2018 Fall Cleaning Challenge Week 2 Review – Getting Rid of 1,000 Things

I started this challenge on Saturday, September 1^st with the goal of getting rid of 1,000 things, mostly papers.

My work for weeks one and two resulted in getting rid of a total of 725 things. That means I only have 275 things to go!

I was able to get one of the four drawers in the filing cabinet to open and close easily. Sort of. This drawer contains:

• My stationery sorted into categories.
• Vacation planning.
• Medical information for each family member.
• The last seven years of income tax information.

There are many things I have discovered and determined while going through the papers:

• I made a pact with myself not to buy any more stationery until I use up what I have.
• We had a great vacation in 2007 to the Smokey Mountains, but I don’t need the brochures anymore.
• My son had a lot of teeth pulled when he was younger!
• This year will be so much easier to handle the taxes with the new laws stating that our standard deduction will be $24,000 for married filers. No need for itemizing.

I have changed my preferences to receive statements in electronic form instead of receiving physical statements. I have also determined that I will schedule a time to download documents and purge things in the office once a week. I have dedicated a binder for my schedules and procedures to keep better organized.

Hopefully, by next week I will have gotten rid of the total 1,000 things.