A graphic of a loft full of boxes which need decluttering
Episode 52 – Loft (Part 2) planning and decluttering

In Part 2 of this three part podcast series, Lesley and Ingrid talk about the logistics that make decluttering your loft so daunting and suggest some challenging decluttering questions to ask yourself. So many homes have lofts and attics that are filled to the brim with stuff - from appliance boxes to suitcases to memorabilia to kids' toys and hand me downs. You name it, it might just be in your loft. But decluttering your loft can be a daunting task. In this podcast series, we break it down so we think about the emotions involved, the planning, decluttering, organising and zoning.
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Transcript of this podcast episode
Intro  0:07  
Welcome to today's episode of The declutter hub podcast, your channel for super easy, no nonsense advice on how to declutter and organise your home. Please welcome your host professional organisers, Ingrid Jansen and Lesley Spellman.

Ingrid  0:26  
Hello, and welcome listeners to Episode 52 of the declutter hub podcast. We're Ingrid and Lesley and we're helping people declutter their homes. Check out members dot declutter hub.com. For more information on our step by step online courses, live q&a sessions we do every two weeks, our membership community and our checklists and guides. In today's episode, Lesley and I are talking about loft organising. This is a three part series and this is part two. Last episode, we talked about all the habits and emotions that determine why we store things in a loft. And today we're going to get down to the nitty gritty of decluttering. Lesley, have you got a loft? Confess?

Lesley  1:10  
You know what? I don't have a loft. Oh. Well, though, you're very helpful, is it? No, but I've decluttered many aloft in my time, let me tell you and banged my head, like millions of times on the rafters and got splinters in my feet and been freezing and nearly falling down it so yeah, you know, I've got a lot of experience of loft decluttering and organising. Let me tell you,

Ingrid  1:34  
and you've got a basement. So I mean, you have a basement instead of a loft. So it's basically the same thing. It's basically stuff as place where stuff goes that nobody wants anymore.

Lesley  1:45  
For the moment Yeah, no, in my house are used for that I have in my house, of course.

Ingrid  1:51  
Okay, so what what kind of stuff do we find in there should just let's just talk about just what the kind of stuff we find out there. So our listeners have an idea of what we're talking about.

Lesley  2:00  
I think they already know to be fair, they're like, yeah, yeah, tick, tick, tick. Yeah, you know, there's things like old furniture that you keep in for a rainy day. Obviously, all the decorations go up there don't know, Christmas, Easter, Chinese New Year, Halloween, etc, etc. All the different decks go up there. Yeah, lots

Ingrid  2:19  
of old suitcases old and new.

Lesley  2:23  
Lots of sentimental stuff as well. So memory boxes. So if you can't, if you can't have memory boxes in your house, the left is the ideal place to store those but sometimes we have quite the large amount of memory boxes don't when sentimental things.

Ingrid  2:38  
Actually, my camping and my skiing gear is in my loft. So that's really helpful. So I want to keep that. We're not going to declutter my skiing gear, okay.

Lesley  2:47  
Oh, no. And that's the perfect place for it. You know, if you've not got a garage or somewhere in your house, you can keep it you know, and it's pretty tricky sometimes to get the camping and skiing game up there. I'm not gonna lie. But it is an ideal space for as long as it's clean and dry. Yep, yeah.

Ingrid  3:01  
I find tonnes of baby equipment, old coats, old prams old baby bots, old mattresses, cribs, you name it, the shop full of stuff, I find baby equipment

Lesley  3:16  
a lot. Because they come with a lot of stuff. And we are desperate to get that stuff out of our house. So the first opportunity that we got to get it in the loft we do don't wait because we're like, plastic goes up. Yeah, there's loads of baby equipment in loss as well, for good reasons sometimes and for other sometimes not for good reasons. Yeah.

Ingrid  3:35  
I find lots of seasonal items like fans for the summer heaters for the winter, summer and winter clothes, you know, the not only the heavy ski clothes, but also if people have small wardrobes they keep the summer or the winter clothes up in the loft

Lesley  3:52  
stuff that they're kind of rotating. So if you've got like a rotation system going on, then that's those kinds of things are allowed to go up in the loft. But we'll talk a little bit more about rotation systems later.

Ingrid  4:02  
Yeah. And of course, close as well from kids. You know, if you have 1234 kids, people use the loft as some sort of almost recycled of let's put the next size into into a into a box or in a bag and then we'll find it when the next kid reaches that age. And then we'll go through it again. And so lots and lots of kids clothes as well.

Lesley  4:28  
Exactly. And let's not forget books, it's quite often an overflow for books. It's quite often an overflow of paperwork, magazines that we don't want. course notes work stuff, you name it, it will be in a lot somewhere across the world, won't it?

Ingrid  4:46  
Yeah. And that's I think why it is actually really overwhelming and it is really a big job is so let's talk a little bit about logistics before we go into the deck cluttering? Why is it so overwhelming? And why is it such a big job? Well, what do we need to sort out and think before we actually open it laughter restart to pull things out?

Lesley  5:10  
Well, I think it's that some of the, you know, we talked about in the last episode, the first episode, part one, so if you've not listened to that, please go back and listen to it, because it's all about the habits and emotions. We talked about it being, you know, the decisions are not that difficult to make sometimes, but it's the logistics that cause problems, as well as being tricky to declutter. It's also tricky to put stuff away, which is why we get this kind of dumping ground scenario as well really, isn't it? So that's, that's the difficult so logistics, it's worth talking about for a couple minutes, just the kind of things that different people might have to think about some people I've got a fantastic loft, when it's carpeted, it's got windows, it's beautiful. It's more or less than an exit another room in their home. But for other people, it's a tricky space to work in.

Ingrid  5:54  
Yeah, definitely. It is often quite dark. So hopefully you have a light up there. If not, I would really recommend getting a light source up there. Even maybe get get your lamp from downstairs. If there's no light at all, you need to have some light to work in. Can you get up and down the loft? Ladder? Easily? It's quite sturdy, or is it a bit wonky? And do you almost need to have somebody there to hold that loft ladder for you? Is the floor safe to work? Have you got a nice boarded loft? And do you feel happy walking around in your loft? Or is it almost kind of you have to balance on the beams going from one thing to the next. So you have to be really on high alert when you work in a in a loft. If you're not sure about the floor space. Of course it can can actually really cold in winter and very hot in the summer. So I actually did a loft declutter recently, and we actually had to put some fans up there. And it wasn't even a roasting all day. But it just gets really warm because it's the top of the house. So we found a fan and we plugged it in. So we actually got some electricity, we got a long electricity extension, and we put over the fan in and that was really, really nice.

Lesley  7:09  
Yeah, and I can guarantee whenever I've worked with clients, it's either 90 degrees outside and let me tell you, it gets from roasting hard, doesn't it and aloft when it's hot outside, or it's the depths of winter. And so it's freezing cold. I never do a loft in kind of April or May when it's normal weather. It's always in the extremes of temperature. And it's really relevant because it really affects your energy levels.

Ingrid  7:31  
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And also, I think, check out if there actually is a plug and electricity plug upstairs. So if you do want to Hoover a little bit, or maybe there's lots of spider web stop there, and you want to kind of do a bit of a cleaner before you get started. Check out if you've got an electricity point, or maybe get a long extension cord as well.

Lesley  7:52  
Yeah, you also need to think logistically about what's going to happen to the stuff that you take out, don't you? So think about that in advance because the volumes of stuff that can come out of a loft if you're doing a good declutter are huge. And so have you got people that can go to the recycling centre for you? Have you got, you know, a really large car that you're going to fit everything into impact? Do you need a skip, we don't often recommend a skip. But sometimes if you are doing a big lofty cluttered sometimes that's the best way. Do you need a man with a van? There's so many options. And you will know what the answer to those is for you individually. But think about it before you get started. Because the last thing that you want to do is to declutter, you'll often have all that stuff sitting in your hallway over the weekend, because that is mightily depressing.

Ingrid  8:40  
I know it's amazing. There's like the books just never it keeps coming out of that hatch. And you're like, how much stuff is on there. So you don't want to have turn your whole house into a tip because you haven't thought before? What is going to happen with this stuff. And actually, there's a service here as well, that you can actually demand will go up the loft and get it out. And not so you don't only get a skip or a man with a van but they actually bring it down from the loft all the way down because there's some stuff can be really heavy. So you need to really think about that. And, you know, also be realistic if you need help. You know, do you need help from a friend or a family member or neighbour or or child or maybe a professional organiser? If you can do that, but don't try and do this all by yourself unless you want to do one books at a time.

Lesley  9:31  
You know, I just I'm just say with a smile on my face remembering it laughing Katie and I did. And everything was great. And now it's a big laughs It was a nice space. But But the lady had kept all the OLED TVs and you know how heavy those OLED TVs are. And I can make a tiff between us because it was a it was an elderly lady that we were doing it for us. We couldn't enlist her help, unfortunately. So between the two of us trying to balance these old TVs and stuff. It wasn't perhaps The most sensible thing in the world to do but yeah, then we did like, you know, there's carpet, a huge like, carpet the size of a whole room like, Come on, we can do this, we can do this. Why are we doing? So yeah, I think that kind of service where the sturdy man, like bring it down for the lock might have been a good idea but then that's quite difficult because you want to go through and declutter this stuff. So often when I'm working in a loft, I do work within the loft, but the stuff needs to come out to create a space for you to work and yeah,

Ingrid  10:29  
yeah, that's exactly my next point, you probably, the aim will be to create some space in the locks itself. But you also want to have somewhere outside of the loft that you can have some space. So for example, if you find a box with lots of books, or paperwork, or photographs, you probably don't want to look at that in it loft, where it's cold, if it's quite dark in your loft, you're gonna strain your eyes trying to figure it all out. So you probably don't have to take it down, have a look through it. But also, if you do find a box with photographs, I would say put that to the side and do that later and start doing all the more bulkier items first. So you don't lose the momentum of you don't get stuck into Oh, look at this photo. So you probably want to do the boxes with smaller things to decide get the bulky stuff done first and then go more smaller into the nitty gritty of it.

Lesley  11:23  
Yeah, definitely. Because if you can work up there, that's going to be the most sensible thing logistically, the last thing you need to do is take things down and up. But as you say, there are some things where it's sensible to do it that way, you need good light, or you need lots of time. You don't want to sort through boxes and boxes of photographs sat on the floor in a dark, dingy loft really do Yeah, exactly that you want to be able to take time over that. But that's going to be specific things that's not going to be everything.

Ingrid  11:47  
Yeah. One really good example for that is I was actually helping a client sort through all her kids clothes, and she had four kids. So clothes were being passed down from one kid to the next. But it all had gotten into black bean bags. So she actually was able to order some books. So we took all the clothes down, sorted them all size wise, in the meantime, went through them and actually realised and said, is this actually going to be nice for the next one? Or has it had its best time? And then we label all the books and then we put all the boxes back up. But because I happen to look at all the little labels in the clothes for the site. We couldn't have done in a dark loft. You're taking stuff up and down all the time. That's that's why I think what makes it so tiring as well. Yeah, I

Lesley  12:35  
know. At the end of the day, when I've done a rough declutter, let me tell you, it is exhausting. Yeah. It's not great environmentally, you know, things like that. There's loads of things that come into play. So have a think about that before you embark on your life. Some laughs are better than others. You know whether you've got a nice one or a difficult one. So I think we wanted to talk about logistics, logistics, because that's important to think about. It's all about this plan. And isn't it planning your day planning your weekend planning an appropriate amount of time, rather than just thinking? Well, that's what I'm going to do today. So it's really important to do this big thing garages, lofts, those kinds of things, it's important to do some planning, because they're going to take, you can't really break it down into bite sized chunks, this is going to be a job that you're probably going to need to do all in one go on over a weekend. I think we what we wanted to do was we wanted to talk about some sort of typical questions when we're decluttering that we find up there. So in no particular order. And the one thing that I want to say about these is there's no right or wrong answers. So what we are not expecting is for you to get rid of everything based on the questions that we're going to suggest to you that you ask. Because only you know, in your individual circumstances, whether that's the right decision to keep them or let them go for yourself. But we just wanted to give you a little bit of food for thought and talk about some of the things where we have barriers in our minds that stop us from getting rid of things that sometimes we should be getting rid of. Does that make sense?

Ingrid  13:57  
Yeah. So basically, we're going to go through some questions you can ask yourself when you're decluttering, to make it easy for you to decision if you want to declutter them or not.

Lesley  14:08  
Yeah, there's something it's always interesting, because when I'm working with clients, there's something quite empowering about somebody being next to you. As you know, you know, that x we do that every day. And sometimes people know themselves what the what the answer is, but they find it really difficult to come to that conclusion themselves without a prompt. So what we're hoping here is that you can do this on your own. And so there's no there's no particular order, because there's no particular order for the most part when we're doing a decluttering aloft as to what comes with things just come and you have to work around it in a kind of clockwise method. So let's talk about let's talk about some of the things that we found up there and the questions that we're going to ask a

Ingrid  14:47  
lot of things have faded hand me downs from other people. And I think we need to ask yourself, am I actually going to use this stuff? I mean, the people gave it to me with the best intentions but Now I think you need to be honest with yourself and go, am I actually going to use this?

Lesley  15:07  
And I think there are loads of things that come into play, let's face it, how many downs are not just things that you've been given how many downs are from one child to another within your own family as well. So for me, for example, I've got, I've got two boys and a girl, boy, girl, boy, so seven years between Luke and Nathan. So that seven years in terms of fashion, and what you would put a child in was very different. And so I wouldn't probably put something, I'm not saying there was nothing. But for the most part, I wouldn't have put Nathan into something that I had from Luke. And probably because I didn't have it, because I don't do Declutter. Fashions, I think the point that I'm trying to make is that fashions change. And so, you know, really, really think that through and, you know, it's hard, isn't it we've talked about in the last podcast, which is about the guilt that we feel, getting rid of things that have cost so much money, you know, and kids clothes, they're in such a short amount of time out that we feel really guilty, just letting that go, you know, baby clothes in particular, you know, a baby might only be in something for five, six weeks, and then it's gone. And that might be something that costs 20, or 30 pounds. And so you do feel guilty about it almost feels very wasteful, doesn't it. And so what you try and do them as you try and alleviate your own guilt by passing it on to somebody else for them to get use out of it. But let's work that through and let's not it become let it become a burden to somebody else. So Hami Downs is something that you need to have an appropriate system that we'll talk about in the zoning organisation podcast, which is coming next week, you really do need to have a system for that, if you're gonna get hammered downs, you need to make sure that the people that are giving you how many downs that you like, the stuff that they're giving you. And you also need to have an honest conversation with them. What do I do with this stuff? If I don't want it? For whatever reason? Can I send it to charity? Do you want me to give it back to you, so you can pass it on to someone else? Etc, etc. hand me downs is a big one. And, you know, for people with families, there might be 10 1214 bin bags of random stuff that's out there. That just sits up there for years and years. So we definitely need a system in place. And we need to pair that right down.

Ingrid  17:06  
Yeah. And also, I'm just thinking as well, it's not only the hand me downs you get from other people, but I also find a lot of stuff in people's lost, that they're holding on to in case their brother or sister will one day have kids maybe possibly. And I'm like, Oh, are they expecting them to know? Then they're just they think that they haven't even they're not even married yet. And I'm like, okay, so they're dating. They're not engaged. They're not married, they're not pregnant. They're you don't even know if they actually want to have children or not. But you're keeping all this stuff to pass down to other people. Maybe, maybe one day,

Lesley  17:43  
you need to do any search on the 21st century and grid. No, everyone needs to get engaged and married to have a baby. You know,

Ingrid  17:50  
I know. I know. But you know what I mean?

Lesley  17:52  
They're not even married yet.

Ingrid  17:55  
Well, my sister is not married, and they're happy. And they've got three kids. So I'm cool with that though. You're

Lesley  18:01  
all cool. All of a sudden. Yeah. And the other thing is about you know, you're absolutely right. And that's where baby equipments and things like that, you know, we see so much baby equipment up there. Don't wear your car seats, Moses baskets, you know, even feeding stuff. Old nappies, not one that use nappies. nappies it, you know, those kinds of things that are up there, one of the questions that I would ask is, if you have a new baby, are you going to put your new baby into a cart? That's 10 or 15 years old? Are you going to get your new baby to use bottles that are 10? Or 15 years old? The answer to these questions might be yes, I would. Yeah. So we're not saying why you wouldn't do that, when it's far from us to say whether you would or you wouldn't. But we're asking whether you would. And quite often, you know, you know, we keep things for our kids all the time, we keep things for grandkids, and they weren't put they won't use them. You know, if you give it a bottle from, you know, 2005 to your child's it's expected now, they just won't they won't use them for different reasons. Yeah. Maybe sustainability. But that's the truth, for the most part, isn't it?

Ingrid  19:14  
Yeah. And I think also, then the question is a good question to ask yourself is, will my kids actually want the stuff that I'm keeping for them? Because if and if your answer is probably no, then that's a good reason that you can declutter it, and maybe ask them, you know, there's a good point in asking them I'm hanging on to a lot of stuff. But do you see yourself actually using all of this stuff? Or am I just hanging on to it because I can't let it go?

Lesley  19:42  
Yeah, because we work with with people at different stages of life all the time, don't we? So what we work with we we work with the older generation who are keeping stuff for their kids because they think that it might come in and it's going back to this idea from the kind of 70s and 80s last year where you need to help someone to set up home Things are very different now aren't because people can go to places like Ikea or, you know, cheaper places, and they can set themselves up for not that much money. And so things are not as expensive as they used to be now to buy a dinner service back in the 70s. And 80s was a huge deal. Whereas now you can probably go and get it for a tenner. And so it's a bit more throwaway and a bit cheaper than it used to be. So people's ideas are very different now in terms of what they want. So we work with the parents that are keeping this stuff for their children. And then we also work with the children and the kind of 30s You're like, my mum gave me this, and I really don't want it because I don't want a patent in a service. I want a white one, you know, that kind of thing. And so we work at both ends of the spectrum. But you know, it's all about that conversation. It's all about, do you want it? Do you want your mom to keep things for you? Do you not?

Ingrid  20:52  
Let's talk about some other stuff, then we also find out there and what are good decluttering questions. So what I also regularly find is furniture, you know, we mentioned it in our list of things we find. And it's not only furniture, but it's also pictures and frames and ornaments and all of those kinds of bits that have been taken out of a living room or out of a bedroom somewhere and then ended up in the loft. So I think a good question to ask yourself is, am I ever going to put these things back? Am I going to put these things back into my house? Or am I just throwing them in my loft just for storing sake?

Lesley  21:30  
It's just that emotion, isn't it that emotion that has taken you to a point where you say, I want a new dining room set, I want to replace the picture that's on my wall with a different one, because I don't like it anymore. I want to get a new lamp, that one's not fit for purpose, that rule doesn't work for me anymore. I don't want that photograph of my child when they're graduating because it seems a little bit old fashioned. But then you feel so guilty, because it's been such a big part of your life and you feel that it's got worth to somebody else, that you then keep it. But those are exactly the things that actually we those are the hard decisions, aren't they, because they have been a big part of our lives. So it's almost about recognising something's usefulness to you. And knowing that it served that purpose. And now that purpose has gone and moving on to something else, or passing it on to somebody who will want to use it at a charity shop or something like that. So it's really, you know, certainly things like diamond insights, like pictures, like, you know, like ornaments, you know, they've played a big part on your mantelpiece in your living room, and they have served their purpose. And it's, it's might be time to let them go rather than to keep hold of them.

Ingrid  22:33  
Yeah, and it's the same with with books as well, isn't it? Especially, I mean, especially if a loft can be quite can be quite damp, hopefully it's dry, but it can be quite damp as well. But if we find boxes with textbooks, and we find old travel guides, and we find books that don't fit on the bookshelf, so have ended up in a box in the loft. And besides the fact they're super heavy, and you know, they're it's not very good for your floors, but if they're in a box in your loft, you're never going to read them again because they're kind of in stock up there.

Lesley  23:08  
I think that's it, isn't it? And some people of course, and we talked at the beginning of these questions that there's no right or wrong answer and some people are going through a transition like this for some people know that the moment they're in, you know, people that are just starting out, you know, people in their early 20s So in a studio flat, they hopefully at some point, they will get a bigger house and they will have space to put books that they really want to keep and things like that. But if you're kind of further on in your life, and the reason why you've got books up in your life that is because they can't fit on the bookshelves that you've got that are already plentiful in your house, then you really have to question that because I would absolutely say don't store any books in your loft unless there's a very specific purpose for that like I am moving to a bigger house next year. Because otherwise why are they there? No, you're never gonna go up to them in a lot often depending on the last space obviously because it may be very accessible so just really think that through but it's about this kind of it's always send some sentimental stuff it's guilt all those emotions are wrapped up that mean that we keep boxing we don't want to let go of them. And it becomes very overwhelming and it takes over the space of books for me is a no no in a loft.

Ingrid  24:18  
Yeah, I think the same kind of going to same category. I also see CD, so record collections or things like that. I mean, if you have a record player, and you have the records, have the records with the record player and put them somewhere that you can actually play them but if you know that you now also always listen to your iPod or you've got an Alexa that you do music or streaming service or Spotify or whatever it is. Why do you still have the record and the record player or maybe even the CDs if they're just in a loft gathering dust and being boxed up and never used again?

Lesley  24:54  
So that was an interesting one actually about the records. There is one where the kind of evil addition of fashions and trends has changed things. So there are a lot of people have said who work with who did get rid of their record collections. And now regret that. There's very few people I think in life who have regret when we're decluttering, with people that have regrets about things. But if there's one thing that I can highlight is people that got rid of their record collections. But I do believe now that records have come back in again. And that's the past 10 years or so, isn't it, that if you are going to keep those record collections, they can now come into your general use in your home and not be in a loft or a basement. So you know, think carefully about this kind of collection type things. I think videos is a completely different thing. We're never going to go back to videos, I can safely say, you know, probably never going to go back to DVDs or CDs, I wouldn't have thought. But records is a different way of listening to music, isn't it? So it's interesting on the record, because that is something that people do regret.

Ingrid  25:58  
Well, I had, I had a record collection, and we had a record player, really good record player. And we actually had it all in general use for about a decade and a half never played it. And then decluttered it after we kind of like okay, let's do it. And now I know there should revival and we could not I couldn't ask you Oh, Miss America question. When even when it was in general use, we never played them. You know, maybe once every two or three years we put a record on. I mean, what's the for me? I was like, Okay, there's just no point.

Lesley  26:28  
I think it's for me, what's happened in our house is that those records have now gone to Nathan. Yeah, yeah. The cooler ones of our record collection from the 80s and 90s have gone to Nathan. So he's listening to them. So I think it's that isn't it? We're probably never gonna go back to records ourselves. But he has done and so. So yeah, it's just one to think about really the records. It's, it's an interesting one. It's probably one of the only things that people have regrets about.

Ingrid  26:53  
Yeah, loads and loads of suitcases as well. The old fashioned ones, the big bulky wants the ones without wheels, actually. So I find them lots of times in lofts. You know, those are, I think, an easy one to declutter for most people. And, but really be realistic about it, you know, don't have I mean, for me, people, you could say, oh, well, I can use them to store stuff in? I don't know. I mean, it's not visible then is it at all when it's in a suitcase, it hasn't got any wheels, and you still you overfill them because they're far too big or difficult, far too heavy. For me, that will be an easy one. to declutter.

Lesley  27:31  
Definitely, I don't like the idea of storing clothes and stuff in suitcases because of this kind of barrier barrier idea that you can't see it. And if we're going to store things, it needs to be labelled appropriately, appropriately. And suitcases don't really lend themselves very well to labelling. I think we all know that suitcases from 20 years ago probably can't be used as easily now, particularly if you're going on a plane because of the weight restrictions and things like that. So really look at those. And again, you know, the interesting thing is charity shops will take them because there are people that are not going on planes and still need suitcases. So you can offload your suitcases to charity shops.

Ingrid  28:12  
Also appliance books, which I find all the time from the large television that is still in the living room because in case we ever move house one day we can put our TV back in the box. Well, I've moved several times also internationally and they do wrap them up in blankets and they make sure they really don't want your old appliance books to move your TV.

Lesley  28:37  
It's not clear now they don't because they did it. They don't go back in half the time anyway because you've added some frame or standoff something on the bottom of them. So please let the appliance boxes go because they are cluttering up lofts and garages and houses all over the country. Yeah, my son's recently moved out and I just see on the top of his wardrobe not crazy, but their iPad boxes and I am chomping at the bit to get approval to get rid of them. You know, it's their stuff. You know, I've got two people in the house who love to keep hold of stuff and that Steve and Luke and so you know far be it from me to dictate to them what they do and don't get rid of, but I am now Luke's move out so the rules have changed. You can either take your plants boxes with you, or they go in in the bin. That's this weekend's job.

Ingrid  29:29  
You've like, waited until he left you saw the key, the key leave the lock and you're like yes, the room is mine. It's back. It's mine and I can declutter it now everything that's left is up for Declutter.

Lesley  29:43  
Yeah, no, no, no only their plans boxes at this moment in time. I'm not gonna get rid of the rest of his stuff. Not yet, anyway.

Ingrid  29:52  
Oh, but that's good to know. So you're not going to put it to your loft and secretly Lesley Brooks

Lesley  29:56  
is full of laughter. established that I can't even Put appliance boxes in my loft. The other thing that we see up there all the time is like no notes from courses that we have done, old, you know lever arch files full of stuff from work and things like that, do yourself a favour and go through it and work out whether you actually need it. If it's sitting in a file up in the loft, chances are that you're not going to need it. If it's, you know, take it to where it needs to be shredded. If it's something from work, just go through that process, gradually take all those things down and let it go. You know, of course, notes and work notes and things, things from a sort of bygone era sometimes that we keep going, we just did our particularly work wise now we use our information very differently. So notes are not a thing of the past. But they kind of are from a work perspective for most people, aren't they apart from courses?

Ingrid  30:49  
Yeah, I mean, if you have university notes, and you left university 20 years ago, and they've ended up in a box of your loved, I mean, will you ever look at them again, you know, 99.9% of people will say no, I will never look at them again. That was that

Lesley  31:05  
again, it's hard, because it's closing that chapter of your life. And that's why people don't want to do it. So maybe be be specific look at something. Look at one essay or something that you're really super proud of. And keep that but don't keep 10 lever arch files from my degree German was Dutch in 1987. Which I haven't got, by the way.

Ingrid  31:29  
Me neither I would if as soon as I started moving houses and everything, I was like, I am decluttering all this paperwork, I do not want it anymore. I have kept a couple of books that I've thought were interesting, that have to do with Hotel Management and everything like that, but everything else No. Gone goodbye, I wanted to I think I only kept my essay or my thesis for the end. And that's it.

Lesley  31:54  
Yeah. That's one thing isn't that. The other thing that finds its way up there paperwork wise, is archival tax stuff. So people own their own businesses, or they know that they've got to keep tax stuff for a certain number of years. And quite often it goes up there in box files or in some kind of box, and it stays up there then years and years and years beyond the time that you need to keep it and so don't let that happen. Go up there, keep a check on that. And make sure that you are offloading the years that you no longer need to make space for the ones that you do need.

Ingrid  32:26  
Also, we find lots and lots of decorations of holidays, different holidays. You know, we talked about Easter and Halloween and Chinese New Year and I mean a whole raft of different decorations. But ask yourself, Am I still actually decorating my house? I'm actually thinking about decluttering my Easter decorations because a lot of times, I'm away over Easter, so maybe it's time to declutter some of those decorations and give some stuff away from that. If maybe you're doing a bit of a smaller Christmas now than you used to do in the past. Do you still put everything up? Maybe maybe you want to put all the Christmas decorations together, but then have a declutter when you're actually setting up for Christmas and kind of thing. Okay, am I actually we have I haven't put this up in how many years? Let's declutter it. Because it kind of grows every time you think, oh, buy that about that, or some people give you things for your decorations, and it can get really out of hand.

Lesley  33:25  
I mean, if I'm doing if I'm doing a loft declutter with a client, I will take the opportunity to go through the seasonal decorations wherever they are at the time, but that's because that's our job to do that and to make sure we leave no stone unturned really. So it wouldn't be a job that was unfinished if we had not gone through the decorations, but my advice to you would be do your decorations as you're putting them up or as you're putting them away. So once you put the stuff up for your holiday or whatever, look at what's left in the box and make really hard decisions on what's left you've chosen not to put them up this time house is probably not going to get any bigger, and there's not going to be any space to put any any more decorations up. So that's probably the best time to look at decorations and make those decisions.

Ingrid  34:08  
Yeah, yeah, X Exactly. Also, we find boxes and boxes full of photos and photo albums and photo albums from family members. Ask yourself the question is actually my love the best place to store all these photos and do I need to declutter them from my loft and maybe if I want to keep them put them in another part of my house because if it is maybe a bit damp or maybe a bit cold or maybe so far tucked away in your love that you never can actually reach the photos then it may be it's not the right place for them.

Lesley  34:46  
Yeah, exactly. And I think you know, I mean we're going on to photo organising here to completely separate project and for a rainy day and we've got a podcast I think about photo organising as well if you wanted to listen to that with the lovely Joe Jacob So if you are interested in organising the photos, look at that, obviously, you can, if you've got things in there, you can digitise things and stuff and so on. But aloft is definitely not the best place to store photographs unless it's a very specific dry clean loft.

Ingrid  35:16  
old toys are also in loft,

Lesley  35:19  
is the same principle, again, isn't it as the clothes and how many downs and things like that in terms of whether we're going to keep them, there are some toys in life that are fairly timeless. I know one of my friends, this is not uncommon, the only thing that she would really keep is Lego, you know, people do tend to keep Lego to pass through generations, because it doesn't really change that much. So we see quite a lot of Lego up there, you've got the kind of rotation of toys idea. So a lot of people don't have the space in their homes for all of the toys that they've got. So they like a rotation idea. But if you do like to rotate the toes every three months or six months, make sure that rotation system is working for you. Otherwise, it's just allowed to total in the loft. You know, and it's not, you're not they're not getting rotated. So it's important, but the people who do tire rotation are generally going to be people that are super, super organised and efficient.

Ingrid  36:12  
Yeah, yeah. And I think it's exactly what you're saying. It's the same for rotation of clothes as well. If you don't have enough water space, and you have to keep some either summer or winter clothes in your loft. Does your system work? Do you actually go up in your loft and get the clothes down? And do you look through it? And do you declutter it? Or have you actually not really done that for years and years, and it's just now a mountain of clothes up there, and that nobody ever looks at anymore?

Lesley  36:41  
So it's an interesting one. So we could go on for hours and hours about all the different things because there are so many different things up there and laughed out there that we could talk about. I think we've given people a little bit of food for thought on that, haven't we? Is there anything else that you wanted to add? Ingrid?

Ingrid  36:55  
No, I think, I think for me, the last thing I want to say to our listeners is that if it's damp or damaged by that bullet, even if it's a difficult one, you know, if you find boxes with old towels and old curtains, and the fabric is gotten a bit hard and crusty and new, you know, just make sure you declutter. That's from your love. There's no point in keeping all of that stuff. And I hope we've given you a whole long list of questions you can ask yourself to help you make those decisions when you're decluttering the items from your loft. So Lesley, is there anything else you'd like to add?

Lesley  37:36  
I don't think so. I think we're all done. And as I say, I think we could go on for hours and hours talking about decluttering questions because it's such a mishmash of stuff in aloft, giving people a little bit of food for thought. And I think that's the important thing.

Ingrid  37:49  
Right? Well, listeners, we hope we have given you food for thought and that you've enjoyed our part number two about loved decluttering and organising. And that you're already looking forward to part number three, which we will have for you next week. And it's all going to be about organising your loft and zoning your loft. What are you going to do this weekend? Are you going to go up in your loft and have a little look around and decide what items you are going to declutter and if you're actually going to need some help from somebody else to get this project on the go. So thanks so much for taking the time to listen today. If you'd like to get more tips and advice, please follow us on social media. We are an Instagram, Twitter and Facebook as at declutter hub, and we have a lively supportive Facebook group where we chat all things clutter, you can search for the declutter hub community and we'd love to see you there. Don't forget our brand spanking new membership. We are now offering step by step online courses live q&a sessions and the membership community. Have a look on members dot declutter hub.com for more information. If you don't want to miss the next weekly episode of the podcast, subscribe to the declutter hub podcast on Apple podcasts, Spotify and Stitcher. It will pop into your notifications each Friday. See you next time.

Outro  39:08  
Thanks for listening to this week's episode of the declutter hub podcast. Check out declutterhub.com for more inspiration, and don't forget to tune in next week.
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