Day 22 Of The Declutter Challenge

Craft supplies

Most people I know have some sort of hobby, it could be card making, crochet, cross stitch, home brewing……anything you do with your hands that needs materials counts for today’s task.

If you have the luxury of having a whole room dedicated to your hobby, then this is probably going to take more than an hour to do, but it is even more likely it needs doing – if you can shut the door and not see the clutter, then it is much less likely that you’ll be willing to attack it. But remember this is about creating more space and a sense of order and calm for your potential buyers so it really is worth doing!

If you have more than one hobby, the first thing to do is sort everything into categories – separate the knitting supplies from the paints etc.

Go through everything, taking one section at a time, and ask yourself the following questions to help you decide what to keep and what to recycle, repurpose or bin.

Is there enough of it to make something else?
Have you already got lots of it?
Is it broken?
Is it so expensive or precious you won’t do anything with it?
Do you like it?
Will you ever get around to doing/using it? Do you know someone else who would, that might benefit from having it instead?
Have you lost bits you need to finish it?
Is it past it’s use-by date?

If it’s causing problems deciding what to get rid of, change your perspective and instead ask yourself “What do I want to keep?”

Be fast. You know in your gut if you really want something. As soon as you touch it – pay attention to your gut. Do not start listening to your head. Your head will start telling you, “Well – you could use it for this or that or some other thing.” That’s what you told yourself when you picked it up 10 years ago and you haven’t used it yet. You’re probably not going to. Get rid of it! If you find yourself dithering, you don’t really want it – but for some reason, you feel bad about getting rid of it. Which brings me to. . .

Be ruthless. Some of your best decisions will be the hardest. Letting go of some things means letting go of dreams or might-have-beens. Sometimes there’s a lot of guilt attached – money spent on supplies for a craft you ended up not enjoying, time and money spent on a partially-finished project that’s been sitting on the corner of your sewing table for years. Sometimes people you love give you things you don’t like very much, but you feel like you need to keep them. It’s all hard – but when you make a decision it will feel like a weight has been lifted!

Once you have a reasonable amount of things left you to want to keep, think about how you want to store them. Here are some ideas, using things that you may find you have available now you’ve decluttered those other rooms!

Children’s furniture can make excellent storage
Pegboards are great making at the most of wall space
Drawer units can be organised and organised well
Vintage Vanity Cases can make beautiful storage for on the go crafting
Wooden bottle boxes can be fabulous storage because of the dividers – Etsy has lots to choose from
Wire baskets are affordable and can store anything
Clean jam jars make good storage for small items such as beads
Lots of tiny tins and candle holders can do a similar job
Vanity Top Trays/ organisers can become great storage for notebooks etc.
Tiered storage that you can hide in a cupboard? Yes, please.
Tupperware can be useful for ribbons and trims – do you have any lidless boxes left over from the decluttering you did? Put them to good use!
Tiered cupcake stands are great storage for washi tape and string etc.
Little buckets can do the same job as the jars and tins above.
Fancy wire kitchen/bathroom organisers make pretty multi-purpose storage for the wall!