one at a time

I like this concept of simplifying material possessions.
It is much less overwhelming and easier to approach.
For quite a while I have been reading a wonderful and always evolving blog called 365 Less Things.

The founder, who lives in Australia, got fed up with feeling overcrowded and decided to simplify her home, one item per day, for a year. She took pictures of each thing and gave a bit of backstory for it. She was sure that she would be done within the year.

The blog has been around for several years and still going strong.

Our home, approximately 1000 square feet, would be luxurious in many parts of the world. It is certainly comfortable here, but in the area where I live, it's considered "smallish" for a family of four. I feel fortunate to have two bathrooms but would greatly enjoy a third bedroom. Mr. Minou and I feel very Japanese as we unfold our living room futon couch-bed each evening, and fold it back up and stow our bedding away each morning.

Honestly, this is not a big inconvenience--the only issues are privacy related. Sometimes it's nice to have a door to close for a multitude of reasons, whether it be a nap, couple intimacy, a good cry, or just a place to journal. Also, if someone is staying up late doing homework or a cooking project at the kitchen table, it's hard to go to sleep. Other than that, I kind of enjoy the ritual of it.

I'm digressing though--the point of that foray into sleeping arrangements was that we are trying to pack a lot of living into our smallish home. Two teen boys, an active home office (Minou's architecture business), an online student (myself, at the couch/bed or kitchen table), a passle of cats, a big brown dog...you get the picture. There isn't a lot of storage, and even with a minimum of possessions, things seem to pile up all around before you can blink.

I have found it essential to having a more peaceful, serene home to have fewer possessions. (Note: this does not mean that my home actually is peaceful or serene--see above, I have two teen boys with very different personalities). Also, a designated home for the items we own so that they can be stored away when not in use leads to less clutter and more peacefulness on the material plane.
I see how the phsyical state of our home affects the emotional state of the family.

So, with a busy week coming up, here are 7 items that we no longer use/love.

a bathroom basket

 

some souvenir coasters

 

a small coin purse

 

a CPR face shield, have more

 

much mended gloves

 

seldom-used picnic ware

 

terrible liquor from a White Elephant gift exchange

 

 

winnowing wednesday: minimal closet

At the risk of incurring the wrath of petit minou un, I am showing you my closet. Which is also his closet. Yes, I know that it is messy. The hanging items on the right side, along with the items in the drawers, are almost the entire contents of my wardrobe (I do have a small carry-on bag of seasonal items stored in the attic).

Anyone who knows me personally knows that "fashionable" is not a word very likely to be used to describe me...but I  enjoy clothes! However, as I travel along my path of "less is more", I have become much more careful about a) how I spend money, even on thrift store items and b) what I bring into the house, realizing how much more I value the space and freedom it brings.

I have been thinking about how to create a very small wardrobe of comfortable, versatile, mix-and-matchable, and flattering items, a la Miss Minimalist's ten-item wardrobe. I was inspired yesterday by a post over at the minimalistmom.com about moving toward ethically made, multipurpose clothing items. I followed her link to (r)evolution apparel and was even more inspired by the story of two young travelers who decided to follow their dream and make a difference in the world...with fashion.

Check out the video of the Versalette and "how to rock it"! It's rather amazing, when you consider the design ingenuity involved in creating this multi-use garment (the model is great at showing the quick changes--she could duck into a phone booth and transform her look in a flash). I'm not sure how many of the options I would actually use... but the fact that this one item of clothing can transform from scarf to shawl to hood to top to tunic to skirt to dress is incredible!

I subjected both Minou and p'tit minou un to a complete viewing of the seven minute "How to Rock the Versalette" video, and they in turn subjected me to some teasing. However, Minou did promise (and petit minou un was my witness) that if I gave away fifteen items from my current wardrobe, he would purchase a Versalette for me (from outside our household budget). Game on, mister! (he didn't know that at all times I have a bag of waiting-to-move-out-of the-house items sitting in the closet).

Here is the Versalette in all its glory:

source: http://revolutionapparel.is/pages/sharing-stuff-we-love

And here is the bag of six items ready to go:

I have three more items already selected to be passed on as well, bringing me to nine. Just six more til I order that Versalette. Not a bad trade, fifteen items out for one in that can take the place of  all the others. What color, charcoal or sage? Opinions?

winnowing wednesday

On Mother's Day, my boys gifted me with a bit of Minimalist Mama bliss: decluttering their closets.

Look what is leaving the house!

too-small shoes

p'tit minou 1 pile

p'tit minou 2 pile

I forgot to count the number before bagging it all up for a friend's yard sale fundraiser to send her daughter to college and for our neighbor friend who is still ever so slightly shorter than p'tit minou 2.

I'm guessing there were at least 25 items. However let's just call it 7 for 7 and put the total at 35.

I can hear the empty space singing to me.

wardrobe winnowing wednesday

to winnow: [transitive]
a) to remove, to get rid of b) to sift or separate c) to blow on to remove the wheat from the chaff

Working on the wardrobe this week.  In part those pesky aspirational clothes. 7 items for 7 days:

1) sweater with a snag

2) color not quite me

3) stained, plus needs ironing, never a plus

4) love this shirt, but I will never, repeat never, be a size small

5) ditto

6) ditto

7) would need to minimize myself to fit into these comfy passed down corduroys

And sadly, keeping these aspirational clothes around, no matter how nice they are, will not make them wearable! They just fill up my drawers. Sigh.

Off to enjoy a cleaner closet. 28 items lighter to date.

winnowing wednesday

to winnow: [transitive] a) to remove, to get rid of b) to sift or separate c) to blow on to remove the wheat from the chaff

So...maybe all this Wednesday winnowing needs a little explanation...
(or maybe not, since I think my main readers are family members who have probably heard more than they ever want to about the joys of minimizing)
...but anyway here it is. I can't remember when I started on my personal journey of "living with less", "less is more", or "Mama's gone minimalist!" (well, not really). I do know that it started in earnest quite a few years ago when I began to entertain the notion that we might move one day. At that time, thoughts were swirling around about a possible future transplanting to southern France (Minou's homeland) or Portland, Oregon for graduate school. And then it occurred to me what a horrendous proposition moving house would be.

Little by little, I began to cull and winnow my possessions. Family was sympathetic to this preoccupation as long as it involved upgrading technology--for example, it was a win-win situation when we got rid of our old, gigantic square box TV and traded it in for a smaller flat-screen one for movie watching. Or the move from stereo system to Ipod. You get the idea. And I learned to keep my impatient mitts off of other people's treasures after one too many enthusiastic suggestions that were greeted with alarm and resistance.

Really, the roots of wanting to live with less go much deeper. But let's focus on the results and not the roots for now. Although we have remained firmly settled in place, and indeed have dug in deeper into our little community here, I think that living with fewer possessions and thinking about what we bring into the home has had long-term benefits.

To get specific: It is easier to find things.  It's a heck of a lot easier to clean when there is less to move around. There is less to pick up and put away. In the past, one of my p'tit minous had shelves full of clothes that were deemed unacceptable for school or what-have-you, but still managed to make it through the wash cycle at least once a week (I know you didn't wear that, since you rejected it four mornings this week! Why am I washing it?!) The way our little home is structured, I share a closet space with one p'tit minou and have a single dresser in a shared space--how nice that all my clothes fit into one-third the closet and that dresser.

My goal is just enough--what we need and use, or love and that brings beauty into our lives. Over quite a few years now, I have gone through intensive "decluttering" or "minimizing" efforts in different parts of the house, the attic, the garage we share with my mom. My inspiration tends to come and go in waves--followed by a long dry spell and a slow, steady silting up of new possessions again. I have found that lately with work, classwork, family life, running, commuting, there is not much time for this downsizing process (though I will never forget my favorite anatomy & physiology instructor saying that she discovered an urgent need to clean her closets just before every neuroscience exam--seems to hold true for nursing coursework as well).

Around the New Year on January 1st, I thought seriously about starting a "One a Day Declutter" through the year, inspired by Colleen at the blog 365 Less Things (her motto is "It matters not how fast I go, I hurry faster when I'm slow").  But I abandoned this idea because...well, it was too slow. However, around mid-April it struck me that if I had been doing this all along, that I would already be at least 105 items further along in my quest to find new homes for things that we (I) no longer need, use, or love.

So, Winnowing Wednesday was born. Once a week I will collect the items that I have winnowed or culled from my home once a day throughout the week, photograph them to share with you with a little bit of explanation, and then pack them away into appropriate donate/sell/White Elephant/to friends bags. When the bags are full enough, out they go (except the White Elephant items which will wait for our neighbors' much anticipated Winter Solstice party).

Here we go with this week's 7 for 7:

1) Actually have needed to be returned to their rightful owner for many a month--regret delayed act
2) how many of these can one really use?
3) too holy to wear, even too holy to repair
4) almost gone, but dispenser also broken...
5) its mate is missing
6) not very sharp duplicate
7) in excess

Total count: 21 items.

winnowing wednesday

to winnow: [transitive]  a) to remove, to get rid of b) to sift or separate c) to blow on to remove the wheat from the chaff

Sifting and separating for the week: 7 items for 7 days.

1) recently passed down to me--pretty, but consensus is "Are you expecting?"
2) great film--watched twice--to the White Elephant stash it goes
3) old prescription--off to the Lion's Club--thanks Colleen for the reminder!
4) works well, but Minou upgraded to an industrial one for his business--why keep two?
5) interesting wrap that Da left-- pretty, but I probably won't wear it, so someone else can enjoy
6) passed down, don't fit...(love those recycled clothing bags from friends though)
7) classic, but can borrow from library

Because I love open space. And less to clean & tidy.

winnowing wednesday

to winnow: [transitive] a) to remove, to get rid of  b) to sift or separate c) to blow on to remove the wheat from the chaff

Sifting and separating for the week: 7 items for 7 days.

1) passed down to me--still haven't read--will borrow from library
2) decorative, but in 3 months we have not drawn still-lifes, and missing the lid
3) useful but have other, more solid bags
4) 1993 was the year I studied in Beijing and used this
5) not sure where this came from...I did used to make quilts
6) passed down to me--watched once--will go to next year's White Elephant gift exchange
7) doesn't fit!