Day 10: Giving Away 100 Things in 100 Days

The Task: Give away one thing a day for 100 days.

The Why: Because a challenge is a fun way to encourage some accountability.  And because decluttering every single day changes the way we think about our stuff and causes us to take pause before bringing something new into the house.

And because it is way more fun to give that cute pair of shoes away to a good friend who will wear them than a thrift store!

The How:  I created a facebook photo album on my personal facebook and called it 100 Days of Decluttering.  Every day I find an item around my house that isn't getting as much use as it ought to and I take a picture and post it to the album.  My friends can comment on the pictures to call dibs on an item they want.  It has been a lot of fun, and in the 13 days I've been doing it I've freed our home of a pair of shoes, and extension closet rod thingy, a basket, some decorative items and throw pillows, a number of books, clothing accessories, various dishes, a lamp and a vase.

The Verdict:  I find I'm thinking about the items in my home through a whole new lens.  When I open my kitchen drawers, I actually see the items I don't use instead of ignoring them all together. I'm also a lot less inclined to buy something I don't truly need with the daily reminder that eventually stuff just gets in the way.

And it's fun.

We are doing one small thing every day for a year to create a simpler, quieter, more intentional life. Take a moment to read all About Us, check out The Rules of our year long project and sign up for our RSS feed or "like" us on facebook so that you can follow our journey to radical simplicity!

Day 9: Using Cloth Napkins

In our house, we call these serviettes.  Luke prefers to reserve the word napkin for, um, well....it's other meaning.  But Wikipedia tells me that the word serviette is mostly just a Canadian/UK thing, so for this post I'll say napkin.  Even though it makes Luke cringe a little.

The Task:  To stop using paper napkins entirely.

The Why: I read recently that forty percent of all household garbage is paper!  Forty percent!?  Since paper napkins in our house almost never make their way to the recycle bin or the compost, we've decided to do away with them all together.

It's not only about the wastefulness involved in disposing of napkins after every meal, but also the waste involved in production, packaging and distribution.  I've been reading The Story of Stuff by Annie Leonard and have been finding my eyes opened to just how much of the earth's resources are used and wasted and damaged in the making of all our stuff.  Only in our crazy throw-away culture would we think it is easier to cut down trees, turn the trees into pulp,  turn the pulp into paper, make the napkins, package them, ship them around the world, and buy them at the dollar store than it is to wash a few extra cloths every day! 

Besides, cloth napkins are nicer.  Every meal is a little bit fancy with a cloth napkin!

The How: We've always used cloth napkins for nice sit down dinners with friends, but we've resorted to the paper ones often for bigger shindigs and too often for everyday use. So the good news is we already own a few mismatched sets of cloth napkins.

We have a party coming up in a couple weeks, for which we would normally buy colourful paper napkins. Instead,  we are going to take the money we would have spent on paper ones to our local thrift store and get a few more cloth napkins so that we have enough for parties.  The only problem with this is that I've discovered in the past that people are hesitant to use cloth napkins (not because they are concerned about the safety/cleanliness of them, but because they don't know if they are allowed to dirty them!) and oftentimes don't even see them when they are on a buffet.  If I had a dime for every time somebody with ketchup on their face was standing in front of a basket of cloth napkins and shouted "hey, Kelly, do you have any napkins?" I would have....several dimes.  Seriously!

The Verdict:  We actually much prefer the cloth napkins, and are really glad to be making the switch for good!

We are doing one small thing every day for a year to create a simpler, quieter, more intentional life. Take a moment to read all About Us, check out The Rules of our year long project and sign up for our RSS feed or "like" us on facebook so that you can follow our journey to radical simplicity!

Day 7: Shopping the Farmers' Market

 

The Task:  We've always enjoyed Saturday morning trips to the farmers' market as a sort of novelty, but this year we want to start treating it more like a grocery store and less like a field trip!

The Why:  A few nights ago, my husband was reading aloud to me and the children from Folks, This Ain't Normal by Joel Salatin and Mr Salatin stated that the average morsel of food in our culture has traveled farther than the farmer who grew it.  And that got us thinking and talking about how much is affected when the food system is dysfunctional.  

When we choose to shop at the farmers' market, we aren't just buying better food for our family, we are buying a better environment, a stronger local economy, and voting with our dollars for small-time farmers who are forced by nature and necessity to farm in a more sustainable manner.

My husband bought 5 different types of garlic!  Most of us have probably only ever eaten 2 varieties!  The woman who sold it to us told us about the different varieties and which were her favourites.  Shopping the farmers' market encourages farmland biodiversity too!

The Verdict:  I've heard people say that the cost of good food shouldn't matter because the earth and our health are important.  In theory, I would like to agree with that, but the fact is that cost is a very real issue in our lives.  I can only report on what I've experienced at my local farmers' market in my fertile corner of the Canadian landscape, but honestly, the farmers' market prices here are very similar to the grocery store.   Some things, like meat and cheese and berries are much more expensive (and even so, there are ways to afford it.  For example, I cannot afford a 17 dollar grass fed steak, but I can afford a couple pounds of grass-fed stew beef at 3.50 a pound!) But most of the veggies are reasonably priced. And oh so good.

We did stop off at the grocery store on the way home for some pecans and milk (can't buy milk at the farmers' market.  Or, if you can, I don't know the right people and the secret password...) and we were quickly reminded that the farmers' market is a far more enjoyable way to do the grocery shopping!  

This afternoon I'm headed to a party with some pretty pies I've made from fresh Ontario peaches and organic blueberries from a farm in town. Have I mentioned that I love summer? 

We are doing one small thing every day for a year to create a simpler, quieter, more intentional life. Take a moment to read all About Us, check out The Rules of our year long project and sign up for our RSS feed or "like" us on facebook so that you can follow our journey to radical simplicity!

Day 6: Making Reusable Produce Bags

The Task:  Sew some reusable produce bags. 

The Why: Even though I bring reusable shopping bags to the grocery store it is still so easy to come home with a lot of extra packaging waste.  Using reusable mesh bags for produce will cut down on some of that waste.

I know that it's possible to buy reusable produce bags, but they seemed easy enough to make myself.

The How:  I purchase 1 metre (a little more than a yard) of sheer fabric.  Sheer curtain fabric is often much wider than ordinary fabric, so 1 metre was more than enough to make 8 produce bags.  You could also recycle an old set of sheer curtains for this project!

Step one: Cut a square of fabric that is approximately 22 by 16 inches.

 

Step 2: Fold one edge in and stitch to make a casing for the drawstring.

Step 3: Fold in half and stitch side and bottom closed.  Be careful to stitch only up to the bottom of the casing you just made.  You want to be able to get your drawstring in later!

Step 4: Zig-zag stitch around the bottom and side that you just sewed to prevent fraying.

Step 5: Turn the bag right-side-out and use a safety pin to push a piece of  ribbon or string (I used scrap pieces of bias tape) through the casing and tie the ends together.

Done!

Total time spent: Using a sewing machine, less than an hour to make 8 bags.

Total cost: 4 dollars worth of fabric.

The Verdict: These were super easy to make, and if they save us from using 8 plastic produce bags a week, that's 416 bags a year!  If we can inspire 1200 other people to do it, that's half a million bags a year!

We are doing one small thing every day for a year to create a simpler, quieter, more intentional life. Take a moment to read all About Us, check out The Rules of our year long project and sign up for our RSS feed or "like" us on facebook so that you can follow our journey to radical simplicity!

Day 5: How Many Knives Do We Really Need?

The Task: Pare down out kitchen knives to three.

The Why: I could never find a knife.  We would use a knife and put it in the dishwasher (I know, dishwashers are bad for knives...what can I say?  These things happen....) and when we needed a knife there wasn't one even though we had 4 (yes, 4!) different chefs knives, 3 paring knives, and 2 serrated knives!  I don`t even remember where we got all of them!

So for weeks now we've had three knives.  One chefs knife (for slicing and dicing), one paring knife (for peeling and paring), and one serrated knife (great for cutting bread and slicing tomatoes).  And when we use one, we wash it by hand, dry it, and put it away immediately.  There is always a clean knife in the drawer when we need it.  Less really is more.

What about table knives?  We have 4 steak knives.  We once had 16 because we were given a mega set of them, but I realized a long time ago that if we're having 16 people of knife wielding age over for a meal, I am going to be serving something cheap like spaghetti, or casserole, or stew....NOT large cuts of meat!
We do have alot of butter knives, but we use them regularly for entertaining, so we've deemed those worth keeping to avoid the use of disposable cutlery. 

The  Verdict:  I actually love having less stuff in our drawers and cupboards.  The more I get rid of the more I want to get rid of!  Having less stuff really is good for us.  And washing something and putting it away immediately after you use it is strangely good for the spirit.

I'm also realizing how much false security I was getting from my stuff.  This project is really about so much more than kitchen utensils and clothing and throw pillows.  It's about a heart that is so broken and confused that it thinks it wants more stuff, when what it needs is to be more like Christ.  It's about our God given need for safety and rest and how we can so easily get consumed trying to find those things in our homes and our favourite housewares store instead of at the center of God's will.

All this to say that I am loving this process and am both excited and anxious about the three hundred and sixty days to come!  Thanks so much for following along!

We are doing one small thing every day for a year to create a simpler, quieter, more intentional life. Take a moment to read all About Us, check out The Rules of our year long project and sign up for our RSS feed or "like" us on facebook so that you can follow our journey to radical simplicity!

Announcing The August Challenge: No Dryer Month

Every month we will be encouraging you to join us in our pursuit of radical simplicity by doing one small thing with us for a whole month.

August's challenge is No Dryer Month.   We will be committing not to use our dryer at all for an entire month. Will you join us?

Did you know that...

• Dryers are among the top 3 energy consumers in most homes, along with the fridge and the water heater?
• Line-dried clothing puts less stress on clothing, causing it to last longer?
• Line-dried bedsheets smell heavenly?
• The suns rays actually kill germs and whiten whites?

On August first I will share some tips to help avoid using the dryer (like, how to keep your line-dried towels from being crunchy!) and encouraging all of you to share your tips as well so that we can all go into this project confident and prepared!

If you're planning to take the plunge with us, I've made a banner (it's 300 x 300px) for you to display on your own blog.  Just cut and paste the code below.

<a href="http://theyearofless.blogspot.ca/2012/07/announcing-august-challenge-no-dryer.html"target="”_blank”"><img src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjaKhciVj_-nKJS7s-ITPAyy3Apla-amR-ork6tg3olOGAhttVh7BMvS-zIWvKQ-dunh09qeFPkbbsfcozsVu5Z4ZpCPvdzeZF-PeN5juyCyDh5llCmEgI3DuAjB0g3-Qi3OKlrJeDERxY/s300/no%2520dryer%2520month%2520300px.jpg" /></a>

Or you can let all of your friends on facebook know that you are taking the challenge by visiting this photo that I've uploaded to our facebook page and clicking the "share" button!

Thanks so much for taking this challenge together with us! We can't wait!

We are doing one small thing every day for a year to create a simpler, quieter, more intentional life. Take a moment to read all About Us, check out The Rules of our year long project and sign up for our RSS feed or "like" us on facebook so that you can follow our journey to radical simplicity!

Day 4: Cancelling our Catalogues

The Task: Recycle all of our current catalogues (FYI: I'm not spelling it wrong, I'm Canadian and that's how we spell it...) and ask the companies to no longer send them to us. 

The Why: Nearly every company has an online catalogue you can browse, making the concept of sending paper catalogues around the world every year really wasteful and kind of silly.  (Catalogues in the US alone are reported as using 53 million trees a year!) Plus, when I need an item I should be shopping only for the item I need, not leisurely browsing through every item the company sells.

The fact is that catalogues are designed to sell us things we wouldn't otherwise buy. If they weren't, companies wouldn't send them to us every single year for free, right?

And finally, catalogues take up space.  If we don't have them, we don't have to store them anywhere!

The How:  I gathered up all of my magazines, and one by one visited the websites of each company to send an email requesting that they no longer send me catalogues.  I assured each company that we will browse their online catalogue when we are in need of something! Then I disposed of all of the catalogues in the recycle bin.

There may have been some I've forgotten about, so I'm committing to immediately cancel any catalogues that arrive in my mail in the future.

Total Time Spent: About 20 minutes.

The Verdict:  Honestly, as a geeky homeschool mom, I'm kinda mourning the loss of my Curriculum catalogues.  But I know that it's better for me to search the website for the things we really need than to go through their entire inventory with a highlighter and a cup of tea. 

The habit of always shopping and constantly browsing for things to buy does not help us to cultivate a life of radical simplicity!

We are doing one small thing every day for a year to create a simpler, quieter, more intentional life. Take a moment to read all About Us, check out The Rules of our year long project and sign up for our RSS feed or "like" us on facebook so that you can follow our journey to radical simplicity!

Day 3: Minimizing our Wardrobes

The Task: Reduce our clothing to the bare (haha, pun intended) necessities.

The Why: By not putting reasonable limits on the clothing we own we find we are always kind of in shopping mode.  We walk past a store, or see a good deal, and think "why not?"  By reducing our clothing to what we really need and wear we can set a cap on our clothing possessions to save money and avoid stress when getting dressed.

Plus, all of the things we don't need will stop being wasted in our closets and can go to a thrift store where somebody who needs them can buy them for next to nothing.  My extra maternity clothes will be sent to a pregnancy crisis center.

The How:  It's easiest to trim down your wardrobe, I think, if you have a sort of uniform that you wear most of the time.  A go-to combination of clothing types that you can mix and match to wear on an ordinary day.  For example, a typical uniform for a stay at home mom could be a pair of jeans and a nice fitted t-shirt.  For me, it's a skirt (normally a long flowing hippy skirt!) a solid color t-shirt, and a pretty accessory like a scarf or colourful headband.   This means that if I have 4 skirts, 4 t-shirts, and a few scarves I can keep myself dressed in an array of fun combinations while only needing to launder my clothing twice a week.

What We Kept:  Keep in mind that we live in a climate where weather ranges from frigid cold to heat-wave hot.  Plus, I'm pregnant, so I need to keep maternity and non maternity clothing.  I think all that considered, we've achieved our goal  of keeping the clothes we need and ditching the ones we don't.

Kelly has:
4 skirts
4 sleeveless shirts
4 regular short sleeved t-shirts
4 maternity short sleeved t-shirts
3 regular long sleeved shirts
1 maternity long sleeved shirt
3 sweaters or cardigans of varying warmth
2 cute summer dresses
1 sweater dress
1 formal dress
2 sets of pajamas
2 pairs of running shorts
bras, underwear and socks
5 scarves and a funky headscarf
1 swimsuit

Luke has:
1 vest
3 pairs of work jeans
3 pairs of nice jeans
3 pairs of black pants (2 casual, one formal)
8 t-shirts! Some for work (he works in construction), and some nicer ones for leisure
3 polo shirts
3 casual short sleeved button up shirts
2 casual long sleeved button up shirts
2 white dress shirts (one short sleeved, one long sleeved)
4 sweaters
2 pairs of casual shorts
4 pairs of work shorts
ties, belts and 2 fedoras
2 pairs of pajama pants
underwear,socks  and undershirts


The Verdict:  For the first time in my life as a mommy I feel like getting dressed is a simple (and fun!) task. I grab a skirt, a seasonally appropriate solid coloured shirt and pretty scarf!  Easy Peasy.

And my absolute favourite part of getting dressed is picking out a pretty scarf to wear.  If you're worried about trimming down your wardrobe, consider a few nice accessories.  Five scarves can turn a small-ish wardrobe into seemingly endless possibilities!

We are doing one small thing every day for a year to create a simpler, quieter, more intentional life. Take a moment to read all About Us, check out The Rules of our year long project and sign up for our RSS feed or "like" us on facebook so that you can follow our journey to radical simplicity!

Day 2: Giving Up Paper Towels

The Task: Stop buying paper towels. Completely.

The Why: Using reusable cloths and towels saves money and time (the time spent running to the store for paper towels!) and reduces waste. Plus, it saves space in my linen closet because I don't have to find a place to store the big bulky extra rolls of paper towel.  Sounds good to me!

The How:  We actually stopped using paper towels to clean up most of our messes ages ago.  We keep a stack of absorbent bar-mop towels in a kitchen drawer with our dish cloths and dish towels and my kids know to reach for them when they spill something or make a mess. I have to buy a new package about once a year because they endure a lot of wear and tear, but the 7 bucks I spend each year is far less than I would spend if we were reaching for paper towel every time one of the kids spills their milk.

I did, however, still buy paper towel for cleaning glass.  I tried using newspaper for the job but found that to be frustrating and unsuccessful.  So now I've purchased a pack of 2 microfiber cloths. The pack cost me 3 dollars and now I don't need to buy paper towels all year.  One small purchase to save a dozen more.

By the way, I use a half and half solution of vinegar and water as my window cleaner.  I've tried plain water and plain vinegar, but the half and half combination works better than either of those things on it's own.

But what about....umm...you know.....icky messes?  Like, what if a child vomits on the floor?   Well, if one of the children vomits on the floor I guess I will just have to whisk away the worst of the (I really hope you're not eating right now) chunks with a piece of newspaper and use an old grungy rag to clean up the rest of the mess.  I can handle that...I think.

The Verdict: Reusable towels don't create any extra work for me because they just get thrown in with the daily laundry, and they save us money, are better for the environment, and take up less space.  Fingers crossed that we avoid the stomach flu!

We are doing one small thing every day for a year to create a simpler, quieter, more intentional life. Take a moment to read all About Us, check out The Rules of our year long project and sign up for our RSS feed or "like" us on facebook so that you can follow our journey to radical simplicity!

Day 1: Tossing the Throw Pillows (Ack!)

The Task: Give away (most of) my throw pillows.

The Why: I had a hard time deciding what to do for day one.  The whole point of this project is that 365 little changes adds up to a radically different lifestyle.  What one little thing could I do to kick off a series of little things?

So I chose the thing that I was most illogically apprehensive about. Some of the things we are going to do in this coming year are understandably frightening and ultimately life changing.  But throw pillows shouldn't be. Right?

But the fact that I am so attached to decorative pillows that I cringe at the thought of getting rid of them is a pretty good indicator that I should in fact get rid of them.

The bottom line is that my throw pillows just don't pass the William Morris test.

“Have nothing in your house that you do not know to be useful, or believe to be beautiful.” -William Morris

Sure, they are nice.  But beautiful? No.  And they certainly aren't useful since I've practically forbidden my family from putting their heads on them ever. Most of them aren't even comfy anyways.

Plus, throw pillows need to be washed occasionally and picked up off the floor a million times a day and replaced when they get worn and old or (more likely, since they never actually get used) out of style.

 I do not need throw pillows.

Full Disclosure:  We have two comfy throw pillows that we actually do put our heads on when lounging on the sofas watching movies, and my daughter has a somewhat sentimental throw pillow I made with her silhouette on it (I've blogged about that on my other blog), so we are keeping those ones. All the pillows in the picture above are being donated pronto!

The Verdict:  The part of me that loves to shop and own and swipe my VISA at stores that sell pretty shiny things is objecting big time.  (But who doesn't have throw pillows? Why would I get rid of perfectly good throw pillows. My sofas will be NAKED!)   But I'm excited about what this year will bring.  I'm excited to foster an atmosphere of cozy minimalism in my home and I think that in time I can get used to the look of my naked sofas...maybe.

We are doing one small thing every day for a year to create a simpler, quieter, more intentional life. Take a moment to read all About Us, check out The Rules of our year long project and sign up for our RSS feed or "like" us on facebook so that you can follow our journey to radical simplicity!