Another Attic to Unclutter

cluttered attic

Have you done the deed and uncluttered your attic?  Perhaps, you have more items stored in a family or friend’s attic that need to be dealt with and removed.

About 25 years ago when I was a potter, I moved from a large apartment to a much smaller one, and needed somewhere to store excess items. Cousins of mine had room in their attic and agreed to let me store my old four poster bed and mattress/box spring,  invoices, slides & photos from my former pottery business, along with some other things. My retired cousins are now un-cluttering their own household, and asked me to remove my stuff from their attic.

judy with curly hairSo, last Saturday I paid a social visit to my cousins. After visiting for a while, I climbed the narrow stairs up to their dusty attic space and began sorting through my things. How fun! I found some photos of myself from over 25 years ago (one with a curly hair perm!), a vintage school desk I used as a child in my play-school room back home, plus some memorabilia from the past.

Some of the downsizing decisions I made were easy, and some difficult. I filled four bags with papers to be recycled, one bag with trash, and brought home some very outdated documents to be shredded. I lasted about 1.5 hours up in their attic sorting and purging. Several more un-cluttering visits will have to be made before it gets too cold in their un-insulated attic.

If you have a long time cluttered attic and haven’t yet tackled it, schedule an hour or two of your time when it’s convenient. Begin by labeling some empty bags or boxes with “shred, recycle, throw & give away, donate, keep”.  Dress in comfortable old clothes, put on your work gloves and be prepared to deal with things that will bring back old memories (good & not so good). If you feel overwhelmed or stressed, ask a friend or family member who will not be judgmental about your ‘letting go and keeping’ decisions, to be there as your ‘body double’. (Someone to sit with you and keep you company while you un-clutter).

After your one or two hours of purging, decision making and bringing the full bags & boxes down from the attic to distribute as appropriate, reward yourself with a nice treat – a hot bubble bath, a walk in nature, a nap, or a do a happy dance singing ‘I did it, I started tackling my cluttered attic!”

Then schedule a few more one to two hour sessions for the near future to once again tackle your attic stuff.

Let me know when you begin this task, and how you feel as you progress with the ‘letting go’ of attic stuff.

Leave a Reply