Chomp, chomp, chomp…
Chomping away at my elephant.
Clutter:
My nemesis. My weakness. My challenge.
The Contender
And in this corner...
Round One:
The Contender doesn't stand a chance!
Round Two: – Not pictured.
Round Three:
Getting there...
That Heely’s box is was full of paperwork & junk, just in case you were wondering. Groan. It was the last thing dealt with. It wasn’t as bad as I feared, as is usually the case with clutter.
Round Four - all that was left was — you guessed it — the Heely’s-box-of-doom. But don’t worry. I came out victor.
See?
Ta-Da!!!
You can see a picture frame on the left… The other half of this shelf/counter was full of pictures. Not with any particular rhyme, reason, or purpose — They were just filling space and part of my CPP (Clutter Prevention Plan).
You see, one of the problems with a Clutter Addict like myself is the fear of emptiness. An empty shelf? AHHHHHH! NO!!!!! Fill it up! Quick!
A shelf full of standing pictures gathers no junk. You’re afraid to put something there for fear it’ll knock something over and then… broken glass, cats and dogs living together, mass hysteria.
...
So the picture-frames-as-clutter-replacement was pretty effective. For a long time. Like, 2 months! Pretty impressive for the CPP.
But then something happened.
Something wonderful.
I became my own CPP.
I fell in love with emptiness.
Absolutely in love with it.
But that doesn’t mean that an empty shelf isn’t an invitation. Oh no. It’s still a clutter trap and must be avoided at all costs, as all Clutter Addicts know.
What to put there?
I came across the answer a few weeks ago in our front room – but you’ll have to wait for a different post about it, since it really deserves its own face time. Here’s what I came up with.
Round Five
Life is wonderful – yay for Mrs. Smith!
Wow! I’m impressed! It looks so beautiful and inviting…and…peaceful. l…l..l…l..l…l.l…ll…!!!!
You are doing so awesome–I’m so impressed!
Thanks, Ladies! (and John, of course)
I LOVE THIS PICTURE OF YOU! So pure, so happy, so clean! : ) You are amazing!
I have problems with paper clutter too. I love empty space because it means I have less stuff! I hate stuff! I always tell people to buy me practical gifts.
Fabulous!! I love space. I have another empty shelf in my life too. Maybe I need to take a picture and show off it’s beauty. For the first time in my life my island is also cleaned off and it’s actually staying that way. Who would have thought that all you had to do was just get rid of everything and it would stay clean all by itself??
hmmm…the paper thing is the devil. it comes whether you go buy stuff or not. other things you can NOT BUY. but paper just comes and comes. i have not been able to figure this out yet. let us know if you have any brilliant ideas! maybe this is a question for the Lazy Organizer…
by the way, it looks beautiful. also, if i stop by sometime can i hear the story of the empty bowl? i promise to ooh and aah over all your almost empty shelves….
Absolutely! Come on by! If we can hear each other over my crying baby and (happily) screeching toddler, I’d be happy to share the story — and even more than happy to have you over!
I love that you showed your decluttering of the shelf in stages. I’ve cleared out a lot of stuff, but realized that I’ve been ignoring the really difficult stuff. Closet of boxes I’ve been carting around for 20 years, here I come!