It’s hard to get rid of sentimental items, whether it’s your daughter’s hand print from kindergarten or the ornament your son made in second grade. They hold so many memories and remind you of a time that you’ll never get back. You can’t keep everything without your house looking like a flea market, so what can you do?
Declutter
Image via RealSimple.com by Christopher Baker
The first thing you want to do is go through your clutter and see what has real value and what is outright trash. That scribble your two-year-old did on a napkin is not worth keeping. You might be surprised at what you find that is easy to throw away.
Once you’ve gone through the first round of decluttering, take a step back. Box up the items and come back to them later when you have a fresh perspective. This is especially helpful if the items belonged to someone you just lost, such as a parent or a grandparent. Don’t try to decide whether to keep the items when you’re in an emotional state. If needed, get a storage unit to keep the items until you can decide what to do with them.
Repurpose the Object
Sometimes items can be repurposed, so you don’t have to get rid of them. Does your husband have a T-shirt collection from college that he can’t imagine parting with? Do you cry thinking about getting rid of your child’s baby clothes? Turn them into a quilt. It’s sentimental, but it also serves a purpose and can give you a reason to hold on to the memories.
Choose One Thing to Keep
If you feel bad about throwing away art projects from school, consider keeping the best one and throwing the rest away. By keeping one of the items, you’ll have something to remember your child at that age without cluttering your whole house with a zillion art projects. Keep one from each age or each grade and file them away in a cabinet. For an especially brilliant piece of art, consider displaying it proudly on a shelf or wall.
Take a Picture and Write About It
A great way to declutter and feel less guilty about throwing things away is to take a picture of it. With digital cameras, pictures take up no space at all (except on your hard drive) and you can keep the memory forever. Once you’ve taken a picture, write about the object. You can put it on a blog online or in a word processing file along with the picture so you can remember why it was so special to you. You may get rid of the item, but at least you won’t forget about it.
Store It in a Storage Unit
Of course, if you really feel attached to something and don’t want to let it go, and yet you have no room for it in your home, consider getting a storage unit. Visit www.usstoragesearch.com and get information on a storage facility nearest you. A self-storage unit lets you store stuff and visit it pretty much whenever you want to.
Don’t let things rule your life. There are lots of ways to declutter your home without losing precious memories.
The above content has been a sponsored guest post by: Amanda Brown
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