Mission Decluttering #3 - Closets

In our teeny tiny home we have GREAT storage closets! A huge linen closet in the girl’s bathroom upstairs, a front hallway closet, a back hallway closet and a closet in the developed basement, it’s great even though none of stuffed to the gills by any means, but it still allows us to store out of season coats, etc. out of the way!  That doesn’t mean however that they don’t need a going over!

For our closets I utilized a little method I picked up from a friend of mine who is super organized and it’s how she does all her organizing (and really how I should be doing all of mine).  She uses the STOP method. S for Sort, T for Toss, O for Organize and P for Put Away.

First stop, the linen closet.

1. Sort – so here I set my watch for 20 minutes and dove right in – Keep, Donate/Sell, Put Away, and Garbage.  Surprisingly, it only took me 20 minutes to sort the entire 4 shelves of my closet, maybe that’s a lot I don’t know, but I was impressed.

2. Toss – anything ripped, ragged or stained should either be tossed or repurposed.

3. Organize - Once the space is clear, clean the entire closet; walls, shelves, doors and floor.  Refold all sheets and towels and stack neatly and return to the shelves.   I use quite a few plastic baskets in my linen closet to sort out all of the other items – toiletries in one, medications on a high shelf out of reach and I hate the plastic used to keep toilet paper and tissue boxes together so I take everything out of those and stack boxes or rolls neatly on a shelf.

4. Put away – anything not belonging back in the closet can be put away in their proper homes around the house.  The Sell/Donate boxes can be taken to storage and then toss the trash.

The rest of our closets contain our seasonal items so I like to do my seasonal sweeps.

 

There are 4 easy-to-follow steps here:

 
1.       Take everything out of the closet. Then, wipe down the shelving, walls and floors, dust and vacuum.
2.       Do a quick purge of anything you're going to donate; separate out anything that needs altering or dry cleaning.
3.       Put everything back in the closet hanging and sorting by color with most-worn items in front.
4.       Donate the remaining items; take alterations and cleaning to tailor and dry cleaner.

Since the closets only took me a grand total of 3 hours I am happy to report that I got rid of the following:

1 bag of donations (7 jackets – 4 of mine, 2 of my husbands, 8 pairs of shoes and boots – all mine!)

4 jackets (and 2 snowsuits) that have been washed and put away for use by Lily at a (much) later date
1 bag of extra hangers (metal ones returned to the drycleaner)
1 bag of garbage and recycling
 
Up next – Our Living Room & Office!