A graphic of various stationery items; scissors, rulers, pens, stapler, pencils, pencil sharpeners, envelopes
Episode 36 – Decluttering and organising stationery

In this podcast, Lesley and Ingrid talk about how satisfying decluttering and organising stationary can be. We explore the stationary items in your drawer that have been around for years and why it's time to let go.
Organising your stationery drawer is something that often gets neglected for years and we have a tendency to hang onto things thinking they will come in one day but the amount of stationery we use now in comparison to years gone by is so little so we should think about letting some go.
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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 36 of the declutter hub Podcast. I'm Ingrid. 

Lesley  0:33  
And I'm Lesley. 

Ingrid  0:34  
If you have clutter and one to sort it out, this is the show for you. In today's episode, Lesley and I are talking about decluttering and organising stationery. Now oh my gosh, I love I just love organising stationery I don't know how about you, Lesley. But there's something so interesting about opening drawers in a desk and kind of going Oh, right. What do I find in here? And then to see that everything is muddled? And I just love sorting it all out? I don't know, maybe I'm a bit weird. I'm not sure. I think it's actually great.

Lesley  1:08  
I think it is very satisfying. And I think it's where we as professional organisers, it's where we kind of come into our own a little bit, because there's quite a lot that we can offer people in by way of advice. And a lot of that is actually in the decluttering side of things as well, to be honest, it's not just about the Organising. So I think, you know, we really do make an impact in stationery. And I think it's really important to have your home office or wherever you got your designated sort of paperwork space, organise your stationery so that you stationery doesn't become part of your junk drawer just means it's got a knock on effect, hasn't it? So I love doing stationery as well. So I can completely understand why you get excited by it. Because we can make a big impact, I think.

Ingrid  1:49  
Yeah. And I think that can we just first of all, just in broad terms, stationery, or office supplies,

Lesley  1:59  
I think it's a bit of a grey area, maybe it's one of those words, it's just blended over the years into something different. But for me stationery is a kind of a catch all for anything that you need in your sort of home office. And I think office supplies is where it veers more into a business environment maybe. So I think office supplies will be something that you would go to the catalogue at work and get very excited about organising new things in packs of 24. And probably use them. But so stationery for me is a catch all for anything. So it can be you know, paper, all of your whole bunches stuff was blah, blah, envelopes, packing materials, or let's say blue tack, or that kind of thing for me would fall into the stationery category and the sort of split office one's business related and one's home related.

Ingrid  2:43  
So let's just agree then to use stationery as the catch all for everything we're going to talk to, to

Lesley  2:49  
our listener, you want to say home office supplies you You're very welcome to say that

Ingrid  2:54  
that's kind of in my head. Maybe my rationale is, for me, I see stationery more as things that are from paper. So envelopes and notebooks and paper for the printer and that kind of thing. And office supplies is more all the other bits like the staples and the and the scissors. But it doesn't matter for me, we can just call a stationary as long as we can talk about zoning. Because I think we need to really make divisions within the stationery to make it work for our clients and for ourselves and for our listeners.

Lesley  3:25  
Exactly, exactly. So maybe we should ask our listeners to vote. Maybe we can have a face off Ingrid who is right Ingrid or Lesley and see what people say. Who is writing? No. But I feel as if I'm right, because I'm a native speaker and you're not, but I'm probably completely wrong on ice. So anyway, right? Okay, so stationary stroke office supplies. I think we just jump straight in there and talk about all of the individual things that we find. And we're not obviously we're not gonna be able to cover everything. But there are some familiar, as I say what, you know, I talked about before we can make a real impact as professionals because what people do is it a stationary draw is a classic thing where people hang on to things for years and years and years, because they think that they're going to come in handy at some point. And so there are things that for me, are no longer really in use that often for most people that people are still clinging on to and they're cluttering up drawers and making these drawers not be usable because there's so much stuff in there. And there's loads and loads of things in the sort of stationery category. So let's start with the first one. A very interesting one. From a psychological perspective is notebooks people have a notebook fetish, don't they regularly.

Ingrid  4:46  
Wow. The amount of notebooks I find I mean from everything from like tiny ones to journalist kind of notebooks with drawings on the top to the a4 sizes With a hardcover with rings with that is absolutely incredible. And then when you actually ask, When was the last time you learned us to notebook? They're like, Oh, yeah, I actually really use notes on my phone these days. It's, and it's like, okay to hash tonnes of them around and or they only like to use a specific size. But they've kind of gathered all of them along the way. So I'm like, can we not just declutter some of this very small sizes, if you only want to use an a five or an a4 size notebook?

Lesley  5:32  
Because notebooks sometimes the things that you get given at conferences as giveaways and things like that, so they're not always I think we have very specific needs and preferences when we're using notebooks in terms of why I like an a4 notebook to sort of jog federal law, scribbling and, you know, sort of doodle and not very good doodling, I hasten to add about when I'm always writing things down when, when we're chatting and things. And so it just depends, but I think what I really wanted to talk about is those people that covet a notebook. Now there are people who love nothing more than going to somewhere like paper chase, and buying a beautiful notebook. And sometimes, you know, they can have, we've seen people with 50 6070 notebooks, sitting there not being used, sadly, with his beautiful notebooks, but the very difficult to get rid of, aren't they? And so, I don't really know what the answer is to those because they are very beautiful. But you have to be you have to be a little bit hard on yourself. Sometimes if they're becoming overwhelming. That's the first thing is in terms of a psychology notebooks is definitely the one that people cling on to a lot in terms of stationery. But for me in terms of storing them, they would go with general paper. So depends on where you are. It depends on the setup of your stationery drawer, if you're lucky enough to have four or five drawers under your desk. That's the perfect scenario, isn't it? And Ingrid is going to talk much later about zoning. But in terms of where it would sit and where it would sit with me. It would be with other paper.

Ingrid  7:00  
Yeah, yeah, I agree. Unless there are so many that it actually needs a shepherd drawer. But otherwise, for me, it would go with with other paperwork like envelopes. So let's then talk about envelopes, Lesley neatly going into the next category.

Lesley  7:16  
I think envelopes, you know, again, life has moved on quite dramatically. So it depends on what a lot of this is going to depend on what generation that we live in. I mean, my kids would never dream of going and buying envelopes from anywhere they would just below is an envelope in the house, they wouldn't know where they were, they were nuts. I mean, because we rarely send things anymore. By post, we email things. So we very, very rarely send envelopes. And if we do send things in envelopes, often those envelopes come that, you know, with a kind of essay on themself is it self addressed envelope or stamped addressed envelope or something like that. So quite often the envelopes come with a mails if you've got to return something by post. And so I think our need for the big volumes of envelopes that we needed in the past as has decreased dramatically. So but we still got hold of them, we're still clinging on to those envelopes. And so, you know, we see things in stationary drawers from the kind of 70s and 80s don't we engraved whether that you know the, the gums not working on the envelopes anymore, but there's tonnes and tonnes of things. And it's, it's quite hard to throw something away, or recycle something. Obviously, envelopes can be recycled in certain parts of the country, or the parts of the country, they won't recycle the ones that have got a gum on them. So you just need to check in your local area. But we can recycle envelopes if we need to. And take it down to a manageable amount of envelopes. But we see too many but for me just keep the basic ones you know, I've got I have an a4 size and a five and a Manila, even window envelopes. You know, do you need window envelopes is that the way that you if you were sending a letter by post, would you use that kind of scenario on a window envelope. It's something that we're you know, people do that to get gather stationery from their offices as well don't they sometimes they like to do a little read of the office cupboard when advocating that at all. But sometimes things find the way home from offices. And we see quite a bit of that as well. And window envelopes fall into that category. So really think you know, why are you keeping 200 window envelopes if you never ever do that kind of that word kind of window scenario, but if you do fine, everyone's different.

Ingrid  9:20  
I also would like to add something else to that Lesley because I also hold my like my birthday cards and my christening cards and wedding cards with my envelopes in my in my paper drawer. So what happens sometimes is that cards lose their envelope with the envelope loses their cards and end up with loads and loads of random envelopes. Yeah, I'm going to use them one day and I'm like, Well, I would rather that you keep the pack where they're all still together and they're all the same size than all the stacks of random envelopes that have lost their friend over the years. And I think it's really important to do a clear out of those as well you know, with the different colours and the different sizes, let it go recycle it and tidy up their drawer until you actually know what you have.

Lesley  10:08  
It's a classic sort of clutter. Procrastination thing, isn't it? You know, and as soon as we say we can actually let go of those envelopes, you don't need them, you're not going to use them and why don't we declutter them? Okay, then. But it's something that psychologically you struggle with, isn't it yourself to get rid of these envelopes? It's quite silly. When you think about it, of all the things that we keep, we're worried about, you know, 20 year old envelopes that are the wrong size that we never ever use, but he's just, well, we're just going to come in one day, aren't they? But they might come in when we're 75. You know what I mean? And so we do we need to keep them for that long is the question. So yeah, anyway, envelope so that's another one that people really struggle with. The other one that I wanted to talk about, which is kind of a passage of time is how many houses you go to so I'm kind of laughing around so I've got a big smile on my face laughing about the amount of Polly Pockets you know, those like what they are called Polly Pockets, aren't they those kind of folders with the holes down the side of them that are plastic that you slot pieces of paper. I mean, I absolutely loads them with a passion and I'll try and get rid of them out of every house that I ever work in if possible, because I think they're just awkward or manageable. It creates a barrier to putting your paperwork away. So you'll never as soon as any clients that have ever worked with me they know if there's any Polly Pockets in the house is a good chance that by the end of the session, they're gonna be long gone. But then if we do that, then people keep hold of the old Polly Pockets and so I often find box files magazine files with like 300 400 Polly Pockets, and they're useful when you're a student maybe or when you're at work and you know if you've got if you've got to do that sort of scenario, but then they become less Ingrid's laughing at the Polly Pocket fetish.

Ingrid  11:57  
I don't mind a Polly Pocket at all, and I actually use them. But But listeners, I agree with Lesley when you've done a massive paperwork declutter or you have there's different levels of poly pockets as well. Some of them are absolutely rubbish. They're too thin, they're too flimsy. And I think those are not good buy a little bit better quality if you like using a poly pocket I'm a lever arch girl file hell what can I say I love a Polly Pocket Emma lever our trust system. But I tried to have a bit better quality. And also over the years if they come a bit grimy and a bit grotty and a bit yucky, I throw them away. And I think that's what I see in my clients houses is stacks and stacks of them. Some of them that are sitting kind of good quality, please by all means keep them but if they're a bit crumbled up and falling apart and just just not good, then take them out and and if you can recycle them, but I think I'm sure to say that we still were throwing away face for Polly Pockets at the moment. But if an if you still have 500 that are in good condition, you don't need that many, you know, stick with 50 and that's fine and then let go of the rest.

Lesley  13:12  
I think it's about it's about being realistic about what your current lifestyle dictates you do ya and if you're somebody that just literally you know, I file very very little but everything's online, isn't it? And so, you know, I I don't think I've got any Polly Pockets. Is that is that really bad? But I've got no I hate them. I hate them.

Ingrid  13:34  
That's very strong.

Lesley  13:36  
How can I hate a plastic wallets? This is quite strange, isn't it? I think even taking other people's houses so much I might enough with the Polly Pockets, let them go. There's no one saying and dictating, we need to keep them.

Ingrid  13:49  
But I think it's also because you've got a filing cabinet you like using the L folders. So you that is something that works really well but if you lever arch file, then do a Polly Pocket can't be a bad thing. So I think it really depends on what kind of system you have at home. And but I think it's we're talking mainly about volumes here. Let's now then talk about ring binders and lever arch files and a four fold and all of those kinds of things. tonnes we find tonnes I mean, there is nothing more annoying than a lever arch file or the lever actually is broken or this little clips don't fit properly together anymore or it doesn't shut properly and I'm like let's just please get that out of the house and use something that is properly working. Because if you want to be efficient and be productive, you need to have stuff that works really well and if if the clips don't close properly in a ring minor nothing more annoying than that.

Lesley  14:46  
It's broken. Yes not effective anymore. But again, it's that psychology of things you know things like lever arch files are expensive, you know to buy aren't the spy good one. You know? One thing that I would always recommend if you are going down And the lever arch file route with your filing and Ingrid and I will never agree on this ever that buy a good one, don't buy a cheap one because it's going to break and it's going to become not fit for purpose really quickly. But it's something that because we spend a lot of money on. And because we think it's going to come in again, that we keep hold off now to keep you imagine if you keep five or six lever arch files, that's a lot of space that you're giving over to old files that you may or may not using them in the future. Now if you've got, you know, teenagers coming through that need lever arch files for work, or I'm sorry for school, then that then you know that you're going to have an ongoing need for those. That's great. So we're not saying at all, don't ever use it. You never ever need to recycle Abraj five, because that's not true. But you've got to look at your current scenario, and be realistic about whether you do that and don't just cling on to them for no reason. Because you think that they're going to come in where you think that the cost a lot of money. Are you worried about needing them again, because ultimately most people could go out and buy a new lube Faraj file if they needed to if they needed one.

Ingrid  16:04  
Yeah. Actually, before I forget, I think you've touched upon something really important there. Lesley, you said about buy good quality. And I think that especially goes for a stapler and a hole punch to buy something that is good quality, because there's nothing more annoying than trying to staple something with a stapler that is falling apart or trying to punch a hole that is crooked and wonky. So those are definitely in a pair of scissors. Those are I think my three favourite organising and stationary products are a stapler, a hole punch, and a pair of scissors. Those I think are the three things you actually buy a little bit of better quality for that you can afford, instead of buying something cheap, because that will pay off. Definitely,

Lesley  16:44  
to know what's what is interesting is that we find all the time as we find these little mini staplers. It was like sort of miniature I know and, and those are the kinds of things you know, if you really town especially when the studio flat perfect. Of course, if you're a child, you take that and you pencil case or something like that. But in general, a normal sized stapler is what you need, you probably only need one of them. Or, you know, maybe your kids have got one in their bedroom as well. But you know, in your office, you don't need multiple staplers. And that's another thing that tends to breed, isn't it staplers and staples? And so but I am definitely a staple girl rather than a paperclip girl and for keeping and paperwork together? What do you what do you prefer? And

Ingrid  17:30  
definitely, I'm not a clip person at all. I hardly use them. i i Love stapling stuff together because immediately three or four or five loose papers become one, which is immediately makes it less chaotic. And that's why like you I have a stapler on my desk ready to go ready for action?

Lesley  17:49  
And then there's also nowadays this these no staple staplers? What do you think about those? I mean, environmentally, they're gonna be good if you come across those? No,

Ingrid  17:57  
not yet. But I've heard about them. But I haven't seen them in extra just yet. But I think I've seen them. I think it's very fascinating. I think, of course, anything for the environment is good by me. So if it's work, why not.

Lesley  18:10  
He talks about hole punches. One of the things I want to talk about with hole punches is you know, they can be quite big to get a good quality hole punch, to punch, punch quite a few pieces of paper at the same time. Yeah, that makes them if you're tight on storage in your drawer, because they're those kind of things that jam your drawer when you wrote them down, they because they stick up. And so there is a lot of people don't know. But there are things on the side of many hole punches. To keep them short, there's like a little catch, you can move across to keep them short. And the kind of measuring thing that sticks out. I don't know that plastic thing that sticks out the side of a hole punch for whether it's in a three on a four or whatever, that can get shoved back in. So you know, if you are putting things away and you don't want things to be cluttering up and jamming in your drawers as you're opening them, you know, do do find that little catch because you know the amount of people that say Oh, I didn't know that was there. So So yeah, so do that with a hit with a whole bunch. There's not much really we can say about a whole bunch other than you don't need loads and loads of hole punches again, you probably only need one in your office and maybe you know if you've got kids doing different things that's a separate a separate issue. Have one good hole punch and have have it let it have a home so that it can be found when it is needed to be found.

Ingrid  19:21  
Yeah, so how do you feel about calculators then Lesley because we were you can now use your phone. You know, there's a calculator on your phone. Do you still have a calculator in your stationery drawer?

Lesley  19:30  
I do I have a desk calculator that I've had for donkey's years that I'll leave sitting there. I just prefer it I think because I'm getting older because I see things and the like the big numbers on that. So have a desk calculator but again, you know, with clients, what we see is we see these kind of what do you call those scientific calculators from our kids with all the like really complicated stuff on there that we're never ever going to use really a normal day to day life. Keep it simple desk calculator with numbers or just use your phone Oh, you know, if you're tight on space, that's it, that's a case in point. And some people are much more used to doing that I've not quite obviously, I use my phone when I'm out and about. But when I'm at home, I tend to use my calculator, and it's on my desk the whole time. And also

Ingrid  20:12  
have just have a test, if you've got several calculators have a test, which ones are actually still working, you know, because sometimes we keep things but then it's related, the batteries run out, or the little solar panel see doesn't work properly, or it's dodgy. And it's a bit wobbly to to you, when you're trying to type stuff in on the on the keyboard, you know, keep it try things out before just putting it back and thinking oh, yeah, well, I want to keep them all.

Lesley  20:37  
Yeah, definitely. I think it's another thing because calculators again, can be expensive, costly. Those scientific calculators are like 2020 pounds or more, aren't they? Really? So you feel guilty? Don't you get rid of them. But if you did, if you did get rid of them, you know, you can send them to a charity shop, if they are still working, you know, don't think that you can't send stationery, I regularly send a whole bag of stationery to the charity shop, loose envelopes, papers, notebooks, boxes of staples, you know, quite happy and they're delighted. Even if they're not going to sell them, they'll use them in the in the charity shop as well. So, you know, there's don't just throw these things away into landfill. But if it was a calculator, I think that it can go into the small appliance recycling section of the tip, because it's got little bits of metal kind of things. I'm not I'm not very good at electronics, but it's an electronic thing, isn't it? So that's where I would put it if I was going to recycle it. Other tip.

Ingrid  21:31  
Excellent. Excellent. So how about rulers then? Find them in all different kinds of sizes, kids sizes, you know, the long ones. Loads of them?

Lesley  21:42  
snapped in half. One,

Ingrid  21:44  
one should be enough, right? One and one large one, one small one should be enough? I think. So no,

Lesley  21:50  
it's definitely the norm. You know, obviously, if you're artistic or if you're doing things or drawing or if you're a draughtsman. I don't even know where the draughtsman use rulers or not. But there's gonna be some jobs out there where people are using rulers much more readily. But in general, I can't even the only time I ever use a ruler is when we're doing them budget for our courses that we run, you know, but things like that, but rulers are the kinds of things that people get as mementos as well. So we also have quite a lot of rulers from Spain, or from the Tower of London or things like that, and our kids have got them. So you know, just make sure you've got one good ruler, have a decent size, maybe the bigger size, and, and don't have multiple multiple rulers, you know, this will go down over time with the kids kids will certainly have loads and loads of rulers, but even when I'm doing my, you know, my kids are older now. You know, they've probably only got one or two now. And that goes once they leave school, really? So yeah, this is just the kind of things and I'm sure a lot of you out there. Oh yeah, I've got loads and loads of rules. It's just something that we never quite get around to. Because it's not critical, you know, the stationery drawers never going to be completely overwhelming our whole house. But the feeling that you've got when you actually get your stationery under control and zone, which we're going to talk about in a minute, is really like oh, look at me with my fancy lovely stationery joy, you get all excited? Anyway, we do. It's not just us. I'm sure our listeners most get excited. So. So yeah, realist is a good one that you can do it again, you know, if they're in good condition, send them off to the charity shop because somebody will use them.

Ingrid  23:19  
Yeah, absolutely. And then I also want to I mean, you briefly touched upon paper clips there and staples. And I want to talk about kind of pins and kind of all the little small little bit, the bulldog clips, and all those kind of little bits and bobs that one has see is that they sometimes have these nice around containers with a little bit of everything. But then they also have lots of other stuff. And it's just if I would say keep the container with a little bit of everything, and maybe a book separately of the staples that fit your stapler, but everything else is just a massive surplus, isn't it?

Lesley  23:59  
I think what it does, you know, we the reason why we like those little round containers because they containerized and divide everything and that's what we that's what we love to do is organise and so it's they've done the job for us. Yeah, but actually in a volume that's, that's suitable and reasonable. You know, so not ridiculous amounts of bulldog clips. You know, those are things some people love the bulldog clips, you know, people tend to have things that they use all the time. So, you know, but I would never use a bulldog clip for anything ever. So, you know, something, I'm, I'm still, I'm using my stapler. I don't even use a paperclip, you know, so it depends on what you do. But I wouldn't not want to have any paper clips in the house. And so these nice little containers that I've got a paper clip of thumbtacks a small book, small bulldog clips, and maybe some elastic bands, which we'll talk about in a minute. Those are the kinds of that's the kind of volumes that's sensible for me and I take those I take those with me when I'm doing paperwork jobs with clients as well just in case they can't find what they've got in their own house. So it doesn't slow us down and On elastic bands, people have a lot of those don't know, when does it when's the last time you use the elastic band,

Ingrid  25:08  
I use a one, two times a year. And I can tell you exactly when, when I do the kids birthday cards, and I keep them together and I put an elastic band around them because they're still little. So I like them show and go through it later with them, the cards that they got and do a bit of more shorting later. But if I have a couple of cards that I want to keep, then I put an elastic band around them. But boy, boy, have I found elastic bands that are completely just been obliterated through time and a falling apart and crumbling and oh, they get really yucky, don't they?

Lesley  25:42  
Yeah, exactly. Elastic bands are quite mangkhut and so are biodegrade. But you know, when you find a Tesco carry bag from 15 years ago, that's that's perished. And it's like the worst thing is that as an organiser, because it goes everywhere. And elastic bands fall into that category as well, because they snap and they're all quite strange. So you know, be reasonable, about about the amount of elastic bands that you're going to need, as well, because that's something that years ago, we used much more of young people would gather in paperwork together, they would use much more than we don't really use them that much. Now, I'm sure people don't you know, and what we're talking about here is we're talking about domestic circumstances, we're not talking about it in an office environment and business environment. Because I'm sure there are of course, there are scenarios where people will use elastic bands the whole time. And but just be reasonable and really think when was the last time I used an elastic band? And actually, if I only had 20? Would I cope with that? And would that be a suitable amount for you? Yeah.

Ingrid  26:36  
I don't think even if 20 in my house, I must have a little box with just a couple in them. It's fine. You know, it's enough. And then when that runs out, when there's one left, I can always then buy a new little box with some other ones.

Lesley  26:48  
I don't think I've got any elastic bands. Oh, wow. Okay, radical.

Ingrid  26:54  
Thanks, Lesley.

Lesley  26:56  
I've got one print stick that's not dried up.

Ingrid  27:00  
They do dry up. It's incredible.

Lesley  27:03  
Yeah, exactly. And, and I think that's it, check your print sticks, and make sure they're not dried up because they dry really quickly don't know, particularly if you've got kids and stuff. So yeah, print sticks is something that we throw away quite quite readily as well, isn't it. And also

Ingrid  27:17  
same, talking about drying up highlighters. And I actually do love using a highlighter, but a highlighter as well, you need to test them on a regular basis, they dry up as well. And there's nothing more annoying than taking a highlighter with you somewhere and then finding out it actually doesn't work.

Lesley  27:32  
Even in the middle of a decluttering session with clients will test pens, you know, get a piece of paper or get one of those and get those notebooks into use and start using the pens and testing them. And the good thing nowadays is you know, there's so many schemes out there, there's a scheme called TerraCycle at the moment where they're looking at loads and loads of different sort of random bits of plastic mainly, that you can recycle and people have got drop off points for things like contact lens pads and felt tips. And I'm sure Polly Pockets might even be in Ingrid, that'd be nice, wouldn't it?

Ingrid  28:08  
Yeah, and I think for the kids pens, the felt tip pens from Crayola. I think Crayola do a really good scheme that you can actually send the empty Crayola pens back to Crayola themselves. Yeah,

Lesley  28:21  
I think the felt ones actually you're absolutely right, I think because again, felt tips of something that with the passage of time the kids kind of move through felt tips, and then they stop using them. And but we can think, oh, we need to keep a felt tip, don't we you know, and colouring pencils and thing. Be really honest about where your kids are in their stage of life and whether or not we actually need help tips and coloured pencils. And if not, you know, offload them, you know felt tips, can we send them to charity, you gotta be really careful with that, because they're probably going to be past their best. If you do want to send them to somebody, you know, really check that they're still they're still good, and they still got some life in them. But yeah, there's quite that Crayola recycling scheme is a good one to check out, isn't it? Yeah.

Ingrid  29:04  
And I think if you are going to tackle your, your pen drawer, I would say divide them into fountain pens, felted, pens and pencils. And then check each category first before deciding what's keeping and what's going because you definitely don't want to pass on any other things that are dead to other people. You know if it doesn't work, what's the point?

Lesley  29:27  
Yeah, so talking about fountain pens. It's something there are very few people nowadays who writes I've got a client actually writes for fountain pen every day. But I think she's like the only person that I know in life who does that. But fountain pens are things that we tend to click Keep ahold of and the ink along with it. So but they're quite hard because a lot of times fountain pens have been given us gifts, haven't they? Or there's something that we got when we were 11 when we started secondary school or something like that. But yeah, you know, think carefully if it's not a really special fountain pen It can go as well on the ink along with it, because it's quite dangerous ink in those bottles, isn't it when you've got kids in the house, particularly. Things should go. But yeah, it depends, you know, because there are people who absolutely love a fountain pen because they do write beautifully, don't they?

Ingrid  30:15  
Yeah, yeah. And if I think about pencils, I also think a pencil sharpeners. I mean, how many rubbish pencil sharpeners can be out there in the world? I mean, you get them in these children's packs, and they've never never ever shopped properly. So keep the proper one and maybe even test them out and see that actually sharp properly. So

Lesley  30:36  
invested in one good one really aren't Yeah, rather than the normal little ones. I mean, obviously, you know, the kids need them when they're pencil cases, they're not going to take a desk pencil sharpener to school are there. But so that's when the little ones come in. And that's where they'd when they tend to breed and we tend to have a lot of, and the same with rubbers as well. You know, we have a lot of, we have a lot of rubbers as well. And you don't want your kids have gone certainly once they're in secondary school that barely using pencils. And so they're not going to use rubbers really

Ingrid  31:04  
just listeners in case you are an American listener and think about what on earth is she talking about? She's talking about an eraser here, an eraser, a completely different Lesley, in other parts of this world.

Lesley  31:18  
Okay, sorry, everybody. Sorry, I do mean something to you about pencil markings. Else. So. Right. Okay, moving swiftly on to talking about ink and things like that. printer cartridges, make sure if you've got loads of printer cartridges, knocking around that they fit your current printer, because a lot of people keep hold of them, you know, take the time to check to cross reference the code on the printer cartridge and the code on your printer to make sure that they're still because we unfortunately, we go through printers at quite a rate of knots these days, because printers are cheap, cheap ish, aren't they and the cartridges are things that cost a lot of money. So people tend to change printers quite regularly. But there's loads and loads of printer cartridge recycling schemes out there, you know, to send them back to where you got them from or whatever. So it's not difficult to recycle printer cartridges these days. But we, again, we tend to keep hold of printer cartridge. I'm not quite sure because we've not done that final thing, which is, let me just double check whether that is for my current printer on up. Yeah,

Ingrid  32:30  
yeah. And also the same goes for lots of other computery bits and discs and software keys, and little cables. And all of those things. Are there actually, for equipment that's still in your house, I find lots of things in in a home office stationery section that has to do with, oh, gosh, that was from the previous printers or not only the cartridges, but also the cables and the software keys and the manuals and the disks that you had to in the previous life had to put in your computer to instal it. All of that kind of stuff, have a look through it and see if it's still in use. And is it still something that belongs to stuff that I have now in my house?

Lesley  33:17  
Yeah, because things move on so fast, don't they? And why is move on and the end? You know, I was working with a client last week. And I was so delighted because he knew what every single way it was and whether or not I needed it anymore. And I was like, Oh, this because normally we just have to keep it all down because we're not quite sure. I'm not sure or you know, you need to check with somebody else. And so I think it was like the best of who is this is just such a nice job. So Stan's all these wires are so yeah, but there are a lot of things that can go these days. You know, you don't need the software keys for a lot of things these days. You know, people are still got PC games hanging around, you know, people just don't use those kinds of things anymore, do they? But they tend to sit down there with the with the other computer bits and bobs. And that now definitely goes into your stationary storage, doesn't it?

Ingrid  34:05  
Yeah. And also what I wanted to also share with our listeners is all those discs that the CD rewritable discs and the DVD rewritable RISC disc, I can't even say it anymore. I find them in the in the bottom of drawers. It's like Oh yeah, and hold some photos. Well, maybe now's the time to see if you can actually still plug it into your computer and you can just put it on your on your hard drive on your cloud. So you don't have all these random CDs with possibly photos or old games or whatever it all is. can declutter all of that. So that's really nice to do a clear out as well.

Lesley  34:40  
Yeah, so when you're doing when you're doing your stationary stuff and you find these kind of DVDs and CDs with things on them and you need to double check and sometimes their files from work or photographs and we're never quite sure what they are. Writer to do list while yet with any decluttering job. Write an action list of things that need to be done. and try and do them because you know, this is your your time your your decluttering. You know you're going through one room at a time or one area at a time now is your time to actually do some of those things that you've been putting off and procrastinating about for so long. So have we ruffled have we rattled through all of the stationery, I'm sure there are loads and loads more categories of things. I mean, well, I know that there are in stationery. But I think that the sort of messages of today is things have moved on in terms of the way that we work now, because of the computer age. And so we need much, much less stationery now than we used to in years gone by. And so give yourself the opportunity to look at that to declutter to get rid of some stuff and to give yourself a little bit more space to breathe. And then that will then give you the space to organise it, which is what we are going to talk about now.

Ingrid  35:50  
Yes, I think it's very important to start if you've got lots and lots of stationery or even if you get little amounts of stuff and you still have to divide it. And if you have a desk like we've talked about before you are lucky enough to have a couple of drawers, you can use one drawer for all of those kind of desk II kind of thing. So stapler, scissors, all of those bits. You can use one drawer for paper and envelope, one drawer maybe for your printer paper, one drawer for some files and some for some the couple of bullet pockets that are allowed in your house, and some a four ring binder. So divided all out and put it into different zones. If you do not have any drawers in your desk, see if you can create maybe some boxes and that way sorted out the cookies box from Ikea might be really really helpful. It has a lid you can staple them up put, we'll put a link in the show notes. To those cookies boxes, we really liked them for the smaller like little bits of stationery, see if you can use to some Tupperware ports. So so maybe some plastic boxes from your takeaway containers and divided like that. And that's where you put in your paper clips, and your staplers and your pins and all the kinds of little bits and bobs that otherwise start flying through that drawer and go everywhere. So that I think is really important for zoning and dividing it using little plastic containers to divide it all out of it.

Lesley  37:28  
Yeah, it definitely doesn't need to be anything expensive. Does it like you say take away containers perfect for most, maybe not maybe the standard sort of Chinese it kind of ones are not perfect for pens are a little bit on the short side. So sometimes you do have to do something different for your pens. But the perfect folio stir. Yes, realise why we were talking we've missed out like the most important stationery item ever. The label machine and labels we have forgotten our most important organising tool, and that for me would sit in with stationery as well. So there's one thing that we're going to allow you to buy listeners as the clitoris. I saw from lovely little label machine because we absolutely love them, don't we? So yeah, just mentioned the label machine. So yeah, what you

Ingrid  38:16  
were gonna say posted notes.

Lesley  38:18  
Oh, yeah, we didn't mention personnel. You mentioned posting it fall in the same category, that kind of labelling type things, aren't they? So yeah, you're gonna have those as well. And you're allowed a little label machine, which we absolutely love in terms of organising, and particular categorization. And within that station, withdrawal labels would go a long way to keeping things nicely organised.

Ingrid  38:38  
Yeah. Well, I've got nothing else to add, Lesley, I think we've actually talked about nearly just about any possible stationery product, but I'm sure there's stuff out there that we haven't mentioned. And that we, you know, our listeners will find in their houses. But I think the most important thing is assign a place where it all lives.

Lesley  38:58  
Yeah, it just needs to not be because it tends to it moves into a junk drawer all the time, doesn't it? You know, if it doesn't, it just gets all thrown in. Just so nice and very satisfying to have a nice station show. And that's what today's podcast was all about.

Ingrid  39:10  
Definitely. So, anything else to to wrap up this podcast? Let's see. Are we there?

Lesley  39:17  
I think with that, I think we're all done, I think all right, we've exhausted our stationary chats for today. Well, listeners,

Ingrid  39:23  
thank you so much for listening today. Good luck sorting out your stationery decluttering and organising it. And I hope this podcast was super helpful for you in getting that job done. If you'd like to get more tips and advice, please follow us on social media. We are on Instagram, Twitter and Facebook and we've got a lovely lively supportive Facebook community where we check all things clutter. We'd love to see you there. If you don't want to miss the next weekly episode, please subscribe to the declutter hub podcast on iTunes, Spotify and Stitcher and it will pop into your notifications each Friday. See you next time.

Outro  40:01  
Thanks for listening to this week's episode of the Declutter Hub Podcast. Check out declutter hope.com For more inspiration, and don't forget to tune in next week.
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