Organizational Help

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Sorting Through Your Things

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So where do you begin if your current home is filled  with a generation’s worth of accumulation?
If you have grown children´s belongings in the house, next time they are home, have them sort their things into different piles: what they’ll take right now, what they need you to hold for them, what they want to give away, what can be tossed.

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Go through the rest and determine your future needs. If things are  family-sized, such as camping gear for example. Do still you foresee future activities of a similar nature? Other possessions might be house-oriented. For example, if you´re moving to a townhouse, you can sell the lawn mower and weed whacker. If you’re heading to warmer climate forget about the snow shovel and snow blower.

Keep your favorites, memorabilia and other keepsakes in the family while getting them out of your house. Give your grown children the art projects, trophies, and holiday decorations they created or had as kids. They may appreciate having them as they start creating their own family traditions.
Keep your best stuff. Give up the plastic, and maybe the stoneware, to your child setting up his or her own household. Why not use the china as your everyday dishes?

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When In Doubt ~ Toss It Out

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Many possessions are emotionally laden, or maybe you’re just overwhelmed with the thought of “maybe we’ll need it someday”. While sorting your stuff through this difficult process, keep these suggestions in mind:
 

• If you haven’t used something in a couple of years, it´s probably a good choice for the out pile. Will it be worth the effort of packing, moving, and unpacking the item?

• Think about the space of your new home and where you will put the stuff you are keeping.

• Put any items you can’t decide on into a separate box. Revisit the box last after you’ve thrown out some other things. Your decisions will get easier.
   

If it’s still too difficult, put questionable items into a sealed and dated box but don´t list the contents. If you don´t open the box within a year, give the box to charity.