Winter transportation can mean ice, snow, and hazardous roads. Road conditions can change in an instant. Before traveling, give cars a winter preparedness exam:

• Check antifreeze
• Check and replace older batteries.
• Remember to keep the gas tank near full to avoid freezing water in the fuel line.
• Check tires and spare tire for proper inflation

Make sure automobiles contain the following emergency supplies:

• Bag of sand, road salt or non-clumping cat litter. The bag’s extra weight means better traction, and the contents can be spread under slipping tires. (Note: some cities have specific regulations about things you can use, consider using towels instead)
• Ice scraper.
• Jumper cables.
• Small shovel (to dig snow away from wheels, or scatter sand on roadway).
• Tire chains (every driver should practice putting them on).
• Flares or reflective triangle to warn other motorists if you break down.
• Blanket.
• Flashlight and batteries.
• Gallon jug of drinking water.
• First aid kit.

When traveling by car, include emergency food and clothing for each traveler. Pack supplies in a backpack in case you need to abandon your car. An emergency backpack should include:

• Jacket, hat, gloves and snow boots.
• Nonperishable food.
• Cell phone.
• Money.

[Source: First Lady Maids]

Beth wrote, “I was just thinking about some books that I have found helpful in the past:”

• 15 Minute Organiser by Emilie Barnes. Or any of the Emilie Barnes books!
• The House That Cleans Itself by Mindy Starns Clark. I love this one! It’s totally different to any other book of this type that I’ve read.
• Sorted by Lissanne Oliver. This is one by an Australian author, who also had a TV show a few years back called ‘Your Life on the Lawn’. She would pull everything out of someone’s house and put in on the front lawn, then they would go through everything and only take back inside what they were keeping.

Thanks Beth! “Your Life on the Lawn” sounds like the TLC show “Clean Sweep”. Very neat!

• Use the [desk filing] drawer to hold paperwork in hanging files – one for each family member, with subfolders inside to record their medical history, school schedules, important papers, and other items. Put “Action” files in the front of the file drawer so they’re easy to access. Atop the desk, a red folder labeled “Bills to Pay” might find a home in a vertical file. And a basket for sorted mail and/or current projects will help keep your desk clear at the end of the day. (Be sure to sort your mail over the wastebasket.) [Source: EZine Articles]

• Keep only the things you work on daily on the top of your desk, the things you work on weekly in your desk, and the things you work on monthly around your desk. Toss or archive the rest. [Source: EZine Articles]
• A pencil drawer should hold pencils and pens, paper, paper clips and highlighters so they’re at the ready when the phone rings or you need to start a grocery list. Relegate the catchall drawer to another spot such as the laundry room or garage. Drawer dividers are a must – they prevent items from sliding to the back of the drawer or getting hidden under papers. [Source: EZine Articles]

• On a day to day basis, an organized system can help save time; bank and property statements will be easy to locate at tax time and birth certificates easy to lay hands on during sports registration periods, for example. In the event of a death, family members won’t have to wonder where the deceased could have hidden a will, but will find it easily. [Source: EZine Aricles]

• Important documents: While they aren’t needed too frequently, most find that when they are necessary, locating them quickly is usually important. (ie: birth certificates, marriage records, divorce records, social security cards, education records, military records, medical records, social security cards, education records, medical records, genealogy records, death certificates, tax returns, bank statements, stock certificates, savings bonds, home warranties, home insurance, homestead docs, car titles, life insurance, real estate deeds, collectibles, wills, et cetera) [Source: EZine Aricles]

• Don’t keep what you don’t need on hand: Papers that have your personal information should be shredded or disposed of safely. For your older files that you want to store, use storage boxes and label every box on the side and top with the contents and year. [Source: Squidoo]

Don’t let your dead/old electronics end up in landfills. Either find an appropriate recycling facility in your area, a community collecting cell phones as a fund raiser, donate them to a good cause, or check out Gazelle.

Buy clothing secondhand AND donate your unneeded clothing and household items to a charity shop. Vintage clothing is considered “in” again, so go through that closet and donate donate donate!

Recycled unneeded, unread, read, used and/or old magazines and newspapers. This paper can be reused, as can a lot of cardboard packaging we wouldn’t normally consider. Try looking at the “trash” products in your household less as “garbage” and instead ask yourself this question: is it recyclable?

Those are just a few things off the top of my head. Any other suggestions?

• Don’t put takeout food containers in the recycling bin. They’re considered contaminated because of the residual food waste in them.
• Leave flattened cardboard boxes at curbside (tied in a bundle no bigger than 3′x2′x4′) if you live in a detached house.
• Check the bottoms of plastic containers for the recycling category number. Depending on the municipality, some plastics can be placed in the blue boxes and others must be taken directly to a recycling depot or private recycler. All municipalities take Types 1 and 2 but check with your city hall for more information about your community.
• Don’t pull the tabs off of pop cans! It is a myth that the tab is the ‘valuable’ part. Please recycle the whole can, tab and all.
• Remove paper labels from metal cans. If not, the labels will catch fire in the metal melting process causing contamination.

1. When did I use this last?
2. Do I need this?
3. Do I like cleaning/dusting it?

If the answer to Q1 is 6 months or more, the answer to Q2 should probably be NO, and if you are like me, I hate dusting so I would answer NO there…. that’s when you take the item and throw it in a garbage bag or in a box labeled charity.

Thanks Serena for this simple tip to help us declutter!

If you have a tip you’d like to submit, either email me at monnibo [at] hotmail [dot] com OR leave a comment on the blog!

Also, I’ve fixed the button — a number of people were experiencing issues with it and it was technical and all my fault, my apologies. It should work now!

How to start:

1. Set a goal for yourself and blog about it.
2. Sign the Mister Linky below (please leave the link to your blog post, not just your blog URL)
3. Come back every week for new tips and tricks on effectively decluttering your home and life!

• Instead of keeping all the back issues of a magazine or newspaper, get a scrapbook or a 3 ring binder and some sheet-protectors and clip out the articles you want to keep.
• Resist buying things on sale just because it’s a good price. 20% off of something you weren’t going to buy doesn’t save you much.
• Stop looking at the classifieds / online listings if you aren’t looking for something specific. Remove the temptation to remove the impulse purchases. (I browse on the “free” section on Craigslist all the time, and I intend to stop.)
• Find useful things to do with items (knitters: knit from your stash, or find a new home for yarn you no longer want to knit with).
• If no one you know can benefit from having it, consider donating to charity.
• If it really is just junk, don’t be afraid to throw it out!

Some good ones were:

• Its broken or, even worse, obsolete (i.e.: your old car phone).
• If you had to spend $20 every month maintaining it, you’d decide it isn’t worth it.
• The Salvation Army might say no if you tried to donate it.

And my favourite:

• You would never clutch it and say “My precious” in a gesture of playful self-mocking. (Assume you’re the kind of person who goes to medieval fairs and quotes Lord of the Rings.)

Possible Goal Ideas:

• Pick a certain area to declutter/revamp: the kitchen tupperware drawer, the home office, your odds-n-ends drawer, the fridge because it has things growing, the garden shed because you have 3 hoes and never even use 1…
• Get your family/housemates to pitch in: Make it a house-wide effort. Get the kids to commit to donating 10 toys they don’t play with anymore to charity, or tell your spouse that you’ll clean out the home office if s/he cleans the garage.
• Reduce: Make a personal goal to cut down your collection of something by 10%, or even 50%! Too many books that you won’t even reread? Donate them to a community centre.
• Reuse: Do you find you’re forever buying elastic bands, or paperclips, or forever searching for the scissors? I’ll bet you have at least 3 pairs of scissors, but can barely find 1. Reorganize your “junk drawer” and get rid of or find a new home for all the extra stuff.
• Recycle: Do you collect pop cans to bring in for bottle deposits, but it seems like you have several bags and never take them in? Consider just dropping them off at the recycling depot and ask if they donate the money to charity.
• Recycle (unconventional): Go through your Spring/Summer wardrobe and weed out the clothes you no longer like/fit/enjoy wearing. Donate them to a shelter or charity shop that will be able to find new owners for them.

Over the weeks I’ll be coming up with some tips of where to take things to donate, or how to recycle/donate/reuse commonly discarded items. Stay tuned! And feel free to email me (monnibo AT hotmail DOT com) with any suggestions YOU have!

Join the SPRING CLEANING CHALLENGE to declutter your home and life in preparation for the warm weather. Why wait till Spring is officially here? Start right now and clear out your cluttered corners until the end of April.

How to start:

1. Set a goal for yourself and blog about it.
2. Sign the Mister Linky below (please leave the link to your blog post, not just your blog URL)
3. Come back every week for new tips and tricks on effectively decluttering your home and life!

• My Friend Amy knew she had books galore, but that wasn’t what she wanted to get rid of!
• Not only did Beth finish her challenge, she got her sister to toss a couple things into the “To Donate” bag as well!
• Ruth @ The ScrabbleQueen Knits, Too started to throw away/donate all kinds of things, but it was only the tip of her iceberg!
• Between DVDs and knitting, Leslie met her goal during those lovely days between Christmas and New Years.
• Serena @ Savvy Verse & Wit finished in record time and actually reminded me how many defunct electronics (floppy discs & VHS tapes) that I had.
• One of Tammy‘s goals for her 100 in 1001 Challenge was to sell/give away/throw out 50 things. I don’t know if she blogged about finishing, but I certainly hope she met her goal. And best of luck with the rest of the 100 in 1001!
• Jeannie @ I Like To Be Here When I Can got her husband to pitch in, and the best part was when they went shopping the day after, they didn’t buy any unneeded items!
• While decluttering, Chan came to the painful conclusion that she has far too much knitting paraphernalia. (But don’t worry, I think we all do!)
• Anita @ YarnDemon Adventures may not have finished by January 1st, but the important thing is that she did it!
• When Marie @ smariek knits got around to her collection of out-of-date electronics, she was only at 29 items. But by the time she finished, she’d cleared out 155 things!!

I’m sure that everyone can glance around whatever room they’re in, and see a few things that they don’t need/want anymore. Half-finished crafts, seven different types of wood glue, those chipped plates you’re saving “just in case”. So, if anyone would like to join in with me, please sign the Mister Linky!

ETA: Forgot to specify a “deadline”. Let do January 1st, 2009 — aim to start the new year with a little less clutter! And remember, if you can donate your items, please do! Your unused items may be someone else’s treasure/pleasure!

ETA2: Have a button!! (please remember to save to your own server)

[Challenge inspired by the title of Gail Blanke's book: Throw Out 50 Things... however, I have not yet read it, so I don't want to claim it is like the book... just that I was inspired by it.]