Seeking to Simplify - 2017 Recap and Ready to work on 2018

In 2017 I made the goal of getting rid of 5 things every day (Monday-Friday) and cleaning out/sorting through a space every day (Monday-Friday). I am really happy to report that I was indeed able to get rid of the 25 things a week that I had wanted to do. I actually did that plus a whole lot more. That means I got rid of well over 1300 items! Some of them were small - a dried out marker counted. So did a letter that I had been saving. So each item didn't always make a real noticeable difference but some of them did and together they did.

  I didn't quite manage to go through a space every day, Monday-Friday all year long but I came very close. I ended up only lacking a couple of weeks worth of spaces. That doesn't mean that I don't have cupboards, shelves, drawers and closets that don't need clean out (we do have a lot of "spaces" when you think about it) but they are in better shape than if I wouldn't have made that goal.

  With getting rid of stuff I have heard people say two things "You'll regret getting rid of that later" or "You'll never miss the stuff you get rid of" I have decided neither of those are always true. I am so happy to have gotten rid of most the stuff and I don't even remember much less regret getting rid of the majority but I have been missing something the last couple of days. I decided to get rid of some snow pants that were to small for my children and as some children have come over to play in the last couple of weeks without proper snow gear I have kind of regretted getting rid of them. I do still need to look through our stuff some more though because maybe I have another pair stashed somewhere. Or I could just keep handy some extra sweatpants that they could layer on. Now I am wondering if I should keep the boots that Megan has outgrown - just in case????

  I made the goal of selling one item a week and I think I did double that goal - which was nice. Most of it came from have a garage sale and then craft sales. I would have loved to triple or quadruple that goal but I don't think that happened.

 Just having the mindset of not buying anything to bring in but always looking for ways to bless others with our excess or make some money off of it was really quite fun. I also really love how having less makes areas so much easier to clean. I am not a minimalist yet but we are working that way. :-) 

 When making things for our craft sale this fall we bought nothing to make things with. We simply used what we had on hand except for picking up some free pallets for making signs with and picking evergreen (for free at a friends).

 It was nice to be able to make some money with things that we already had on hand.

As far as other simplifying goals. I had hoped to go through 5 photo files on my computer each day and delete things that we didn't need. I did very well at the beginning of the year on that project and then took a big break through the busy summer. I did make progress however so that we good.

 I also planned to empty my e-mail in box every day. That went much better but then I go lazy on that too but yesterday I got it cleaned all out again so we have a fresh start on that project.

  I do truly love living a bit more simply. I am still working to get even better at this. So, I think last years goals will continue on for this year and hopefully they can even more become habits.