Kninja Knitter

This occasional Saturday series is intended to share specific details on my Environment Evolution. And today I spent seven solid hours over an eight-hour period working specifically on my office space. This room was my son’s bedroom when we moved in almost 25 years ago, and once he moved upstairs (and then out of the house), it became a dumping ground. I did a lot of work in here last year in order to set up my workspace (getting out of the living room), but old habits can be a beast!

No one else was in the room where it happened… but now they will be.

This weekend, I launched Declutterpalooza 2025, tackling what was easily the most lava-covered zone of my home: my office-slash-storage-slash-where-good-intentions-go-to-die room. When the day began, the carpet was nothing more than a legend whispered among file folders and fabric piles. But by the end? The pink carpet made its triumphant comeback—and so did I.

I’ve been a member of the Take Your House Back course and support group for a couple years, and three times a year they present the All-Day Declutter event! I’ve never been able to participate for the whole day before due to schedule conflicts, so I was excited to dive in this time! They were specifically targeting storage spaces, so my office was an easy choice. It’s been storing SO much stuff for far too long.

The coordinators of the course, Cas Aarsden, Dana K. White, and Dawn Madsen each presented a session in the morning, 45 minutes each, with 15 minutes in between. That gave me the opportunity to haul my recycling out to my curbside bin while the trash bags collected in my living room as a holding space. All told, I filled five 30-gallon trash bags as well as my curbside recycling bin. I have a few more boxes of recycling to take to the SWACO station. I also have several boxes full of donations to drop off at Goodwill tomorrow.

The work in this room is far from done. I’d like to eventually transform some of the space to be a guest room when needed! But first I have more purging to do. I also have a LOT of music to sort through; I have duplicate copies of a lot of my church music since my system of organizing has been weak. There’s a tote full of papers to shred, having sorted through files from as far back as 2000. I’m also coming to terms with some of the fantasy clutter that’s here – I’ve already pitched a lot of things related to crafts I no longer indulge in (or never did).

Here’s what the spaces looked like once I wrapped for the day.

Stay tuned as Operation Guest Room continues—and don’t worry, I am throwing away my trash! 🎶

Knit on. 🧶