5 TIPS TO HELP YOU DECLUTTER YOUR MASTER CLOSET

 

Hi if you are new here, I’m on a quest to simplify my home this year, organize it and find some order within the chaos. Perhaps that is why you have also find this post.  Here is where I’m at. I moved into my house 12 years ago, of course, the same year my husband and I got married.  Prior to that I had always lived with a roommate.  Well, I guess technically my husband is still like a roommate of sorts plus the three kids we added.  And as you can imagine we have amassed a lot of stuff.  After 12 years in my house with adding the addition of the 3 children and husband most of the time I’m just trying to survive through a daily routine of activity.  This has left many areas of my house in disarray and as result has left me mentally the way.

 

Where to Start?

 

I have decided to focus on these targeted areas that have been left for far too long.  First up was my master bedroom closet and bedroom.  But today I’m just focusing on the closet. My closet had become a hodgepodge dumping ground just to hid things that I was supposed to tackle later.  Here is the before shot of part of my closet:

 

 

 

I’m hoping some of you can relate.  Guests are coming over and instead of dealing with putting things in their proper place I just put everything in a box and hide it in my closet because my closet is the one place no guest will see.  And after I will tackle putting away whatever was contained in the box. But, atlas that doesn’t happen. But I have determined the 3 reasons why I don’t deal with my clutter: 

 

  1. Out of sight out of mind (so many other things I would rather do)
  2. I was forestalling decision making on those items in the first place.  (I have no clue what I should do with it!)
  3. Daily life continues and these tasks get pushed aside.

 

5 TIPS TO HELP YOU DECLUTTER YOUR MASTER CLOSET

 

 

TIP #1: PURPOSE

 

When first assessing my closet I took a look at what actually was in it.  What sorts of things were there and asked myself were they supposed to be there?  What was the purpose of the master closet?

 

Here is what I found in my closet:

  • Clothes of course (mine, my husband’s and old baby clothing I wanted to keep).
  • Blankets, pillows, duvets
  • Memorabilia such as all of my journals that I have written in since childhood, the kids baby boxes, photo albums (from my childhood)
  • Gifts I had hidden away to hide from the kids
  • Shoes, ties, belts, scarves (Clothing accessories)
  • Other miscellaneous items – I kid you not, I found a scrapbooking kit.  ???

 

TIP #2: ENLIST HELP ESPECIALLY IF IT ALL SEEMS TOO OVERWHELMING

 

I have gotten to the point with these severely neglected areas of my house are just too overwhelming for me to tackle by myself.  For my closet I enlisted the help of my mom.  She came over one Sunday and we did as much as we could in about 6 hours that we could.  This initial declutter burst is sometimes exactly what I need to get going.

 

TIP #3: UNIFORM HANGERS

My mom and I took pretty much everything out of the closet and started from there.  And one key thing I noticed when we took all the clothes off the hangers was that I had of course a hodgepodge of hangers as well as seen in picture below.  I’m still in the process of creating all of the same hangers but my kids did give me these fancier ones for Mother’s Day one year and I had to keep those ones.

 

 

 

TIP #4: ORGANIZATIONAL SPECIFIC PRODUCTS

 

I had a lot of scarves that I had just, let’s face it, shoved in one of my drawers which meant I didn’t really see them which meant I wasn’t really wearing them.  If I put them back where I can see them when dressing I’m more likely to choose to wear it.  I purchased one of the scarf organizers from Ikea.

 

TIP #5: BINS AND VACUUM BAGS

I’m usually bad with boxes or bins but if there is a plan in place and a strategy then well it works out a lot better.  I did want to keep some sentimental items because I just wasn’t ready to part with them.  And that is totally ok!  Did I need to keep as many baby items as I had? No, I was able to let go of a lot of it.  Those things that I was not able to let go I made a dedicated bin and used a vacuum bag to save on space and to organize it.

 

 

 

After Photos

 

I hope those 5 tips will help you in your declutter of your closet.  Here are some of after shots of the declutter and reorganizing of my master closet.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Do you need more help decluttering? There is tons of fabulous advice here – The Art of Tidying Up – A Complete Guide to a Decluttered Life

 

Cheers,

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Bonnie Dani

Educator, Writer, Blogger, Mom

Contact Me: [email protected]