Image Credit Depop.com
I have a confession for you all; I am sat in my room after an hour of dying parts my hair pink (temporarily of course) and am on the verge of dying the whole head just because I can. With no work and no school, it really does seem like an appealing idea for someone who has never really played with hair dye before in their whole seventeen years. It all started when my mum spotted some old hair chalks under the bed and after some big protests from myself along the lines of ‘mum, my hair will go frizzy with all the water you have to spray’, and ‘ You can only do one strand and that’s it’. Funnily enough, not long after I was in the bathroom with bright pink hands colouring my hair and I absolutely love it and wouldn’t be surprised if I will be seen walking about with candyfloss locks later this month. Despite all this hair talk, hair dyeing is not the topic I want to go into for this month’s article. I know that with all this time on our hands it’s becoming very easy to fall into a state of boredom so I thought, with the help of some well researched tips, that I would offer you some help in filling that time with one of my favourite activities; de-cluttering. As surprising as it is that any joy can be found in such a mundane task, there is plenty of fun to be had when clearing and tidying spaces. During isolation I have spent numerous days de-cluttering specific areas of my room, rather than tackling the entire space in one go because that is when it begins to become tedious rather than productive.
When I first began to look at ways to declutter my room, I found a lot of the tips and tricks online were quite impersonal as they took a severe approach to cleaning and aimed to get rid of everything that didn’t have an ‘aesthetic appeal’ that blended with the room. For me (and I can imagine a lot of others), I have always believed that keeping things that mean something to you is important even if they may be considered junk by an onlooker. It is always lovely to keep items that are special, especially if they were a gift or have been passed down to you. Keeping this in mind, I have come up with a routine that has always worked for me when de-cluttering. Firstly, it is always a good idea to leave the room and then re-enter purely so that you can have a fresh perspective on what it is you want your room/space to look like, it also means that you can picture how someone may look at your room when entering and then work from there. Once you’ve done this, always gravitate towards the area that you feel needs to be cleared first, this will be the most time-consuming space and should be tidied first. Then it really helps to categorise; for example, you could make three piles if you were sorting out shelves; books, ornaments, and candles. Then you need to pick a category, let’s say books, and ask yourself how many times you have used (in this case, read) the item, if you’ve read that book lots you might want to take it off the shelf or perhaps lend it to a friend if you don’t think you’ll read it again. With any category, you should look at whether you like the item enough to keep it or whether you are keeping it for the sake of it. The best way to look at things is in a positive way rather than negative; if the item makes you happy whatever it is then you should make sure it stays but if you haven’t got a use for something anymore then it’s best to give it to charity or sell it so it can be loved by someone else. For extra storage, Ikea sell big clear, flat containers that slide easily under a bed if it doesn’t have anything beneath it, similarly they do material boxes that you can pop on top of your wardrobe which are very useful for storing sentimental things that you don’t want on show.
Don’t be too hard on yourself if you feel you can’t get rid of as much as you wanted to, some things are really hard to get rid of so don’t force yourself into any decisions you might regret. When I’ve filled my bags with the things I don’t want, I always re-evaluate them after a few hours to make sure I haven’t got rid of anything that I shouldn’t have. This being said, try not to go back and salvage all your goods (I always manage to grab a top or two from my bundle that seem to work their way back into my wardrobe). When you’re completely happy, choose which bags are going where, either to charity or a friend or worst case scenario, the bin (some things just cannot be given away, especially not bright pink shorts that should never have been made in the first place, let alone worn). One other thing that has been brought to my attention is the app Depop (depop.com) where you can sell and buy clothes in an easy and safe way; you have to post a photo with a short description and a price and then people can message you and buy the item, when you get an account you attach a PayPal account so that you can be protected both ways and you have to post the clothing item to their address, really simple and fun stuff (great for clothes that are in good condition but you just don’t love anymore!)
Image Credit Depop.com
I hope these tips help on your de-cluttering days, you might find it exciting to find and sort through the items you didn’t even know you owned! Next month I’ll be talking about the art of isolation fashion photos, so stay tuned.
