A graphic showing a loft containing a lot of boxes
Episode 292 – 10 things to declutter from your loft, attic or basement

Sometimes a loft, attic or basement can feel like the land that time forgot. It’s packed to the brim with all kinds of things that have not seen the light of day for many years. In this podcast we’re going to talk about 10 things you can declutter from your bulk storage areas.
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Transcript of this podcast episode
00:00
Sometimes a loft, basement or attic can feel like a land That Time Forgot. It's packed to the brim with all kinds of things that have not seen the light of day for many years. In today's podcast, we're going to talk about the 10 things you can declutter from your bulk storage areas.

00:28
You're listening to the declutter Apple podcast, bringing you tried and tested no nonsense tips and advice from the leading experts in decluttering, and organizing your home. Now, here are your hosts, Ingrid Jansen, and Lesley Spellman.

00:51
Hello, and welcome, listeners. I'm Ingrid. And I'm Lesley. If you're new to the declutter help podcast you're so welcome. What you'll find is that we try and find a fun factor in the serious business of decluttering. And if you've been here for a while, you know exactly what we mean. So thank you so much for listening. If

01:11
you'd like to get involved in conversations related to this podcast, it all takes place in our Facebook group. So come and join our lovely, warm, supportive community. To find the Facebook group go to declutter hub.com. Forward slash group to find out more, or you can search for the declutter hub community on Facebook. Well,

01:30
hello, Lesley, I'm excited about today's podcasts because it's a 10 Things podcast. And I think our listeners know that we love our 10 things. And we also love that our listeners share with us all the time, which sad things are in their houses as well. So we actually get emails, we get comments and reviews, our members get involved. Everybody's telling us who I had number three, nine and seven.

01:54
There's something very compelling about a 10 Things podcast, because it's immediately actionable. I think that's why people love it, people can go Oh, so it's relatable. Of course, people go yeah, I've definitely got some of those. And it's actionable, which is really, really important. So we've come up with a great list today of some things that you might find in what we call our bulk storage areas. So your bulk storage area might look different. But it's a loft, UK based loft, which is kind of an attic, everywhere else in the world, a basement, not necessarily a garage, but it might be an outbuilding of some kind, but somewhere where you store a lot of things that you have decided you no longer want in the body of your home. So that's what we're tackling today. So let's jump straight into number one, which I know you're a little bit fearful, loving bridge, right?

02:43
I know, I was hesitant, you kind of had to really pull me over the line here to put this on the list. lesbi because I was like, no way that is getting this is the currently topic for my house. But I can see where you're going with this. Yes.

02:57
So number one is Lego language I'm imagining all around the world. Now there are people taking a sharp intake of breath like, How dare you suggest less that we declutter our Lego, but there is method to my madness. Ingrid, tell me why you think we shouldn't declutter Lego? And I'll tell you why. I think we potentially should.

03:21
Well, honestly, I think you know my love for Lego. I think it's the best toy ever invented, to be honest with you. I think it's brilliant, I think I mean, I had it around when I was a young child. My mum kept it for a very, very long time and actually then divided the Lego for my sister and I and we each kind of books of her own LEGO when our kids were born. And my son is a massive LEGO fan. My dad, my daughter loved Lego as well, when the whole thing Lego kind of came about. She was all in. But it's been such a big feature in my life for such a long time that I always thought they were fantastic gifts. I always felt like I don't know, I love Lego. And maybe it's also listed because I really liked the sort.

04:10
I mean, the sorting of Lego is as you might imagine, with my patience is kind of I have not gotten any patience for that. But the reason why I think that there is a potential to declutter some Lego is because I think you know, you talk though Ingrid about you having Lego as a child. Now back in the day, you know, I was born in the kind of late 60s You were born in the early 70s. Yeah, Lego was a very different beast than what it is today. Yeah, we got a kind of collection of Lego which was just a few bricks of different sizes. If we're being honest, right? It wasn't like little harps and signs and everything is very elaborate. Now you know, you're building trees, all these kinds of you know, I mean, my my whole my family surprisingly love Lego as well. So we've got it all over Steve's got it Leah's got it. Nathan's got it. So Lego is here as well. Have I decluttered and At this point, no, I have not. But I think that it's a very different thing. And so what we find in lofts attics and basements is that people have got these huge boxes of light, it's kind of in between. So I'm talking about between where you are where you're firmly still building Lego in your house on a regular basis. And I've got a little bit of that was there and Steve. And that kind of interim period where pit where the kids are gone, you kind of an empty nester, but you're holding on to these boxes of Lego for potentially your grandkids in the same way that your mom did. Yeah, but I think Lego has really changed that. So back in the day, we were just given a whole box of Lego is a few bricks, different sizes, build something, whatever, use your imagination, use your creativity to build something. Nowadays, it's all set of Lego, that with instructions with packets, all those kinds of things, designed to build a specific thing. Like there's not much. I'm not saying there's not any creativity going on. But there's less it's more of a kind of engineered creativity now to get you to a certain point, right? Yes. So these massive boxes of bricks that we still retain and we keep, do the kids actually one than these days? Or do they want the, you know, Star Wars Lego or the princess Lego or the to see what I mean. You could give somebody 1000 red or yellow bricks, and they'd be like, Oh, I'm going to do that. Yeah.

06:27
I know. I'd be that's that's a whole other debate. Lastly, that you know, creativity of children just making up stuff with just a couple of breaks. It has changed. It is true Lego has changed a lot. And I mean, you know, the good thing is though, that Lego is still super popular. Yeah, it's still your if you are stuck with a whole box of Lego and you're like, I don't even know what to do with this stuff. You know, there's a big seller's market for it. There's a recycling scheme now worldwide for Lego. I mean, there are options and I think people these days are less afraid because I think we covered it are with Lego bricks that we had back in the 70s the kind of 20 yellow blue and green ones and red ones, but now we all have so much of it at a too much of a good thing can be too much. I even I even agree with that. Lesley so yes, yeah, feel like you're like, Oh yeah, I've got like, books just full of this stuff in my in my bulk storage areas. They're sitting there gathering dust, you can declutter it and

07:36
you're still very sad saying this. So we're not saying declutter all the Lego but you know, look at things like jet you know, the early Legos that kind of Duplo maybe you've got Lego that's kind of fake Lego, you know, dupe Lego? Do you know what I mean? Like that other stuff that that's kind of snuck in with your normal Lego that you can't use doesn't quite fit in. So really evaluate you've what you've got and see whether you've got too much. This is probably more about paring down the Lego that you'd no longer need that is not getting used to allow space, more space for the ones that you do use. That's what we're saying. Lesley,

08:07
do you actually think that people have turned us off now? They're not listening? Border like they have gone too far. This is skipping to the next spot. Exactly. I think we need to quickly move on to number two. Yeah,

08:23
let's move on to number two. I you know, the bottom line is everything that's in a loft about loft buttock, not a batek, an attic, loft, attic, or a basement is kind of probably something that's quite precious, which is the reason why it's up there. But a lot of this is about the passage of time, that's what we're talking about a lot is the passage of time is going to dictate what you do with that. So number two, also something that has been very special in the past, but maybe no longer is, which is paintings and pictures and photographs that you have taken down from your walls. At some point, Ingrid, what are we going to say about that?

08:59
I'm going to be truthful here, Lesley, then I've got a couple they are not in my loft attic or basement at the moment. But they're kind of in an area that I think I think I need to listen to my own advice here because I had some paintings up the wall. They took them down, replace them with something else. Indeed, we find them a lot in the bulk storage areas. And it's like I got to put this back up. No, and I'm like, why is it silly your house but it's hard. It's just a hard one.

09:30
Yeah, I think paintings paintings are probably easier because we've made a conscious decision that we're going to swap a painting over. You know, some people like to change things up as well. So we've got that option. So some people love the regeneration particularly, you know, over the past few years has been a kind of maximalist deco where people use collages and people are constantly changing things around and things don't need to be quite as uniform as they used to be. So there's definitely mileage in people keeping things and swapping them over. But you have to look at your own behavior. Then go, what are you actually doing with these things, if you've got a pile, which, honestly, 80% of the homes that including ours, in fact, have got this pile of things piled up neatly together, like tucked behind a server underneath the server in a loft attic or a basement that you've kept, because you're not quite ready to let go, you know, if you've got a family pictures, a great example of that, you know, you had your kind of family picture taken, you know, one of those lovely shots when your kids were little, but somehow now that your kids are 18, the one that you had as them as toddlers seems less relevant, or you've had all the photo shoots done where, and you've only got a finite amount of walls. What do you do with those old pictures? And they're big, they're bulky, you feel like you're never gonna put them back. But what do you do? Do we have an answer as to what you're going to do with them? Ingrid?

10:48
I recently tried to give one of the kids paintings away and I was unsuccessful.

10:57
Exactly. So it's just I think that definitely there's mileage in if it's a smaller item, there's mileage. And if you've got photograph frames, for example, you can definitely take photographs out of the frames and let the frames go or replace the frames with something. But just evaluate whether or not that is ever going to be useful. You know, some people just decide that they always want to keep that it's a sentimental item, you know, that kind of portrait picture of when your kids were little, sometimes they might come back in at some point. You know, it's this is hard stuff. But if you've got an excess of them, and they're taken up really valuable space, maybe it's one to look at.

11:33
Yeah, definitely. Number three, Lesley it tax archives, boxes with paperwork that are in the land that time for God's boxes full? Nobody knows. And then you open the books that you got, oh, my goodness, gracious. This is like tax paperwork from 1995. What is this doing? Still in my in my love story, my attic? This is crazy.

11:57
Yeah. And I think that, you know, tax, tax archives, paperwork, archives, whatever, it's gonna be very dependent on your individual situation, have you? Do you run a business? Do you have to keep things for tax purposes? What sort of stuffs up there, right. And so that's going to very much depend on your life and your self and your country, all of those legalities. So we're not being be legal, you know, we're ignoring the legalese here, you need to know what you need to keep. But what we're saying is, what happens is that people potentially do their taxes every year, decide that they don't want to keep those kind of tax archives with all the receipts and all that stuff in the body of their home, which makes complete sense. So they need to go somewhere in a bulk storage area to be kept, for legal reasons for a certain amount of time. In the UK, it's typically seven years, it's different. We won't go into when it how long it is, but it depends on where you live, how long that is. But what happens is it goes up, they all go up year after year after year, and none of them ever come down. So they've never you never go actually, my legal responsibility was only to keep those things for seven years, for example. But I've got them for 20 years. And so we're not saying get rid of all your tax archives, because that would be not great. But what we are saying is make sure that you're checking every year, that there's a throughput, you know, what if a new year goes up, can a new year come out an old year, sorry, come out, you know, very important to keep on top of that, because otherwise, you're gonna have 2025 boxes, you know, like candles, banker's boxes of stuff that's taken up valuable step space that you could potentially use for something else, or more importantly, for space with nothing in it, which is really what decluttering is all about. Right, Ingrid?

13:39
Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. And of course, be mindful when you are decluttering paperwork, especially archival paperwork, tax paper, financial paperwork, make sure you shred it, make sure you don't just throw it in your recycling bin, burn it or shred it or bring it to a special company that's shredded for you. Be careful with that. Yeah,

14:00
if anybody wants any advice on paperwork, we have a fantastic and I mean, absolutely fantastic in depth course, which you can buy as a standalone course. Or you can get access to obviously in our membership called Project paperwork. It goes into massive detail about what you should do because what we find is that people are very, very nervous about what to do about that and fear fearful of making mistakes. So do check out project paperwork, and we'll put the link in the show notes to that as well. So yeah, tax archives number four and grid. We Yes, we see this a lot, right.

14:34
I see this a lot and I'm happy to report I am not among these people. I'm feeling smart. Now. I do not have any books in my loft, attic or basement. The books that I have are in the body of my house on bookshelves, pared down, but we find boxes and boxes and boxes full of books in these areas.

14:57
I'm glad that you've not got any in your basement because you've been I've got a basement.

15:02
True true. I've got under the house area that they're not going to,

15:10
like a crawlspace. You do have a very nice loft stroke attic Ingrid. And you could easily easily put books out there. And but I could, but I'm not going to. Yeah, exactly. No, it's so so important to keep books in the body of your home so that you can enjoy them so that you can look at them so you can see them so you can give yourself the opportunity to look at them. Should we have an overflow of books, I really think that we're gonna direct people to listen to the podcast that we did on books, specifically, because there's a lot of emotions involved in books, this is not easy. But one thing that we are quite clear on is that you shouldn't really be keeping them in a loft or an attic or a basement. Yeah,

15:51
yeah. I think you know, you completely forget that they're there. You don't know anymore. What titles are up there. If they're in a books, you're never going to read them. Because you you'd have no idea where they are. And you have to rummage through maybe 20 or 30 books is full of books. They're far too heavy. It's not I mean, most houses here are steel, this delicate wooden rafters and things like that. And wooden ceilings. You can't have that kind of weight up there. You know, it can get hairy. We're not talking about two books, boxes with books, right. But we've seen like, whole lofts full of books. And that's when it gets tricky. Yeah,

16:29
definitely, I think you know, but really all boils down to, why am I keeping these things in my loft or attic. If I love them so much, I need to give myself an opportunity to be able to use them. So there will be specific reasons why you got books in a loft attic. If you move in, if you're doing a renovation, of course, all those things are exceptions, but really evaluate if you've got an overflow of books that are sitting there in your bulk storage areas, is it not time to pare them down a little it is hard if you're a book lover, so we would urge you obviously to go and listen to any kind of material that we've got on books to get yourself to that place, because you can't just go oh, I'm gonna get rid of the books out of my attic, it's not going to be as simple as that for sure they've gone up there. There's a reason why they're up there because you have struggled in the past to let go of them. But give yourself an opportunity to look at those and go, You know what, I just really want to have all of my books somewhere where I can actually access them. And when they're in box, it's really not good for them because they're placed. And often they're not stored really effectively in those boxes, or they're not stored in the right kind of boxes. And so it kind of messes with the box as well, doesn't it?

17:38
Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. Right, Lesley, I think we should books is a tricky one as well. I mean, maybe maybe our listeners are like, What are they talking about today? Pillows all to the clutter all these things and we don't want

17:56
to go on to the level one, two that I know. Some people like, Yep, I'm totally going to do that. Yeah. I'd love to know whether people want to or don't want to, you know, because we've got we've definitely got people who are reluctant and struggle, but we've got people who are fired up and ready as well. And so we've got people spam both things. And hopefully there are some things within here that resonate with you that you think you know what I could do that this weekend. Box is probably a bit shaky to me. But if you're raring to go Go for it. Yeah.

18:27
Right. Well, let me move on to number five ha sweep bags. And if you really are listening for the first time, you might wonder to yourself, I didn't even know what a sweep back is basically a sweep back is a back with a random collection of things that you've kind of swept up from around the house when you were expecting company or people were staying over or anything like that. And you kind of go and who I need to tidy up quick, let's get it back, throw some stuff into it all looks tidy. And I'll just put the back somewhere down. And then over time, this happens more and more and more. And at some point, it's like, what are all these bags doing here, boom, up, up, you go, it goes into the loft. And that's where it lands, never to see the light of day and then when some point you're like I need I've got no idea what's going on. When I pull the last letter down, stuff falls through the throat Oh my head and who are all these bags but just random stuff all these sweep bags. Because we do that

19:31
we do a sweep often in a state of panic doorway. And so it's not enough to just clear it from your kitchen surfaces or your living room surfaces or if you've got somebody staying over in a bedroom, you kind of have to conceal the evidence as well don't you and which is why they then not only do they go in a bag, they then go somewhere to the land That Time Forgot that which is what we're talking about today. And then our job quite often as professional organisers is to kind of find these things and go through them. and they can be equally massively satisfying, but soul destroying in the same way because these things take a long time to go through. But you can find absolute gems in them. You know, this is where we find jewelry that's been lost passports, little bits of money that you didn't know you had, all these kinds of things are in sweep bought boxes and bags. And so we would urge you to take them one at a time, you know. So if you know you've got those kinds of boxes or bags up in your life, take them one at a time, don't bring them all down over one go. Because they take a lot of time to go through saying we'd like these little human these casual dishes in your kitchen or junk drawers. Because it's such a random assortment of things. It takes time and energy and effort to go through them. So one at a time, one sweet bag at a time, but as I say, can be super satisfying, because you can definitely find things that you have lost and things that you absolutely can declutter as well. Yeah,

20:58
very satisfying. I agree. Well, let's leave. Big list. Before the break. We have dealt with five down five to go. So let's go for a break. And let's dive into some more after. Hi, everyone. Welcome back to your 10 things to declutter from your loft attic or basement. We've had five tricky words. I'm not sure if it's going to be any issue. Now. Let's the after the break, because I don't see

21:23
it getting any easier. So I thought six to 10 list. No, no get any all over it today. The bottom line is a loft attic and a basement is a difficult thing to declutter. Can you actually go in and do it? By you know, can you even find these things? It's all buried underneath things. And so it may be that you have to actually do a full loft, attic and basement declutter to uncover these things. But we did talk about it about six, seven podcasts ago, we talked a lot about the emotions relating to a loft attic and basement. I think it was called like setting up your storage spaces for success or something like that six, seven podcasts ago. So if you're struggling to actually get to that point, you know, do listen back to that podcast, because that will give you the tools to make the right decisions and to understand why you've been keeping these things. It's so so important.

22:12
Yeah, definitely. So let's go to number six and Lesley. We find a lot of kits, equipment and lofts as well old colts, old prams old Moses baskets, possibly to hand down to the next generation. The plastic is deteriorating as we go along. But yeah, we still think that in 30 years time we're going to put somebody else in there. I think this is a good one to talk about. Yeah,

22:42
yeah. So what we've not done so far before we started talking about we've not done a tally. I know we always do a tally. The last Titleist retrospectively do a tally from one to five and say what we've got and then let's talk about Moses baskets. Yeah. Oh, excessive Lego. Have we got that? No. Yes, you have. Yes, you absolutely. But not in

23:03
my loft. Nothing below. It's all still. I do and speak Lego should the law of supplying

23:12
an excess of Legos. We've got number one paintings and pictures. Have we got that? Yes. Both of us have got that? Tax archives. No. No. Books? No. No sweet bags? No. So we're two out of five. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay. Um, I was I was bothered the fact that we had not done a tally. Now we can continue talking about Moses baskets and prams. So first thing before we even started talking about it. Have you got any children's equipment? In your loft?

23:40
Yes. Oh. What do you got in there? I've got a moses basket in there. And was

23:48
what? So why is this on the list? And why is it not gone? Because

23:51
it was a moses basket that my husband that Max was in, that my husband was in, that his father was in. So it's a family heirloom, and it's been? He's my husband, my mother in law did not get

24:07
a look into the Moses basket.

24:09
I'm sorry. Yeah. And sorry. And yeah, sorry.

24:12
What did you just skip female of the family? Oh, sorry. And of course, my

24:18
mother in law completely made she, she upcycled it. So the fabric was really was was really bad and the padding and so we put a new mattress in we put new kind of at one of those veils that hang over. It's beautiful. Beautiful, okay? It's just a family heirloom.

24:36
Okay, so family heirloom and do so right. So we're looking at maximum now and it's hard to say 1517 To be fair, but do you is I look at my children. For example, if I had something like that, I think it would probably be a no, I think there'd be like No, I don't want that. That's that's that's the problem. Because yeah, I just think that, I don't know. It's hard to No, because I don't know, because it's not appeared yet. By the way, it'd be very nice for grandchildren at some point soon. But not not of my 21 year old or 20. But anyway, so the point is, we have to be honest about it. I think that's kind of slightly different because it really has got a lot of sentimental metal. Yeah. Really been passed through the generations. Yeah, a lot of things are not like that. They're just a moses basket. That's one generation old. Yeah, it has been kept just in case

25:28
everything else. I've decluttered Lesley, the children to the children's chairs, the courts, the things I didn't even go up in my loft. I was like, after of course, guests after child number one is went into the loft and came down for child number two. And then when when my husband and I decided, okay, we're happy as a family now. Every time the grad or something, it was gone. I was like, it needs to get out of my house.

25:51
Yeah, I think I think there's a couple of things that are wrapped up. So sentimentality, and I can absolutely see that and can absolutely see that it's not something that even if your own kids didn't use it, I can imagine that it's something that you would keep regardless of that, you know, and so, you know, because other people further down, the generations might use it. Yeah, a lot of that is about health and safety. So a lot of different generations. You know, because there's so much stuff nowadays, you know, the way that children are reared, if for want of a better word is very different. And the the kind of the way that people do that, and the examples of what you should do, what you shouldn't do is all different, the materials, the all of these things are very different. So I think this has kind of health and safety element to the sentimentality thing to it. Health and safety is a big one for things like prams, and car seats, and all that kind of stuff as well. But so is the passage of time, you know, I'm sure that the way that I bought a car seat and back in the day through with the, with the, you know, the watch call, we used to use seat belts, you know, you used to have the whole the car seat and not not on the actual basket, but to hold the car seat, and you kind of use the seat belt in the back, you know, to mean and then But nowadays, there's all like ISOFIX type stuff that they just click into and all that. So even the kind of technology has changed as well. But we really need to look and identify whether or not we're keeping these things for the right reasons and have these honest conversations with our children, if they are at an appropriate age. Obviously, we're not asking our eight year old whether they want to keep it when they have a baby. But you know, if we've got a 20 something or a 30 Something child that will hold it, you know, do you feel that you would want this when you have your own children?

27:29
Yeah, Agreed. Agreed. Okay,

27:32
but the reason why we keep holding because it's so expensive. Yeah, this prompts like 1000s of pounds, you know, I mean, are they are over 1000 pounds for params. And car seats are not you know, we have different cart five different car seats for different things and little seats and baby seats and toddler seats and it's expensive, right?

27:50
Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. So, yes. I think you're right. I think mine is more sentimental than anything else. I mean, everything else is gone. If you've got anything, talking about the telly, no, okay, if you're okay, I'm one of them.

28:03
I'm one of you know, I have got one thing actually, which is a seat. You know, when they get older when they're like about seven or eight, and the you just with a little seat in and then it just kind of elevates them a little bit. Yeah, I've got one of those. Oh, and why have we got that? Because because I've got a little nephew. Okay, you know, I mean, I think he might not that he's been in it for years, but I can't it's no health and safety responsibility with that. It's just a piece of plastic that just Yeah, it's not like a complicated thing. It's just something that in the car, so little booster. Yeah. Yeah. A booster seat. Exactly. Yeah, no time and was so long ago because so far eradicated from my mind. But yeah, have got a booster seat. So yeah.

28:48
Okay, I let's go on to number seven. And I'm already laughing but I'm feeling smug because I don't have this. So this is good. old wallpaper, paint tiles, and offcuts of carpets. Yes, we find them everywhere. Not only lofts, attics and basements, garages sheds. Under the sofa. You name it there there.

29:16
No, it's a weird one. Isn't it really? So again? Is there value in keeping some of these things some of the time? Of course, is it valuable to keep old tiles if you tile a kitchen tile a bathroom, and you've got some leftover Of course it's valuable because there are instances where you need to replace tiles. You need to look at the volumes of tiles that you've got wallpaper I would argue against that being sensible because I'm like, if something goes wrong with your wallpaper, you are you You know accomplished enough to replace one section of wallpaper which has been on the wall for five years which is going to be very different shades the one that you place it with. So wallpaper for me is a kind of you need to let that go but I'm here to be proved wrong, of course, paint potentially useful to do some touching up. But same principle. Are you ever actually going to use it? There are instances where I've used paint touch up, but you need to look at how much of it you've got, you know, if it's got like a tiny two inches at the bottom of a car, is it ever really going to be useful? And the other one off cuts of carpet drive me and say, because the carpet fitters just leave like random offcuts of carpet and everyone goes, Oh, that'd be used. I'd be useful as a little matte aura thing gear to throw down in the back of the car or to you know, people can find a use for these kids because it's brand new bit of carpet, which is something that is expensive that you paid for the carpets that is leave them always though, yeah. And I find myself like I've just need to literally get this to the tip straightaway, but it feels bad to throw away a brand new piece of carpet.

30:51
Yeah.

30:52
psychological barriers all the time. Yeah,

30:55
it's been a long, Kasia actually what we're talking about the other day that we've had like our hallway carpet, which is like eight years, like, How long ago was that? It just didn't seem that low by this time goes by so quickly. But nevermind, but all the offcuts of carpet were gone. I was like I can't I don't do that kind of stuff.

31:13
I mean, you wait, I think if you have I've got some carpet, you really need to look and go, What am I going to use? What purpose have I got to use this off of carpet today? You know what I mean? If you can see a use for an awful lot of carpet, and you've got a carpet fitter, you think Oh, that'd be really good to cover that a little bit in the bottom of our wardrobe or something like that. Yeah, get the carpet fitted to put it in there and fit it. You know, said Do you mind here, I'm gonna give you an extra Turner to just stick something in the bottom of the wardrobe. Because that will be helpful to have a new piece of carpet. Yeah, to replace some old carpet. But you've really got to be able to think about a use for that here. And now if you haven't got one, it's just clutter and it needs to go. Yeah, that's why I'm saying keep a sensible amount. Yeah, wallpaper, in my opinion, probably needs to get ditched. It's probably useful, but you need to look at when you've repainted it. This is the problem that we've got. People have got paint and wallpaper and carpet and Tales from things that have long been changed as well. You know what I mean? So look at whether it's from a renovation project that's gone before. What else was there in carpet? Yeah, I have a bit of a bit of a no bit of a bit of a Debbie Downer on carpet. I'm afraid if

32:26
you've got any of these Lesley, I've got I've got

32:29
tails. But I've got a sensible amount of tiles and I do not have any tiles for something that's gone before. And I have paint Yeah, I agree.

32:41
Yeah, same we did a bit of paint clear out a while back not in my attic or loft but in a more suitable place. And a couple of tiles in that indeed from when we did our bathroom because we still I still want to tile my downstairs loo that I haven't done yet. But that's that's that's a project so but yeah, couple of tiles no carpet, no wallpaper. Okay, so very good. So what kind of one one on this one? Okay, let me go

33:09
pepper on your walls though. Ingrid. No,

33:12
nothing this however the wallpaper then I not in this. No, not in this house. I'm thinking like, did we have wallpaper before we take took it all for anything like that. I love it. Well, I know you do. But you're very good at that kind of stuff less than designing and choosing and wallpapering and that kind of stuff. I know you can't wait to put your hands on my house. But it's a shame you live so far away from me. Otherwise, I'm always ready.

33:35
Always ready. We will pay for everywhere. Yeah.

33:42
Let's go to number eight. Oh, this is also boxes with we find with course notes from old jobs, your university, your school, your college, a first aid course you did 25 years ago. Maybe even your driving test materials. I mean, courses that you've taken in the past, maybe even health and safety, I don't know. But then you think, Oh, I made some notes and stuff and the booklet and the printouts and the thingy and oh, you never know when it might come in handy. I'm gonna put it in a box in my life that it ends up probably in your office first somewhere. And then at one point, you're like, why I've got all these things. Let's box it up and put it in the loft.

34:26
It's time isn't it? We need to evaluate these things. We're keeping them for sentimental reasons. Often, it's the sentimentality surrounding these items that makes us keep them but we do have this kind of little as Ingrid said, think that they're gonna come in handy one day, but will they you know, today's the day this weekend is weekend to go Am I ever going to look back at my driving test notes that are made for my What do you call it the theory test? You know, am I able to look at that I literally just drive around you know, I don't really have I'm not gonna refer back to that. Yeah,

34:58
or of course you I did. Oh work, like eight years ago you did like a course that was like a day that you were like out of the office. You're like Roku. And then Word

35:07
Perfect. Yeah. Word Perfect. 2.1 in like 1999, or whatever. I don't even know when it goes on 90. Yeah, exactly. It's a word purpose of getting a loan from a computer. I don't think that's gonna get you anywhere.

35:25
And sometimes there's even still the CD there. Let's see how to install it on your computer. Oh, I gotta take you back to the good old days. But I

35:36
mean, learning those things that can imagine I mean, we were we were at the cusp of learning. You know, my kids, I've got no idea about that. I'm like, literally wasn't not a computer like me. So I came across one when I was at school when I was about 15. And there was some strange people who did like computer science or whatever. And then he went into work and had to deal with the, you know, the onslaught of the internet and like, they've got no idea. Like, it's like, they can't even conceive what that was like. I'm like, literally you just start to read about it. Fax machine was

36:07
like a daily used piece of equipment in our office. You know what I mean? I still remember the dialing in total even get all that

36:17
Steve was obviously you know, Steve, isn't it isn't an accountant. So when he first started like 21, one of his job when he first started as a real Jr. is Jobs was driving sets of accounts from Birmingham to Bournemouth, you know, that was one of his jobs for the day, because he's as happy as Larry just saying, Oh, my God, listen for music. But that was the way that accounts were taken by a junior person driven in a car, you know, not sent by it's like crazy, isn't it? So think about it, really. But anyway, we digress. And we're already well over time. So we need to continue. Well, I know what's notes need to be up for evaluation, because that's a lot of paper. It can provide a fun exercise to go through them. So enjoy the exercise of looking back, and then just let them go. And if there's something really interesting then that you want to keep you can keep individual pieces of paper. You don't need to keep the whole lot. Yeah,

37:05
exactly. numb. Oh, of course, before we forget, have you got course notes, Lesley? No.

37:13
I don't even take course notes. I just got angered write that down. I've got some quote I've got I mean, I've got some course notes from things that we've done together. And I've just sat there. I've never looked at them. But they're on my desk and yeah, so they might come in, but I think I'll just get rid of him at some point. He feels like he should you get things that you print things off now. Because a lot of them are like workbooks and stuff and they have to write things in. But am I ever going to look at that you tell me. Am I ever going to look at any of those courses that

37:40
we've done online? Definitely not. I just don't take tell me what I've asked me what I've written down.

37:49
In which case notes about everything. I'm like, You're never gonna look at that. Never gonna look at it. I think it's like a habit thing. But

37:56
there's indeed there's not there's nothing in my life like that. Absolutely not. Because you know, and I've decluttered a lot. I did a massive clear out a while back of just old notebooks and everything. Garner's right. Oh my gosh, we need to crack on Lesley. This is like we knew this was going to be a long one, right? Okay, number nine, out grown and overflow clothing. Mainly always in black big backs.

38:22
People have set up like those little fabric wardrobes or rails as well if you've got a rail big enough, some people have got them on in like little wardrobes to try and get the dust off them. As long as you've got space in your loft and stuff. Yeah. Again, you know, sometimes it's necessary depending on you know, the size of your house, you have to work with what you've gotten. Sometimes this might be necessary, but what you need to make sure is that you've got a process in place. So if you are using a book storage area for an overflow of clothing, what is that clothing? Is it a summer and winter swap over? perfectly valid perfectly fine. Ingrid does that she does it from our main bedroom into a spare bedroom. So there's no problem with doing that if you've not got space of course we all have to work with the space that we've got. But if these things have lain up there for five years and you've never touched them from decades ago what what what are you doing where's the process to do the the swap over what do we call it a seasonal swap?

39:21
Yeah, yeah, seasonal change over Yeah. Yeah. seasonal change over of clothes. Yeah, yeah. But also like you know, outgrown stuff you know, that we might have cut for for child number two with child number three and then it gets you know too much and then we can't cope anymore or it can also be handed down through other people.

39:40
I've got two or three kids and I can't cope anymore. What can I do about not got any clothes just the children?

39:52
No, I think it's you know, it's but it's also like the hand me downs from other people is all these clothes that kind of end up in bags and boxes and things So, that gets flung up there of that letter and go yeah, I'll look at it another time and then sometimes you know, it is outgrown because you've missed it through circumstances you know, but at one point is to a nice clear out of all this stuff, you know, other people can really use those clothing those items of clothing so donate, donate, donate, if you can. It's really important. No outgrown or overgrown clothes here in in my loft. Lesley only some ski wear, but I've got that's of course, sports equipment. That's not. But no, of course we go skiing. So yeah, and we go through it every time. That's it. Nothing else here. How about you? Nothing. Okay, we're doing good. We're no good. Last one. Last one.

40:41
We need to speak. Nothing great. Off we go.

40:44
I know. I'm like shoes. It's like, we were like, people are gonna be like, they're gonna be here forever. Today. Number 10. suitcases and backpacks. We've talked about this before. We know, we know, we know. But do we really need suitcases without wheels, suitcases that weigh about as much as you're allowed to take on all of that these days. Your suitcase is a loader like eight kilos, you can put 202 stuff in it. Let those go, you know, you really, you know, if you want to store something, ideally, you would not put it in a suitcase that you still can't see what it is, you know, you want to put it in, you know, containers that you can see through with labels and stuff. But all suitcase is normally not ideal.

41:33
Then there's a guilt associated with with letting go of suitcases because often you can't donate them, you know, you have to just they have to just go to landfill. Right? And so that's where there's a barrier there for people because, oh, I just don't want to send this hard. Shell plastic suitcase without any wheels. Can't send the charity. No one's gonna want it. Put it onto a local giveaway site. Somebody might have a use for it. So I would try that before. But yeah, but don't keep it in your own house because it's still landfill. Even if it's sitting in your loft, attic or basement. Yes.

42:11
Ah, I'm thinking Lesley. I think I've got two suitcases in my loft. But they've got wheels. They do have wheels. So there are you need

42:22
suitcases because you got to go on all day. Yeah. We're not saying get rid of all you know, all we're saying we're saying, look at the suitcases. Yeah, and only keep the ones that you're currently using or you can see are useful because they undoubtedly will be a situation where you need a bigger suitcase or you need multiple suitcases or things like that. Kind of what if scenario so people needing it? When do we ever use more than one suitcase when we go on a plane, but some people do if you were emigrating overseas, and that's definitely in your line of sight for the future. Perhaps you do need to keep a few more suitcases because you might need to emigrate with five suitcases and not just one. And so there are instances you need to evaluate your own life but it's keeping hold of these things for no reason, you know, each individual item and go but why am I keeping it? What is my emotional response to this item? That means that I'm struggling to let go of it. That's what this is all about. Last attics and basements are very, very hard. And we have done a lot of podcasts about them so do you know if you're ever looking for information for something anything I will live in a relatively less they've spoken about that before? We are on our website in particular we have which is easier to search things within our website, then it is within the podcast players. So do come onto our website and take a look. Even if you end up listening to it in a podcast player. Do you research on our website Declutter. hub.com forward slash the podcast put in laughs attics, basement suitcases sweet bags, all of the things that we spoken about. And it will pop up with all of the content that we've got around that individual topics that you can find things more easily, because it can be difficult scrolling through and sometimes the titles you don't know where we've spoken about these things because it's not in the title. So do your research on our website. It's a really valuable resource for you to find what you're looking for.

44:13
Exactly. Well as li what's the Telly then we have we each have to before the break. I'm losing this one I think

44:23
got that you've got you've got a few got.

44:25
I've got kids equipment, I've got the Moses basket and I've got the tiles and paint although they're not really in my law.

44:32
I'm not we're not counting that as that's fine because we everybody needs part tiles and paint you just don't need any excess of what you need. Okay, so I'm not counting that as one.

44:42
Okay, so no course notes not in my loft, no agronomic have not in my loft suitcase. Yeah, there's a few suitcases, obviously, but not none that I don't use. Okay, okay, I'm doing only two

44:53
to Intel. So you got your moses basket. So that's 333 and I'm going and none in the second half. Wow. So I went, Yeah, you win.

45:05
So listeners, you need to tell us. Have you got any of the 10 things that we've mentioned hanging about lurking away gathering dust in your loft basements or attics? We would love to know, let us know. Tell us, send us a review. Tell us in the comments. Go to our website. Leave us a comment all of those things we would love to know from you. What it is that you're keeping up there or under in the basement of your house. Yeah, let us know. That's it. That's it. I've enjoyed it less the app enjoyed. It's been fab talking about this. So thanks so much, listeners. I hope you enjoyed it too, and we'll see you next week.

45:49
Thanks so much for listening to the declutter hub podcast. Don't forget to subscribe to us in your podcast player so you don't miss an episode. And we'll see you next week.
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Episode 292 – 10 things to declutter from your loft, attic or basement

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