Our tech team has launched updates to The Nest today. As a result of these updates, members of the Nest Community will need to change their password in order to continue participating in the community. In addition, The Nest community member's avatars will be replaced with generic default avatars. If you wish to revert to your original avatar, you will need to re-upload it via The Nest.
If you have questions about this, please email help@theknot.com.
Thank you.
Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
consuming less
i'm on a bit of kick to make more room in our house. it's *tiny* and we have way too much crap. like WAY TOO MUCH. i feel claustrophobic. i figured it would be more constructive to concentrate on what i can do rather than focusing on drew and his massive amounts of crap (and i do mean massive). i also want to spend less money and be less of a consumer in general. to that end i am not renewing my everyday food subscription, nor will i renew my cook's illustrated subscription (print & online) when it's due. they end up taking up a lot of space. i'm thinking i will let go of some of my sewing stuff, like fabrics i bought a good ten years ago that i still haven't made anything with, which is really hard for me. i look at it and think "i could make such a pretty X with this", but ten years? really? it's way past ridiculous and maybe i shouldn't be on d's case about being a packrat until i look at my own stuff!
is anyone else doing anything similar, or done so in the past? how did it work out? what did you do? any tips?
Re: consuming less
Good luck!
I think we're pretty good about not collecting too much stuff. Or at least I am. The biggest problem I have is not donating clothing that I haven't worn in years. My aunt is a hoarder. Having been to her house, I'm really paranoid about keeping onto things. I also am thinking that once a year or so we should make it a goal to get rid of/give away at least 10 items or something like that.
I don't have any magazine subscriptions because I feel like any information I'd want is available online. In one of my college courses, my professor required us to get a weekly magazine/newspaper subscription for the semester to encourage us to read articles in print. I understood his theory, but found it really annoying to be getting a magazine every week that I had no time to read.
Agreed. DH and I did a massive overhaul of our clothes during the holiday break. We took out everything that we had not worn in 6 mos-1 year and it is going to be donated.
Also, we go through our garage and go through it 2x a year to do inventory. We did this over the summer thinking we were going to move but we did not. We still have lots of stuff but it is much less than before.
As for the magazines, a lot of my subscriptions end this year and I am not renewing them. It gets to be too much and then I end up recycling them.
It feels great getting rid of stuff we really never needed in the first place and donating it to someone who can use it!
Also, our pantry is filled with food and our freezer is stocked with frozen meals so our goal is to use as much as possible before making another trip to the grocery store. The only items I will buy is fruits and veggies and milk.
Finally, we are revising our budget and we are going to try a cash only system-except for bills (all of them are automatic). So if we need to buy anything, it will be on a cash basis only. Let's see how that will work.
Omg, can you go talk to my MIL? I was just looking at seven keepsake ornaments from her in the last two-three years, most of which have absolutely no meaning to us. It keeps coming (though to be fair, she's gotten better).
Anyway, we're purging before we move. I rotate my closet out for the seasons (summer stuff in a box under the bed in winter, etc.) and when I do it's easy to donate clothes.
My parents are kinda anti-consumerism and getting moreso every year. It's really changed how we buy xmas gifts. We all exchange lists of what we want and need and tell each other what we're getting (not the recipient, obviously) so there's no duplicates. It works great (except when my dad forgets to check his email). We also do a lot of donating to each other's favorite charities in their name.
Edit: Oh, and I've become addicted to trading books on Swap.com. It's pretty cheap ($2-$3 to ship each book) and I get tons of new books that I can then exchange for even more new books!