#363: Your Advent De-Clutter Challenge!

Hello my friends. Happy Advent welcome to today’s episode. I’m so happy you are here. So this is a super short Advent, I feel like this is maybe the shortest it can get with us having let me pull my calendar back up. But I know it’s crazy short. Yeah, like Christmas is Monday. So we have one day of the fourth week of Advent. So rest assured I am not here today to add a million things to your plate. And I know this is a crazy, full hectic, beautiful time of the year. And you know, I don’t want it to be one more thing that’s super challenging, super daunting of like, Oh, my goodness, I know I have to do this or, you know, bad timing for this, whatever. I do think Advent is really great time to create space, you know, even pre Advent. So maybe this podcast should have been time for November. But I personally usually end up doing this kind of throughout Advent, where I’m trying to make space for the Savior. Right? That is the point of adventures like preparing our hearts. But physical preparation can really help to I mean, we cannot separate talked about this a lot on the podcast, we cannot isolate, oh, that’s for my mental health. That’s my physical health, that’s very spiritual health. We are whole beings, and all of these areas of ourselves work together. And our physical environment can either help or hinder these other aspects of us. So for example, like if I woke up, and I was like, I’m gonna wake up early to pray. But I go sit in my living room, and I’m just attacked by clutter, visually, not actually attacked. But I’m sitting there like, hi, I gotta do this, oh, my gosh, that pile over there. Like, oh, yeah, I didn’t pay that bill yet. Whatever. I am not going to be able to quiet my mind, quiet my heart, and all that. So this, you know, goes into every other area. Same thing, if I’m trying to work out in a space that’s just crazy and hectic. Like we’re all busy moms, majority of us here listening. And if not, you might not be a mom, but she might be very busy as well. And you know, there are times obviously I have to take my kettlebell to the playroom and just work out among a bunch of little people. And it is what it is. But it’s not ideal environment does have a really big factor. So I love doing this before Christmas. Because also if you have kids, you know that new toys are going to be coming into the picture. It also just feels like a lot. There are a lot of things added in like, there’s this point where I’m like, oh my goodness, I need to give out these Christmas gifts. Because I’ve had this box sitting here. I usually I don’t know, everybody’s got their own methods. But I usually try to wrap before. Ideally I am shopped and wrapped before Advent doesn’t always happen this year. I was definitely shooting for that because of the baby being due December 3. So hopefully by the time you’re listening to this, I am blissfully because that’s all newborn stages bliss, right? Let’s fully rocking a newborn, and not worrying about my Christmas list. The reality is I’ll probably be writing some notes for my husband like, can you please stop and grab this gift card or Oh, I forgot this person. And you know, that inevitably happens. But anyways, my goal is usually be shocked and wrapped in it. A lot of you do that too before Advent and then it’s but then the downfall is sitting in big boxes. And I still got wrapping paper and all this stuff. So even just seeing piles of gifts makes you want to kind of simplify the rest. So my approach here I’ve given different approaches.

Last year, we talked about this too, you could go back and listen to that episode. I didn’t. So I’m not sure what I said last year, but I do clean like when we’re talking about actually cleaning and whatnot. I do that quarterly. So that’ll be coming up again, January I deep cleaned my house in October, which was well timed for before the baby I was like good, I’m going to have hopefully decent energy. It’ll still be pretty clean by the time like the baby comes home be sitting there looking at cobwebs in the corner, because I just did it a couple of weeks ago. And then hopefully, like I’ll be itching to do stuff again. And you know, then once you take it down all the Christmas stuff in January usually want to deep clean again. So I do that and I have an episode of podcast episode that’s you’d have to go back a little bit. But if you scroll through, it’s called like my Quarterly, weekly and daily cleaning routines and really not strayed from that I do the same kind of thing quarterly. So vacuuming the mattresses, all that jazz. So I’m not talking about cleaning. I’m just talking about decluttering today. So this is kind of in addition, I’m doing those things quarterly. But these are things that we don’t check in on all the time that you’re just gonna feel so much better. If you can’t print some of this clutter before. Sweet baby Jesus comes also before we head into the new year, and you just want to throw everything out, burn it down, you know. So what I’m going to do is just give three areas that I’m going to declutter this Advent. Hopefully I did this before the baby actually a little bit pre Advent. And one of them I know actually yeah. To at the time of recording this, I’m recording this in October. I’ve done two of these, and I’m still working on the third. So I’ll let you know what these are as we go through. But my thought because it is such as I thought about, like, should I make a little calendar to share with all of you that has like a task a day, some of you might love that I actually usually get overwhelmed by that content. If I miss a day, I’m like, oh, shoot, I didn’t do that. And I didn’t do that. So now I can’t do all three of these things in one day.

So I’m just gonna give three areas that I think would really help you out to declutter and make space in your mind and heart. And then there’s essentially, by the time you listen to this, especially if you’re not even listening, the day it comes out, which I don’t expect all of you to, there’s like about that week, right? Because this is gonna come out on Tuesday. So you could work on one of these that whole rest of the week. Then the second one, that whole second week of Advent, the third one, the whole third week of admin, there’s still space in there where you can obviously, if you’re working on something for six days, day rest, of course, then you can combine things, you know, I think it’s very doable to just think of three general areas, and then give you freedom and how you want to do that. So will happen to him that I’ll talk about it.

So number one is kids toys. I think this is so pivotal, like, I am sure a lot of you, like myself are going through and ditching stuff all the time. When you’re just sitting and playing. If it’s to be I’ll be sitting and playing, I’m like you haven’t touched this a long time, throw it in the box, like when you’re not looking or I know we all have our own methods, some people like to involve their kids on it all the stuff. So however you usually do it, but this is a really great time to do it, since like I said, more is probably coming in, even if you’re very minimal about it. And we are pretty darn minimal. We it’s literally my parents buy each child like one gift for Christmas, because they have 18 grandkids. And that’s also five is all they need to do. So that’s still a ton for them. And then godparents buy them a gift, because again, we’ll have 18 nieces and nephews, and we’re not buying for every single person. So each kid really is getting like two gifts coming in. And then we’ll get them. I guess that’s a whole thing we could discuss. But we we’ve done the like, want need were read some years. Some years, we’ve done like three gifts, because baby Jesus got three gifts, and then a stocking or whatever, I at the time of recording this, I only have things saved to my Amazon parks and waiting for Prime days. So I haven’t done it yet. But what I did last year, I think was like stockings, one gift per kid that was like specific to them. And then several shared gifts. So like a Lego train set, or remote controlled monster trucks because we just our two boys were older than one year old didn’t really need that yet. So that was like a shared gift, like that kind of stuff. So this year I do I’m telling you right now I have things like that are mostly shared stuff in my Amazon cart. So like a little archery set, little suction cup archery set, that’ll be a shared gift, things like that it is really convenient that my kids are. So my kids, if you do not know are six, four, and two, all boys are very into a lot of the same stuff. Now, obviously, there’s differentiation in my six year olds more into Legos and things like that. So the older stuff, and you know, and that’s what stockings are for a little bit too, we do differentiate. So everybody’s got their own thing. But I’m just saying we don’t even have a ton coming in. I still like to go through their toys. So we one go through your kids toys. And however you want to do it if I think this one might be easier to just do in one shot because it’s kind of unless you’ve chosen a bunch of places maybe you want to do one day you go through the toys in their room. One day you go through playroom or whatever it looks like. For us, it’s pretty central, like we have a play room. And then we have one trunk in the living room of choice B they only have magnet tiles in their bedroom. So magnet tiles and books. So we just I just usually like when they’re playing kind of go through it. I just like I don’t make a big deal out of it. I just pick up like the other day I did this was like this dump truck. No one’s touched in a long time, stick it over to the side. And I just kind of move things over until then once they’re on to something else, like they’re eating lunch or whatever, I’ll go grab a bag and toss it all in. Then no one has ever asked about this. Like, again, I’m pretty selective. I know some people do the like, put the bag in the basement, wait and see if they ask for something. So whatever method you want to do here or involve your kids on it, if they ask you, like, hey,
we do talk about that. I mean, we have done that some years. So far. I haven’t this year though. We’re like, okay, like, you know, you’ll probably be getting some new things. So we need to give some of our things away and have that conversation but whatever it looks like if you don’t have little kids at home and you’re listening to this because many of you as grown kids, pick your area for this one. Okay, so you get a freebie. If you just listen to all of that the next two should apply to you. But you get a bonus area so maybe you want to declutter your kitchen, maybe appliances As are your drawers or something like that, or your office, if you have a home office or something like that, that is not in the next two categories. So that’s what I focused on first.

Um, next up is digital clutter. This is a huge one, I think you need at least a week. So this is the one that I have done the this one on the next one I’ve done already. That first one Kids Toys we’re still kind of working through. That’s why I was like, yeah, maybe I’ll involve them, maybe I won’t, because I have just been slowly siphoning some of them away. But this digital one weighs on me, like crazy. Like, this is the one that if my phone starts glitching or I go to take a picture of dinosaurs, I’m like, I just really need to do this. But I need to make sure that my phone like my all the stuffs on my computer before I do, or it’s on the cloud or whatever your methods. So again, you have like a whole week here, just tackle it how is best for you, if you want to go through and say like, I’m going to delete and just get it on my phone one day, like one sitting sit down, see how much you can do. And timers really helped me to when I’m decluttering I should add that, like, Okay, I only have 15 minutes, but I’m gonna see what I can do with 15 minutes. So maybe you do 15 minutes a day and just see what you get done in a week. And it’ll be better than you know, when you started. So then you still see progress, even if you didn’t quote unquote, finish it because this especially is one I feel like I’m never done with. So I did this before the baby. And I done this for every baby just because I want to make sure I have space on my phone, or at the hospital, like to take pictures or videos or, you know, whatever. And I want to make sure everything’s backed up before I delete stuff. So I kind of do both. Just one night, I just took my laptop, you just take my laptop in bed, but my husband was reading took my laptop Min was like I’m just gonna look through and get rid of some of these things, get rid of duplicates, make sure everything’s in the right folders. Everybody has their own system, I personally use Dropbox, which I still worry about, because a lot of Dropbox goes down one day because all this is here. So I used to do like Dropbox and on my computer, and on a flash drive, which like Flash drives are done now. So I this is you know, these are things areas I need help with that I should be having someone on to talk about. I’ve purchased an external hard drive before and I put like most of our home videos on there home videos, you know, videos of the kids and stuff. Because I’m like, What if all this goes down, you know, but I don’t even know where that is or how many I actually got on there. So right now my only method is really Dropbox. If it gets hacked, I don’t know, we’re not probably not gonna have family memories, somebody else, let me know what you guys do. Because I need the space need the space off my computer harddrive and off my phone. So that’s our current method is just it all syncs up. So it should upload right to my Dropbox. When I take anything on my phone. I just make sure that it’s all there. I make sure it’s in the different folders like 2023 pictures and videos. And then I typically break it up by quarter two. So I’ve done this for all the previous years, like I don’t know, at least since we’ve had kids until last year, you can I can search like January through March 2022. Or was that a quarter? Yes, April through June did it this year, and oh, so far, it’s all just in one big folder. That’s 2023 pictures videos, but that’s fine for me right now feel good about that. Went through the camera roll, like I said both through delete screenshots you thought you need that you actually don’t need or funny memes, whatever it is your phone and your laptop. All right, last one.

So this would be third week of Advent where you have another whole week of it. And you’ll feel great is going through your wardrobe. I have done this recently. And we have a teeny tiny little closet guys like tiny and my husband I share it. And then we both have a couple of drawers we have like a storage bed. And we have he has a dresser because I have more of the storage drawers I think actually right now. Do I have all three? Yeah, I have all three of the storage drawers, we had to pull one of the jurors out to fit the bassinet because it’s like little legs that go under the bed. So anyway, so he has a dresser and I have the three storage drawers. So basically another dresser and then we share this teeny tiny closet. But I went through and I feel so much better now. Just pulling out things that even if you need to hang on to stuff like I know sizes are an issue and I get that I’d heavily relate being pregnant postpartum this that you need like a million sizes because you’re like this was one I’m three months pregnant but I’m not in maternity yet but this is one I’m postpartum and I’m not back in my regular jeans. Yeah, and the whole thing. So I get it and I don’t like when some people just like toss everything get new when you need it. But I’ve done this so many times like I really could not do that every time. So you know, I think there’s an in between there were some things. I think the approach that I like to take anyways because I’m not an expert in this is I just donate or toss or get rid of the things like that are not I wouldn’t pick it anytime like that one sweater you’re like It’s really cute but it’s really scratchy so I only like you never even picked up put it on you just like it hanging in there. All those kinds of things that whatever maybe it was a good deal. Maybe Maybe you are the person though that have been pretty set in your sizes maybe you’re done having kids, you know and you are holding on to things that are like from two or three sizes ago. Maybe those are things you’re letting go of but even at that base level of just, this is like go through and like this is stained this is saying I’m throwing this out. I the other day throughout a dress that had breast milk stains down the front of it but I was like But you know what, I’m just gonna probably breast milk stay in the next one so I might as well keep it and I was like no Brittany like come on. Just Just toss it. So I did I tossed a lot I donated a lot. I feel so much better with even of those clothes like I know that everything in the closet. Oh this is what I was gonna say if you have to hold on to different seasons because I still do I just get it out of my main place. Because that was my thing before was like well I don’t want to take these out because I’ve just kind of put them in but it was way more stressful every single day picking something to wear that was like oh but that doesn’t fit anymore because that fit two weeks ago in pregnancy but doesn’t fit anymore. And this and that so I have two only two garbage bags which there’s a classier way to do this I’m sure but mine are in garbage bags. So do it however you need to. I have a bag in the basement of that are still some maternity clothes. So hopefully I don’t need them at the time that you’re listening to this but like in October here I still have a couple that are like you know the side route shirts and stuff that I just haven’t dabbled in yet and I have them there in case I really need them at the end. So I’m sure I will pull them out yet. So I’ve one yard bag of that kind of stuff. And then my other garbage bag. Okay technically I have three bags, I just remembered where I have another one. Another garbage bag is of all the stuff that just might fit again one day that doesn’t fit right now. So those are like my normal jeans, my you know, tighter shirts, whatever that’s in a separate garbage bag right now. And then the third bag that I forgot about because it is in the back of my closet and I need to bring it down is summer clothes. So in general summer clothes that fit when I’m not pregnant, but are specifically summer bathing suits, summer etc. So now in my closet so then my three drawers again you do not have to do this like me I’m just letting you know what I do my three drawers are wonder is all like undergarments PJs and then includes like sports bras regular bras did it a socks, underwear. It’s all my sleep stuff is in one drawer, my other drawers all workout slash like workout style clothes. So like all the leggings, all the T shirts, all the tank tops. My my third drawer for my underwear drawers is like my jeans, some sweaters, some shirts that are more like everyday shirts, not workout shirts, but don’t quite need to be hung up. And then in my closet is the other stuff. So once I pulled out all that stuff that does not currently fit, or that I would not currently wear because it’s a summer outfit or something. The only things in my teeny tiny closet, I know will fit me right now. I know are seasonally appropriate. I arranged them by color. It makes me so happy to open my closet and see them arranged by color. And I know everyone has different methods for this too. And actually, just yesterday, I bought it all the a huge 30 pack of velvet hangers for 10 bucks, and I’m super pumped about that. So I’m gonna go through probably after I record this, take all my plastic hangers off. And can you say nesting it did I tell you I’m asking. I did clean our outside garbage cans the other day that didn’t happen to
us, we came home he’s like, You are actually the Allstate commercial or whatever commercials that it is where they’re like, protecting you from becoming your parents. We don’t really watch that much TV, but we do watch football and you always see them during football. So you know what I’m talking about if you do too, and he’s like, they were cleaning the garbage cans like that was one of them, like well, needs to be done. So here we are. Anyways, developing yourself. I this is like a personal journey here that you’re probably letting you in on is I am on this, like, desire to make things that I’m already doing in my life, spark more joy and like create more beauty. Not adding in things not like costing more money, like yes, I just told you my $10 investment in hangers was the only investment I made here. But things I’m already doing like if I’m already gonna open my closet every day, and I’m gonna see it shoved full of a bunch of stuff that doesn’t even fit me right now. It’s all out of order. Like that. I’m going to have that encounter every day where I can open it and be like, ah, like, these are all nicely arranged around their nice little hangers by colors pleasing to the eye, you know, and I’m trying to do that in other areas too. Which if this is interesting to you, email me we’ll chat about it. Maybe I can have some people on to talk about this kind of thing. Um, but like with meals and things like that, too, like most of the stuff does not take that much extra time to feel like okay, I’m already slapping together a meal like, right. But if you put a tablecloth down first like that just elevated it or just trying to do these things that a lot of times I do for my family that I don’t necessarily do for myself. And I’m like, wait, wait, wait, Brett, take the extra second. Like, when I pray in the morning. I’m usually like, I had to get up. I gotta pray for it, because I gotta everything just feels rushed already. And I’m like, it takes two seconds to light a candle and grab comfy blanket. And now it’s just totally elevated that time. You know. So this is a personal journey that I’m on right now is making things beautiful. So, and some of you’re probably rocking the heck out of this. So all seriously, I’m serious. Let me know your tips, tricks, what you’ve been loving how you’ve been doing this too if you’ve been doing things like that, or any decluttering tips and tricks. But I hope this was helpful. I hope this gives you again, the three areas of kids toys, digital clutter and wardrobe, I think would be wonderful to kind of clear out physically and mentally at this time. And let me know how it goes. You can share it on Instagram. I’ll reshare it on my stories if you share it and tag me. And I hope you have a really wonderful start to Advent to next episode we are going to talk about I don’t have actually pulled up in front of me. But I believe we’re going to talk about yes where to start when the idea of diet and exercise overwhelms you, so this might be for my newer listeners but might be something that applies great for all my veterans as well that you bleed from. Alright, I hope you have a great rest of your day. I’ll talk to you next time. Bye

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