So far I'm flinging:
1 sugar bowl (matches the dishes I already de-cluttered)
1 creamer pitcher (matches the sugar bowl)
3 coffee mugs (nobody here drinks coffee... I didn't realize we HAD coffee mugs)
10 piece tupperware dealie that does 100's of things... that I've never used
1 ugly cross-stitched picture from my cousin
2 orange silk flowers (I hate orange, no clue where they came from)
1 pitcher with no lid
1 yoga CD (I tend to use the "relax and breathe deep" boring times to run and switch the laundry... it's just not working for me!)
1 yoga book
1 pilates CD (same story as the yoga CD)
1 pilates book
1 pack of bubble gum I must have hid from the kids years ago
1 tube of dried up lipstick from the back of the bathroom cabinet
4 old razors with no blades (I have no explanation for this)
1 baggie full of the clips to the hot rollers (the rollers are gone, but I couldn't find the clips)

It's all LITTLE junk (none of the BIG IMPACT of a big hunk of junk) but it's all out of here!

I cancelled out of my after-work meeting tonight... coughing like crazy... and it's good to have a "bonus" night to de-clutter. Maybe I'll wear myself out and get a good night's sleep tonight? The cough syrup with codeine is another bonus, LOL.

Julie

If you have boys, get the clothes pins without the spring; otherwise they will dis-assemble them and you'll step on clothespin parts!!

Let's see who else can dig in the back of the cabinet!

(boy, I hate cabinets w/ a "back" in them. but I guess they're useful for holding all that stuff we can't quite toss)

Here's what's in the back of my ultra-deep one.

*a box containing souvenirs and snapshots, marked "wedding and honeymoon."
*a box containing all the issues of "Good Food Magazine" ever published--it folded after 3 years, so I kept them partly bcs they showed my work (not that clearly, since I'm a copyeditor, and you only notice us if we screw up), and bcs the recipes were sort of nice.

Now, I have a set of Good Foods in the bedroom, and I get them out to cook out of them now and then. I won't really use the others, I don't think. But I can't quite let go of them. Maybe in a year or two?

Oh, and:
* a penguin platter that I keep forgetting I have and therefore never use.

S'pose I can let them go?

Yes, Plow In, mold counts only because it's nasty and took 2 days of treating. OF COURSE you get to try another cabinet!

My results:

Tonight's cabinet was the top shelf over the stove, with the DUSTY shoebox of small "treasures" and odd-shaped lightbulbs.

These bizarre items were flung without blinking an eye:

1 marker (dried out)
8 turkey skewers** see below
1 rusty-icky bottle opener
1 refrigerator diagram
3 wire easter egg dipper-holders
3 parts of turkey basters (why did I have 2, and where is the missing part??)
2 plastic relish forks
1 bent knife (might be a grapefruit knife, but I hate grapefruit)
1 metal something (actually looked like part of a desk drawer?)
1 small glass carafe for heating syrup for pancakes on the stove (LIKE I WOULD EVER DO THAT! LOL)
3 cork pullers (how many cork pullers does a house with no wine bottles need?)
2 wisks (one rusty, one too heavy to be useful)
1 vinyl patch kit
1 handle to something

**Please note that I did ask DH what those metal pokey things were, and he THINKS they're turkey skewers. Keeping in mind that we have NEVER USED THEM, he was a little snippy when he asked if I was just going to give them away to the garage sale. Ummm... YES!! Gee whiz, I'm sorry I even let him see them. Maybe one day he'll get rid of the hoarding mentality? It's really kind of funny because he makes fun of OTHER people with the hoarding mentality, but doesn't see it in himself.

I need to go tie up the trash bag before he decides to go through it and make sure I didn't throw out "good" stuff that we might need some day.

Julie
(I actually went to bed 2 hours ago but woke up & needed more cough medicine)

What a relief.

Gloria

Sheri, good job pitching that candy!

One thing that really helped my this year was moving from a traditional house with traditional closets and cabinets to a house we remodeled extensively before we moved in.

I was able to spend four months really evaluating what we needed for storage space and adapting the space to fit how we live. Since I'm 5'4", I made sure that any spaces created didn't have shelves above my sight level. Out of sight out of mind didn't work for me (especially since my DH is tall and tended to stash stuff up high.) I took out almost all of the upper kitchen cabinets and am putting in open shelves.

For my youngest kid's rooms I didn't have closets installed. Now, nothing piles up in those black holes. The problem for me now, is since we don't stash stuff, we end up with hot spots piling out in the open. But that's good since it makes me deal with them. And as usally, 90% of the stuff is just trash.

Gloria

Thus far I have found:

16"D is pretty deep--it'd be really nice to have some closely spaced shelves that you can reach the back of!

www.shelvesthatslide.com

Wow, 27 ramekins? And all those deviled egg platters.

deviled-egg platters always make me wonder if the reason I don't care for deviled eggs is mostly because of the platter--they're a pain, bcs they're SO specialized; you can't use them for anything else. You can't nest or stack them. And they're usually very big!

I came home from work today coughing less, but more tired. So far this is all I've tossed today:

1 empty canning jar
2 ceramic planters
1 vase
2 phone cords
1 pack phone directions
1 gallon bag full of wooden drapery rings
2 wood shelves
1 chin-up bar DH never installed for DS 12 years ago

Thirty more minutes searching for junk (while the clothes dry) then I need to get ready for early bedtime.