Minimalism Month

A couple of times a year we clean up our closets to give away clothes we no longer need to places like Red Cross and charities like them. For us the joy of getting rid of old stuff is part the relief (we talk about the house actually feeling lighter) and part helping others.

I like the minimalism movement for the freedom and reduced consumerism which I feel is getting out of hand. At one point I was browsing Aliexpress.com to find something useful to satisfy my spending cravings. A few months ago I devoured “The 100 thing challenge by Dave Bruno” a book that’s easy to read and hard to put down. I liked the idea and rule set but never got around to apply it. This is dipping a toe in the minimalism ocean.

Our house is filled with things we might need one day, things we want to use someday and purchases that were plainly ridiculous. We have kitchen equipment for every thinkable meal, 3 types of grills, an office filled with abandoned hobbies, a garage bursting at the seams with gardening tools (even though our garden consists of 2 trees, grass and a beech hedge) and of course some unnecessary things too. It’s a family challenge and we agreed that we can only discard our own things.

For the next 30 days we will get rid of at least one thing a day.