Closet clean out, part 1

We are almost finished with our goals for February! There are just a couple of small areas in the bedroom left to tackle.

February
Master bedroom
Master closet

The closet project wound up taking a lot longer than I expected! To start things off, here are the before photos. Notice the leaning hamper and laundry basket precariously perched on top of a yaffa block.


See the bags spread out across the top shelf, taking up more room than they should.


And look at the floor... yikes! I think it's down there somewhere.


I started off by catching up on laundry. I think it involved at least 10 loads. But I am proud to say I am caught up. Everything is washed and put away other than the clothes we wore the last couple of days. YAY! Now, if I do just 2-3 loads per week I should be able to keep up with it.

After that, I went through my shoes. I realized I have mostly been wearing the same four or so pairs and haven't worn many of them in years. The shoes I do wear kept getting left out because they didn't fit in the closet. It was time to let a lot of them go. *tear* I had 16 pairs that went in Goodwill bags, and four that went to the dumpster. I loved those four pairs of shoes to death...literally! I had already had the silver and black heels repaired once, and the two pairs of flats were worn beyond repair. If only they made purple and gold shoe polish... I decided that it was time to let them go, but took this picture to remember my old friends shoes. This has definitely been the most emotional part of the de-cluttering process so far! See how cute they are? Too bad they no longer are comfortable and barely have soles.


The next step was going through all of my clothes and getting rid of things I know I won't wear again. It involved trying on lots of things to see how they fit my post-baby body. I am still in the process of losing baby weight, but there were a lot of things I knew I wouldn't wear again. I wound up with seven bags of shoes and clothes, plus a few bags, to take to Goodwill!


I also filled up an entire laundry basket with extra hangers! I'm going to see if Goodwill or anyone else wants them so I don't have to throw them all out. I decided to stick with the hangers that don't have the twisty hook part because they don't get all tangled up the way these do. For the most part my husband's are black and mine are white.


Stay tuned for the after photos, coming soon to a blog near you! By the way, do you want some extra hangers? Do you have an emotional attachment to your old shoes and clothes?