What 15 Minutes Can Do! + My 7 Decluttering Tasks

When I shared last week's task list with you, I told you that I planned to spend some time decluttering my oldest child's room near the end of the week.  It was pretty messy to begin with, but little did I know that my youngest, being ever the little munchkin, was going to sneak in there while her sister was at school and wreak ungodly amounts of havoc towards the beginning of the week.

When it happened, I thought it unfair to make my oldest clean it up, and felt it too overwhelming a task for my little one to handle alone, and since it was already slated on the docket for Friday-Sunday, I simply ignored the mess for a few days.  But the mess continued to grow.

Come Friday morning, this is what was staring back at me from that room:

Yes, I know.  I cringed, too!

I did the best thing I knew to do...I put it off and went grocery shopping (which I had also been putting off until payday, so in my defense that was a necessary task as well!)  But alas, no little fairies had come to my aid while we were out and about, so once I had fed us lunch and put the little one down for her nap, I got to work.

I worked absolutely as fast as I could.  My goal for that day was simply to clear some space that I could work with.

Here is what I was able to accomplish in just 15 minutes:

My poor little weenie dog doesn't even recognize the place!

I was pretty pleased with the progress I had made that first day.  The next day I did more of the same, I finished cleaning up everything that was on the floor.

It doesn't look like I got quite as much accomplished this day, but I had the girls pull everything out from under the bed and I also cleaned underneath the table on the left that you can't see behind the door.   I also did not miss the opportunity to vacuum!

I still had the far right corner that is not visible on either of these shots to tackle.   In that corner are the closet and bookshelf, both of which had their contents spewed about.

This is what I tackled on Sunday.  Now I will admit that when my 15 minute timer went off, i had stacks of books everywhere, so I set it again and did another 15 minutes this afternoon just to not be leaving a mess in her room because I knew my stacks would not get left alone!

So after 30 minutes today, here is what I'm left with:

Why yes, that is a Barbie car bookend!

It's looking pretty good in here after only 1 hour total spent cleaning over 3 days, but I'm still not done yet because...well, when I cleared the floor....this is what I did:

So here is my plan for the week:

Monday:  Quick clean the floor in the younger one's room  (yep...they moved their mess making in there, and it just needs to be dealt with, plus she decided she wanted to sleep on the floor so its all mixed in with her bedding!)

Tuesday-Thursday:   Work in the older one's room

Friday-Sunday:  Work in the younger one's room and begin relocating some games/puzzles/books.

We have cleared all the toys out and rearranged the living room, and so I want to move some of the family games into some living room shelving.  My youngest's room was a former office, so it has lots of shelving on the high wall that we've utilized for games and puzzles, but we've often wanted them while she was napping and weren't able to go in and get them, so now that we've made some room in the front I'll be moving them in there, and putting some books for her on those shelves.

I need to make room some some more books we were recently given on the older one's shelf  (they are currently in a box in the garage), so I'll be doing a lot of relocating of things at the end of the week.

What will you be working on this week?