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I spent my birthday KonMari-ing my closet

A couple of years ago I bought Marie-Kondo's book "The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up" and tried to implement it towards my closet. However I did not pull out every single item from my closet as she suggests you do. I did sections at a time. This time, I did it her way.

It took me 20 minutes to clear out my closet. Which isn't bad in my opinion. I thought it would take a lot more time. I started this at 10:30 am. Here are photos of my entire closet emptied out onto the bed.




I started going through the giant pile one piece at a time. If I still liked the item and it made me happy, I put it back in the closet. For items I no longer liked I had to decide if it was something I could sell, something I could donate, or something I could give to my sister or friend. Marie Kondo advises not to give items away to family or friends because it will burden them. It's not good to transfer the burden is what she says. I get that, but my sister also donates clothing a lot too, so I'm not too worried about it and my friend who is the same size as me always loves anything I give her (so she says).


By 12:30 I cleared off one part of the bed already. I took a break here, because I was also doing laundry at the same time and had to stop to fold laundry. I also made myself a drink and put on some music. I listened to The Cure's Disintegration while I did this. Disintegration is my favorite album ever. 

Marie Kondo says you shouldn't think about the item too much. It should be a quick decision. Go with your gut kind of feeling. If the item was a maybe, I tried it on to see how I felt about it. If it was comfortable I decided to keep it, if not it went into one of the piles. Three hours later, I only had two piles left! I wanted to be done by 3 pm with everything so I could do my workout. I was done by 2:30 pm. It took me four hours. 


My donation pile.

My sell pile.

Items to my sister or friend.

I probably got rid of maybe 75 items or so? Here's what my closet looks like after I put everything back. I'm still trying to figure out the best way to organize it. 


I don't know what that green sack is hanging off the top left shelf. That belongs to my husband and I can't reach it at all without having to get the stool out. 😂 


The main section is where I currently have my Free To Be Wild Bras and my tanks for working out. After that I've got my pants and sweaters for work. On the left I have more workout clothes. On the right side are my accessories, bags and shoes. 


Here is where I can't really figure out how to organize the top row of clothes. It's sort of a mix of stuff. I have on the left- clothes I need to photograph for my blog. Then I have some miscellaneous items like scarves, tees and cardigans, dresses that I only wear for summer. I'm leaving it the way it is for now. 


I have a lot of extra hangers!

The bottom rack is mainly my hoodies and outerwear. I'm not sure how to organize this either. Right now I have it by color, but it isn't working for me. I may have to break it down by category instead. Defines Jackets, thin hoodies, Scuba Hoodies and then leather jackets and heavy winter coats.


The top drawer is full of tees. I definitely have enough t-shirts to last me the rest of my life. They're all folded up and easy to see. 

I used the KonMari method for folding t-shirts.

The second drawer I have my socks and underwear. Yes I even went through this As you can see I don't have many bras right now. I'll have to explain in another post. It's a work in progress. Without going into too much detail, basically for the last few years I was wearing size 32A. Recently the band started feeling way too tight. I had to get rid of all my bras and get new ones. That's why there's only 2 bras int he drawer there! I need to order more. It's hard finding new bras when you're flat chested!

I don't bother folding underwear, I just stack them on top of each other. I also have way too many socks.

The third drawer is full of bottoms. On the left side are my sweatpants and joggers. In the middle are my textured leggings. On the right are my prints and align crops. I actually got rid of a lot of leggings over the past few months.


My bottom drawer is the most empty. I have 5 pairs of jeans and a knit that I decided should not be on a hanger. On the left is a vintage Fendi bag that I put in a Marc Jacob's dust bag if anyone is wondering. 


There you have it! I realize I'll never have a capsule wardrobe. It's just not doable for me at all. I still have a pretty full closet as you can see. It's still a work in progress but it is more manageable. By nature I'm not a messy person, I just have a hard time organizing my things so that it makes sense. I think once summer rolls around and I can move my winter stuff out of the way, the main section of my wardrobe should be less crowded. At least that's what I'm hoping.

Have you read or watched Marie Kondo's tidying up method? What do you think of it? I wouldn't say it's life changing, but I do think it is something I need to practice constantly. I have figured out that there are certain colors I should never buy, like green and brown. I am not someone that wears earthy colors. I do wear a lot of gray, purple and pink. I also have a decent amount of black and navy so I think I know what colors to stick to going forward.

That's it for me! Hope you all had a great weekend and here's to another week.











Comments

  1. Wow! That was a big event! Glad you tackled it and made progress. Thanks for sharing. My wardrobe is whittled down to much less, and I chose white, pink, grey and black as my core colours. I don’t like browns and greens either. I’ve decided to only buy something new once in a blue moon and then I’ll wear it all the time. Otherwise I buy things don’t wear them and then don’t like them anymore. It’s amazing how much my tastes have changed over the years!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I would love to see other people's closets/wardrobes. I wish white was a color I liked wearing. I feel like that would be that key to making an outfit look put together.

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  3. Good job, Leslie, and it didn’t take you that long! Capsule wardrobe doesn’t work for me either. I just find it hard to part with things that I still like, even though I don’t wear/use them as often. I have too many clothes, scarves and handbags.

    I’m trying to be good and will be buying less. No I’ve never read or watched Marie Kondo’s tidying up method and maybe I really should. :)

    Hope you had a wonderful birthday.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I would recommend checking out her show on Netflix or read the book. Don't have to do both I think. I watched one episode on Netflix and I'm curious to see how she does with other families but I have a feeling it's probably similar. If I don't have anything else to watch I might continue.

      But that's the plan, to buy less and part with more items this year!

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  4. Your closet looks great!

    I watched Marie Kondo on Netflix and I think it had an effect on me. I am not at all up to tackling my clothes so that will wait, which is already against her method. I did go through my documents/paperwork and I was able to reduce that from four filing cabinet drawers to two. I had a lot of stuff to shred, things I'd kept far too long.

    I also worked on my books. I didn't take them all off the shelves and pat them to wake them up, but I went through each of them to decide keep or go. I took about 65 to the used book store and now my shelves are much neater. Success!

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    Replies
    1. Paperwork is a totally different kind of monster. I do shred papers now and then, but I probably need to do another cleanse. My husband on the other hand.... I'm afraid of his paperwork. I can handle my own but not his!

      I actually have all of my books boxed up at my parents house. I didn't take them with me when I moved. Now I only buy e-books. It definitely saves space !

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  5. Great job!

    You inspired me to binge watch her show this weekend - although I didn't tackle anything more than shopping bags I don't know what to do with a 100 lululemon bags - can't throw them in recycling and can't stomach putting them in trash. Any suggestions?

    I recently reorganized my athletic wear in the closet. I have Power Y/CRBs hanging and all my patterned leggings hanging so I can see and admire the artwork more often. My other tanks, long sleeve shirts, and most of my Lulu pants are on shelves. In the summer I hang up my speed short collection. Bras are in baskets on the shelf by style and patterned/solids. I tried organizing by color once but I prefer item style as I tend to buy only certain styles (speeds, energy bras, older power y, newer CRB II and swiftly tanks). I like the look of uniformity of item organizing in my closet.

    I'm nowhere near a capsule wardrobe - I love patterned pants especially werkshop and terez so I have a ton of solid tops that work with the pants. The colors are all over the place but anchored with black and white. I wouldn't know how to make these a capsule wardrobe.

    Thanks for letting us in on your konmarie-ing

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I used to have a ton of Lululemon bags, especially the small ones. When I sell some of the pieces that no longer work for me on Ebay I usually package them up and give them a Lulu shopping bag. Some of the buyers really appreciate that. That's pretty much how I got rid of my stash. For the bigger shopping bags I leave some in the car and take them with me when I grocery shop, to reduce plastic bags. But you only need about maybe a handful or so- depending on how much you buy. I also think Lululemon will take some of the bags back if they're in new condition. Not 100% sure though as I haven't tried. Goodwill might take them? I try to donate as much as possible instead of throwing things out. I do my best to try and avoid adding trash to the landfills.

      Sounds like you're pretty organized as well. I think I need to organize by style and then color.

      I wouldn't know how to build a capsule wardrobe either. It just sounds so limited. But I guess that's the whole point!

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  6. Happy belated birthday my friend! Hope it was both fun and relaxing!!

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