince them that they are great games, I put aside in a box. I have told myself that if after 3 – 6mths, no one, including me, has asked about them, I shall pass them on.
Books – the same principle applies to books. Obviously, solid Christian and/or creation based books are to be kept. Fluff will be thrown out. I try to have books that are suitable for the different age groups so that at any one time, any child can go to the bookshelves and pull out a few books to keep themselves occupied.
Clothes – this has been easy to pare down. Those that are immodest or scruffy will not be considered. What’s considered immodest to us are obviously short skirts and spaghetti tops/dresses. Outfits that are too sheer also get the boot. I keep a few tight fitting tees for the girls to wear under their too large dresses so that they don’t expose their bodies inadvertently.
Because we are open to have as many children as the Lord blesses us, I’ve always kept a few pieces of boy and girl baby clothes. But realistically speaking, since my younger ds is almost 5, I will be passing on all the boy clothes that are too small for him. If the Lord should bless us with another baby, it’ll be at least another 2yrs or so. And what if it is a girl, again? Then I’ll be hanging on to a huge bagful of clothes that is gathering dust and occupying space! I can trust the Lord to provide if and when He blesses us with a boy. I do not want to end up hoarding stuff.
Knick Knacks – put simply, we don’t have these in the house. Yes, I know they can beautify the home but practically, they just add to our workload. The only knick knacks we have in the home are photographs of our family.
I hope this gives you some idea of what to do when you wish to de-clutter your own home. And no, you don’t have to wait till you are pregnant to do this! I was determined to de-clutter coz I realise that it was difficult for my ds to vacuum the house when he had to keep on moving pieces of “stuff” around. So if you are finding it hard to keep up with your chores, or that cleaning the house is taking too long, then it is probably time for you to de-clutter.
Another tip – try to not have stuff on the floor. Leave your floors as bare as possible so that vacuuming and mopping are a breeze. You don’t have to waste time moving items from place to place as you vacuum/mop.