{"id":2162,"date":"2017-02-17T07:49:01","date_gmt":"2017-02-17T07:49:01","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/frugalfashionshopper.co.uk\/?p=2162"},"modified":"2017-02-17T07:49:01","modified_gmt":"2017-02-17T07:49:01","slug":"de-cluttering-am-i-any-good-at-it-are-you","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/frugalfashionshopper.co.uk\/wp\/de-cluttering-am-i-any-good-at-it-are-you\/","title":{"rendered":"De-cluttering \u2013 am I any good at it? Are you?"},"content":{"rendered":"

As most of you know I\u2019m down-sizing big-time to a flat (or apartment, as they say over the pond).\u00a0 It will have 2-bedrooms, a living area and a small kitchen and bathroom. And no garden.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m ready for this.\u00a0 I wasn\u2019t at 60 or 65, or even, 68, but at 70 I am.\u00a0 And it\u2019s nothing to do with being \u2018old\u2019.\u00a0 It is, however, an acceptance that actually I could do with less back-breaking gardening (I shall have my daughter\u2019s garden to do if I feel the need for bending over and pulling out the weeds) and also, seriously I could do with less housework.\u00a0 And no I don\u2019t want to employ some \u2018help\u2019 or not yet, anyway.<\/p>\n

But look at it this way.\u00a0 We are moving back to a buzzy, wacky city with all that city-life brings: the coffee shops; the shops; <\/em>the theatre; the museum; the cinemas (ah yes, cinemas within walking distance, oh bliss).\u00a0 And proximity to a main-line station that\u2019ll get me to London in a trice. Won\u2019t it be noisy, said someone anxiously to me.\u00a0 Oh, please, yes! \u00a0I want noise and buzz. I choose life! \u00a0\u00a0Have you ever sat up on the 1st<\/sup> floor of a coffee shop in the North Laines in Brighton and watched people walking past in the street below?\u00a0 Sometimes it\u2019s as though you\u2019re watching a crowd of extras from Star Wars \u2013 I love that!<\/p>\n

And incidentally, this flat (and I have found one, but nothing is fixed yet, because we haven’t sold). Yes, this flat happens to be in a retirement block (which isn\u2019t institutional, it\u2019s just what we Brits call a condo). \u00a0Well, what about thinking about ageing rather than sticking one\u2019s head in the sand?\u00a0 Hmm?\u00a0 (Read the last two sentences with a bit of an upward inflection) More about this in another post.\u00a0 Anyway, I know it wouldn\u2019t be for everyone \u2013 but it is for me and Mr Frugalfashionshopper<\/em>.<\/p>\n

So, to decluttering! And I don\u2019t mean just clothes.<\/p>\n

Recently I got rid of a lot of books that I\u2019ve had since studying for my degree.\u00a0 And even though I got this degree at the ripe old age of 40, that\u2019s still 30 years ago.\u00a0 And do I read these political philosophy books?\u00a0 No I don\u2019t. So, they\u2019re out, they\u2019re gone.\u00a0 And novels?\u00a0 Why keep them?\u00a0 They\u2019ve also gone.<\/p>\n

I know people who’ll be horrified that I\u2019ve got rid of books.\u00a0 And I agree, books don\u2019t necessarily have to be read all the time, instead they kind of tell you who you are.\u00a0 They sit on shelves and speak not only to you, but to others, and say this person has\u00a0read these books.\u00a0 Now.\u00a0 Actually. \u00a0I think there\u2019s a tiny bit of a peacock display thing going on here. I\u2019ve been there, I did that once, but now, no, there won\u2019t be the space.<\/p>\n

However, we’re moving to a 2-bed apartment, and the largest room is supposedly the main bedroom.\u00a0 Not in our case.\u00a0 We shall entertain in this room and make it our sitting room with all our A\/V, streaming, listening, music equipment plus a big screen. And what was supposed to be our sitting room (a smaller room) will be our combined study, and that\u2019s where my books will go.\u00a0 Yes, I do have books that I\u2019ll keep.\u00a0 The ones on India and the Indian Army (I\u2019ll tell you why I\u2019m interested in India another time) my fashion books and the ones on current political issues, they’ll go there.\u00a0 And novels \u2013 they\u2019ll come in and then they\u2019ll go out again to a charity shop.<\/p>\n

So, I\u2019m good at decluttering books.\u00a0 And I\u2019ve got rid of quite a lot extraneous \u2018stuff\u2019, particularly excess kitchenware; bowls and pretty plates that I\u2019ve picked up in charity shops but never used.\u00a0 As for clothes, I\u2019ve cleared out a whole cupboard\u2019s worth and our remaining clothes, plus coats, are now in a wardrobe that\u2019s the same measurement as the built-in wardrobe we intend to construct in the new flat.<\/p>\n

The easiest clothes to discard were my charity shop clothes.\u00a0 The clothes I have difficulty with are the ones that cost a certain amount, as in, were full price.\u00a0 These are going, albeit at a slower pace.\u00a0 The cruise frocks will be kept, btw, because i) I love them and ii) I fully intend to wear them again. This cruise frock below is a good example of a dress that is not worn often but will, definitely, be worn again.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Yes, my criteria for getting rid of clothes is, do I wear this item? \u00a0And, will I wear it in the future? \u00a0If the answer is in the negative, why on earth am I keeping it?<\/p>\n

But then there are some clothes that I never wear that I can\u2019t quite bring myself to throw out.<\/p>\n

First, is my wedding dress, which I bought off-the-peg for not very much in 1974. ( I believe it’s different now and thousands are spent on this item.) \u00a0As you can see, even \u00a0then I was determined to be different and didn’t wear a traditional white dress!!<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Don’t you love my mother’s pink crimpelene dress,\u00a0and what about the nice touch of my petticoat revealed at my cleavage – sigh. \u00a0It was a feature in every photo!<\/p>\n

Anyway, I\u2019ve kept the dress hanging in the back of my wardrobe for ever.\u00a0 And I can still get into it \u2013 just. The pic below was taken last year and you can see my boobs have grown with age and don’t really fit into the space provided!!! Also I should be wearing heels. \u00a0Actually on my wedding day I was wearing platforms with heels – not possible now with my weak ankles.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Then there\u2019s a 1980s dress and jacket, I simply can’t throw out. \u00a0The dress looks as though it’s made for someone very slim but the material is quite stretchy. \u00a0 \u00a0The label says ‘Made in England’. \u00a0That alone says it was made some time ago!<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The jacket, I think, is so 80s.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"\"I never wear this outfit now, but I can\u2019t throw it out and I can\u2019t say why, except that it tells me that at a particular time in my life I wore this outfit (out and about in Brighton actually) and felt good in it. Maybe I should try the dress on again.<\/p>\n

And the oldest piece of clothing I possess is never to be thrown away as it\u2019s over a 100-years old and is my grandfather\u2019s mess jacket.\u00a0 I haven\u2019t found an occasion to wear it yet, but maybe in Brighton I will!<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

I don\u2019t have many of these \u2018I cannot<\/em> throw this out\u2019 type of clothes, so for the time being, they\u2019re in the back of the wardrobe where they’ve always been, and will continue to be, I guess.<\/p>\n

Do you have items of clothing you\u2019re hanging on to, despite not wearing them for years?\u00a0 If so, do tell me what they are!<\/p>\n

With love<\/p>\n

Penny, the Frugalfashionshopper<\/em><\/p>\n

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\"Facebook\"<\/a>\"pinterest\"<\/a>\"Facebook\"<\/a>\"pinterest\"<\/a><\/span>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

As most of you know I\u2019m down-sizing big-time to a flat (or apartment, as they say over the pond).\u00a0 It will have 2-bedrooms, a living area and a small kitchen and bathroom. And no garden. I\u2019m ready for this.\u00a0 I<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2176,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[132],"tags":[37,49,50,59,70,75,93,112],"class_list":["post-2162","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-fashion","tag-attitudes-and-age","tag-charity-shop","tag-charity-shops","tag-de-cluttering","tag-fashion","tag-frugal-fashion-shopper","tag-older-women","tag-thrift-store"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/frugalfashionshopper.co.uk\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/02\/gold-black-dress-featured.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/frugalfashionshopper.co.uk\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2162","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/frugalfashionshopper.co.uk\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/frugalfashionshopper.co.uk\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/frugalfashionshopper.co.uk\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/frugalfashionshopper.co.uk\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2162"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/frugalfashionshopper.co.uk\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2162\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2179,"href":"https:\/\/frugalfashionshopper.co.uk\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2162\/revisions\/2179"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/frugalfashionshopper.co.uk\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2176"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/frugalfashionshopper.co.uk\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2162"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/frugalfashionshopper.co.uk\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2162"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/frugalfashionshopper.co.uk\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2162"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}