It’s finally warm enough here to switch out my winter clothing for my spring and summer stuff. Usually, I have a habit of shoving the new seasonal items into my closet alongside the fall/winter clothing, but I want to try reducing the visual clutter of items I know I for sure won’t wear between May and September. I also have my spring/summer clothing to go through, both for the sake of decluttering, but also for adding the items to the clothing tracker (which I’ll split up bit by bit – even doing some 20 items a day is a chore). I don’t think I need to make a point of specifically aiming to wear everything throughout the month (it’s definitely not quite shorts weather yet), but I want to instead see what I’m most drawn to.
Reading:
Art history still seems to be keeping my attention well enough, so I’ll keep going for it with more Taschen books. I happened to have finished the Matisse book over the weekend, and had already pulled Georgia O’Keefe to read, so I’ll just be adding Keith Haring for now. If I happen to finish both, I’ll see what I’m feeling – mythology? ancient civilisations? fashion? fiction? – and choose from there.
Using what I’ve got:
For my financial literacy courses, I have an activity planned for them this week which is focused on price comparison in the context of different groceries charging more/less for the same items. To make it more fun, I’m including the instructions of the activity in some of the cards from my stationary box that I don’t think I’d use otherwise (it won’t be all of them, but it will be a solid dent in the pile). The intention is for the cards to feel similar to an old-school dinner party invitation, with the double purpose of the design on the front of the card being how I split up the groups (i.e., everyone with a blue card will be in the same team).
If I have the time this week, I’ll have a look at stages of change & shopping habits – and if not, that will be next week’s post!
As much as I love dinosaurs, I don’t like my skin to be scaley. Winter in Canada is rough on the skin normally, so that majority of the products I use from November to April are all about keeping my skin from painfully chapping or my lips cracking and bleeding. First, I’m focused on finishing off the lipsmackers lip balm that I’ve been working on for most of 2021 – that I got in winter 2018/2019, as a stocking stuffer – which I genuinely thought there was none left, but then opened it today to take photos, and somehow a usable amount has emerged. I do have a second lip balm on the go (also from the same year), which seems to be unending, as I’ve been using it regularly and I still have a few months’ worth of use in it. For hand cream, I’m 2-3 uses away from done with the shea squeeze tube, and likely about a month from done with the body butter. The hand cream is better for warmer months (i.e., when the “Feels Like -37” line is long gone from my weather app), and the body butter is my best friend for now.
What my other categories are:
As I’d mentioned in my No Buy rules post, I have many categories that need to be used up before I bring in more. I wanted to switch it up for the remaining categories and give you visuals instead of numbers this time around, so you can see just how much I’m working with. I just talked about how much yarn I have left, so I’ll continue with the craft supplies theme:
Pens and other writing utensils:
I’ve whittled this collection down over the years, but this is what I have in my stock pile – meaning what’s not currently in my pencil case for planning or what I use at work. I do have a mix of artsy-er pens as well as a fountain pen mixed in with dollar store highlighters (some of which have been in the pencil case since I bought it, in 2012), so some of these will take longer to use. That’s my issue, though, is that I like to have something to use, but then if it’s too nice, I won’t.
Planner stickers:
I’ve kept every agenda or planner that I’ve had since grade 6/2006, since they tend to function more like a memory book than just a to do list for me (and I’ve never been much of a diary writer). Over time, I figured out highly detailed colour-coding and highlighting systems that I would use to stay on track of my academics, work/volunteering, and personal stuff in between through to the end of my undergrad thesis. Once I was off the shoestring student budget, I was drawn to planner stickers (I also liked stickers as a kid) to bring my weekly planner spreads to life. A lot were bought, and I limited myself to the size of a photobox from Michael’s of how many booklets I could have. I have decluttered a few booklets as well as pulled out sheets that I wouldn’t use at all (the quote-heavy ones, mainly) – and the irony of having three separate sticker books about budgeting is not lost on me.
Greeting cards:
This shouldn’t be too much of a surprise with how much effort I put into other “pen and paper” stuff, but I have over 120 blank greeting cards. Some were gifts, but most were a mix of restocking what I’d used, sales while at the mall, and impulse buys from Michael’s (I’m sensing a pattern here). I used to write to friends and family for the fun of it after moving to a different province for work, but that has slowed down significantly with moving more to video calls for the sake of being able to see each other. I do have some ideas of what I can use these for, but that’s in some time from now.
Tea:
I got into DavidsTea in 2013, and the amount of money I’ve spent could have paid for a trip to Iceland. The amount of tea that I have now is less than half of what I had at my peak around 2016, and the stock pile of specific blends has to do with not wanting to order frequently (reducing emissions from transportation) and not buying outside of the semi-annual sale. Note that the tins aren’t all full – most are half full or less – but I’m not switching the contents of a tin until it’s fully empty and been washed. Also worth noting, about 1/6th of this is from gifts.
Body products:
Some of these have been on my shelf, unopened, for longer than others – most notably, the Maui shampoo, conditioner and mask sets, which were purchased in January 2020 (on sale). I haven’t been able to finish them yet since I cut off about half of my hair (it was to the small of my back, and now just over my shoulders), so I don’t go through shampoo and conditioner half as quickly as I used to, and the fact that I had another four sets of shampoo and conditioner – bottles and soap bars – to get through before reaching these. Some other stockpiles – the toothpaste, deodorant (medium tins), and body butters – are based on what I know I use regularly and need to have at a moment’s notice when I run out. I do have a pharmacy in walking distance, but I prefer to reduce my number of trips out of the house as much as possible (and I don’t have a car). The bar soaps that are all the same were bought in 2021, and I liked the scent because it smelt like one of my toy sets from my early childhood. Nostalgia as a driving force for consumption? Never heard of that before! I say that jokingly, however, as that wasn’t the intent behind the scent blend that the shop owner made. The rest of it? They’re remnants of gifts kits, sales, or shop displays doing their job. If nothing else has highlighted the excess of the body products stock pile, know that I bought a 3-shelf organiser from Ikea to store all of it.
Later this week, I’ll be talking about what my shopping habits have been like (which will definitely be a series unto itself), and today’s post works as a snapshot of where I’m at right now. Thanks for reading!
Lady with Less 