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About Me:

ceejay74

I'm the CFO of a three-adult, two-child, two-cat household. There's me (CJ, age 49), my husband (NT, age 50), my wife (AS, age 44), and our kids AA (age 13) and SL (age 11). The cats are named Whiskey and Clue and they're about 12 years old.

Until July 2007 we hadn't been serious about financial stability, but then we started focusing on paying down our massive debt, building an emergency fund and saving for retirement. In October 2010, we finished paying off all of our credit card debt--over $70,000! Adding in student loans and mortgages, we've paid off more than $250,000 of debt so far. In June 2015, we used a windfall to pay off all our remaining non-home-related debt!

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Big picture goals:

Buy a rental property in Minneapolis in 2022

8x income by age 65 OR Coast FIRE by 2031 (tracking retirement in two ways at the moment)

Completely debt-free by age 65 (2039)

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April declutter/organize challenge! Want to join in?

April 1st, 2014 at 03:55 pm

Must be the spring cleaning bug, but I feel like every area of my home and life has more clutter and disorganization than it needs to. So I declare a declutter/get organized challenge for April! My only rules are that I make SOME progress every day and report it here on the blog.

Tonight I have a finance committee meeting for my condo, so I don't know if I'll have much time or energy. One thing that would be an easy fix is there are a bunch of empty boxes and envelopes from bday and Xmas hanging around in my closet (on my shoe shelf where I tend to hide presents until it's time to wrap them). So if I do nothing else today, my goal will be to clear that out. Should take 5 minutes or less.

Other organizing/decluttering projects I'd like to tackle this month:
- Do my taxes! (Definitely falls under "get organized" because I need to gather papers and fill out forms; plus I can declutter after by filing all the paperwork away when I'm done.)
- Sort/file/discard paperwork. We've got a big pile that keeps getting moved from counter to table to cabinet; need to get rid of it.
- The kids' room. See if I can get them to donate/toss toys; clear out the outgrown clothes; find a place for everything that's left.
- The front closets. Discard/sell/give away unwanted stuff; rearrange what's left so it's not so crowded and chaotic.
- My clothing. I'm sure there are things I can get rid of in my wardrobe.
- My email inboxes. Both my personal and work inboxes have several hundred emails each that need to get filed and/or deleted.
- The bookcases. We need to either get rid of some books, or get some bookends and clear off the tops of the bookcases so we can utilize those as additional shelving options.
- The living room. I want to move more of the kids' stuff into their room once we clear out some space in theirs.

I'm sure some other ideas will come up as the month progresses. I don't need to get it ALL done; I just need to get SOMEthing done every day this month.

How about you? Are you in?

Posted in Uncategorized | 14 Comments »

14 Responses to “April declutter/organize challenge! Want to join in?”

Joan.of.the.Arch Says:
April 1st, 2014 at 04:06 pm 1396368393
1396368393

Try to find the skinny metal kind of book ends that libraries use. They maximize shelf space, as compared to decorative bookends.
Bluebird Says:
April 1st, 2014 at 04:45 pm 1396370746
1396370746

I have very similar items to deal with. I'm in!
CB in the City Says:
April 1st, 2014 at 05:04 pm 1396371870
1396371870

I'm in! I can't promise I'll do something every day, though, as some days are pretty long!
creditcardfree Says:
April 1st, 2014 at 05:17 pm 1396372667
1396372667

I'm in...your fitness challenge got me going last month. I also know our neighborhood will be having a garage sale in the middle of May. This will help me prep to do that if I am so inclined.
Debt-free by Thir-ty Says:
April 1st, 2014 at 06:50 pm 1396378222
1396378222

Count me in too! I actually just made a mental list the other day of things I should do for spring cleaning tasks. This will definitely help me to actually accomplish it. Tonight will be putting the winter boots away (except maybe one pair...just in case) and busting out the spring/summer shoes (Gotta start small!). I'd like to say that I'll pare them down while switching, but...
wife of the deacon Says:
April 1st, 2014 at 07:43 pm 1396381399
1396381399

Count me in. I've started today by going through the boys' closet. I have ten items to pass on to a friend, three items to go back to the school for the uniform exchange, and two to trash. I have also started a list of items that I have in the next largest size for the oldest.

I'm encouraging the girls to go through their things as well.
snafu Says:
April 1st, 2014 at 08:00 pm 1396382434
1396382434

I'm in! My fav trick is to grab a laundry basket for items that belong elsewhere, a sturdy, reusable grocery bag for donations [need to reduce number of promotion bags] and a trash. Set a timer for 20 minutes and focus on one closet or one area at a time. Having stipulations makes it go quicker. Do you use it, love it, serve you? Purge items no longer age appropriate, wrecked, broken, stained, replaced, didn't live up to advertisement, frustrating, bad memories. Once the timer pings, pitch trash, donations to car for next outing or designated storage for charity pick-up, drag laundry basket room to room to offload as appropriate. Done until tomorrow, give yourself a reward.
FrugalTexan75 Says:
April 2nd, 2014 at 12:36 am 1396399014
1396399014

I need to be in too! I can commit to doing something decluttery/organizy 15 days this month. That should give me a good start on packing ...
snafu Says:
April 2nd, 2014 at 08:51 pm 1396471871
1396471871

4/2. boxed all but 3 of my cookbooks for our firefighters giant book sale. I mostly use ivillage.com whose recipes are healthier, require fewer ingredients and easier.
Ralph Says:
April 5th, 2014 at 04:24 pm 1396715077
1396715077

Sure - in like Flynn! Except for the slightly late start. Great idea! Heaven knows I need it! I got the disorganized and disheveled gene from my father, so I need to develop habits to overcome it. The reward of a de-cluttered life is awesome. Today I threw away a couple of windshield washer bottles. I usually save one or two to dilute for summer use, and there is one that has just the right amount in it, so I got rid of the two extras. A micro-step, but a step nonetheless. And now I am doing taxes. Last weekend was a total washout, and the amount of organization I got done just felt great.
Sian Says:
April 8th, 2014 at 01:20 am 1396920012
1396920012

I'm in! My post is having a yard sale in May plus I'm moving in several months. great timing!
Homebody Says:
April 16th, 2014 at 08:01 pm 1397678508
1397678508

Good grief I am so out of control that for the first time in my entire adult life I had to have the accountant file an extension for our taxes!
My English Castle Says:
April 30th, 2014 at 06:54 pm 1398884062
1398884062

I need a decluttering extension!
ceejay74 Says:
April 30th, 2014 at 07:16 pm 1398885378
1398885378

Me too, and I started the challenge! April turned out to be a lot more eventful than I predicted, and I didn't declutter every day like I planned. I'm done with organized "challenges" until things settle down a bit in my life.

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Ceejay74's Personal Finance Blog

A blog to help me document my journey out of debt.

April declutter/organize challenge! Want to join in?

14 Responses to “April declutter/organize challenge! Want to join in?”

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