Takeaways from Spark Joy: How to organize your home the Konmari Method

Last year, I read "The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying up: The Japanese Art of Decluttering and Organizing" by Marie Kondo.  I held off reading Kondo's second book coz there were mixed reviews as some say the second book contains similar content as the first book.

Anyway, since I always look for some refresher/inspiration when it's time to do some decluttering, I decided to finally read the second book - "Spark Joy: An Illustrated Master Class on the Art of Organizing and Tidying Up".

Yes, the reviews were right but what's great about this second book are:  (1) it has illustrations on how to properly fold your clothes and organize your items vs the first book which only had text descriptions and (2) the author shares more real-life stories and experiences about her family and clients about tidying up and some of which may sound like our own stories.  😆

If you're a visual type of person, Spark Joy could be an easier read than the first book coz it has illustrations.  I got the Kindle Paperwhite copy so the illustrations are in black and white but here are samples of the colored illustrations from the physical book -

How to fold tops and shirts the KonMari method

How to fold plastic bags the KonMari method

What are my key takeaways from Spark Joy? Sharing with you my favorite lessons below but most of them are actually in the first book.   Still a good read though coz sometimes, it takes more than once or twice before lessons sink into my head! 😜😂 

• The important thing in tidying is not deciding what to discard but rather what you want to keep in your life.   

• Tidy by category - in this sequence -  (1) clothes, (2) books, (3) papers, (4) komono (miscellany), and (5) sentimental items.  When tidying a specific category e.g. clothes, gather all items of clothing in one spot; do not tidy up per location. Why?  When you gather all related items in one spot, it allows you to see (1) if there are duplicate items and (2) objectively assess how much you have per category.    Then you can start discarding.  You can only plan where to store them once you know how much needs to be stored. (Based on my personal experience, you have to store the items per category close together.  For example in my case, I had 3 different shelves where I stored assorted supplies and when I gathered all the items in one spot, I discovered I had a lot of duplicate items.😮 )     

• For storage, remember the rule of thumb is 90 percent.  Fill your drawers to the point where they look full but not stuffed.

•  Everything that can be stood on edge on its own without falling over should be stored upright in a drawer, rather than flat e.g. folded clothes, stationery supplies, etc. This doesn't just save on space but it allows you to (1) view all the content at one glance and (2) pull out an item easily.

• The 2 skills needed to successfully organize your home are: 

          (1) the ability to keep what sparks joy and discard the rest; and 

          (2) the ability to decide where to keep an item and to always put it back in its place.

• When buying something,  consider the design, the feel, the convenience, and every other factor most important to you - until you find one that you really love. 

• It’s far more important to adorn your home with the things you love than to keep it so bare it lacks anything that brings you joy. - Kondo

• Do you collect some themed stuff?  Here's a creative solution from Kondo.  One of  her clients, for example, love mushrooms -  she has mushroom postcards, erasers, figurines, keychains, even an ear pick with a mushroom on the handle!  Why does she like mushrooms?  "It's their modesty, they flourish in the shade of great trees," the client explained.  Just talking about her mushroom stuff collection brought her a lot of joy but unfortunately, all the items were stored out of sight. They were still in individual plastic wrappers and boxes, and collectively, they were stored in a tin can. The owner would open the tin can once a month to look at them.  Kondo thought even if the owner spent 2 hours looking at them each time, she would only get 24 hours of joy from them in 1 whole year!  So what Kondo suggested was for the client to create her own personal mushroom space inside her closet. She decorated the fronts of her clear plastic storage boxes with mushroom postcards, covered the spare bedding with a large mushroom-patterned cloth, hung her mushroom keychains around the necks of her hangers, and displayed her mushroom miniatures in a basket on one of the shelves.  Now the owner gets to see her favorite mushroom-themed items everyday. 

• When you realize that you have just the right amount of stuff - a feeling that you know you have all you need to feel content - is what Kondo calls the click point. 

• Are you a bookworm? Here's a good insight from Kondo so you it won't be a struggle to part with your old books:  We read books because we seek the experience of reading. Once read, a book has already been “experienced.” Even if you don’t remember the content completely, you have already internalized it.  (In my case, writing about my key takeaways after reading a book is my closure so I could easily refer to the lessons without having to re-read the entire book. 😉)

• Is your garbage not picked up everyday?  If yes, to prevent your kitchen from smelling bad,  you can put your kitchen scraps such as fruit and vegetable peelings, chicken bones in a plastic bag or plastic container (just drain them well) and store them in the freezer.  Though you may think the idea is yucky, Kondo points out that the scraps are put in the freezer before they begin to rot, thus, they are still part of the food we just ate and thus, not garbage yet.   

• Do you keep physical diaries/journals? Flip through them and reminisce about things that happened and keep only those that still spark joy. Or you can adopt the criterion of one Kondo's clients - to discard those that she would have felt embarrassed to have anyone read after she died.

• Do you still have albums of printed photos?  Kondo recommends to remove all photos from the albums, lay them out on the floor so you can arrange them per year and review each one.  Keep those which bring joy (or as one of her clients put it - where you look good 😁 ) and let go of photos that (1) don't bring joy, (2)  look similar, or (3) scenes you don’t really remember.   Then put them in one nice album.  Kondo explains, "Photos will only keep your memories alive when they have been arranged so that you can enjoy them whenever you like".

• How about organizing and decluttering digital photos and digital data?  Kondo says the same principle applies: Choose what you wish to keep, not what you are going to discard. You will never finish if you approach it by trying to decide which ones to erase when there are so many possibilities.  

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Though Kondo encourages people to tidy up, her advocacy is not minimalism but it's more for people to learn how to keep only the things that bring them joy and to keep them in an organized way so they are accessible (and not forgotten).  And even if the concept of tidying up focuses on material things, Kondo's final reminder goes beyond materialism.

Towards the end of the book, she shares this story when one time, her family went out for a picnic lunch to watch the cherry blossoms.  Her mom prepared them a beautifully packed lunch with such loving care that touched her heart.   Her mom also brought a bottle of pink-hued amazake (a beverage from sweet fermented rice) and she served the beverage in small pink glasses with cherry blossom patterns.

When the glasses were filled with the pink amazake, Kondo said "it looked like cherry blossoms were blooming in our glasses. How beautiful! The blossoms I viewed that day with my family were the best I had ever seen." 

Kondo further shares -

The glasses were an expression of my mother’s love and affection, chosen out of her desire to make that day special for us ... I had seen those glasses in our house many times and had always thought they were pretty, but they had been transformed into “those special cups that my mother filled with amazake when we went to view the blossoms.” 

I realized that the value of things with which I have spent precious hours alone cannot compare with the value of things that bear precious memories of time spent with other people. My favorite clothes and shoes are special, and I wear them constantly, but they can’t compete with things that have been steeped in memories of the people I love. 

I realized that what I had really longed for was just to be with my family. Compared to the amount of time I spent with my possessions, myself, and my work, I had spent far less time interacting with my loved ones.  Of course, I will still continue to value my time alone. But the purpose of it is to nurture me so that I can enjoy an even more fulfilling time with my loved ones, so that I can contribute even more to the happiness of the others around me.

How I Became an Accidental Minimalist

I can't believe it's been over 4 years since I've become an accidental minimalist. Accidental because I didn't mean to become a minimalist.   One day, I just decided to dispose all of my furniture except for 2 small pieces  (shoe cabinet and console table) with the intention of redesigning my place.  And yes, when I say all furniture, that included my bed frame so I was just left with a mattress on the floor.  😂

And then when I went shopping for furniture, I purchased a dining set BUT while I was waiting for the invoice, the sales personnel asked me to sit on a La-Z-boy and that was it - love at first sight sit! 😍 😂   I cancelled my dining set transaction and bought the La-Z-boy instead.  Wahaha.... 😂

For 6 months, I never went shopping for any other furniture coz I was super happy with my La-Z-boy that I didn't feel the need to get any other piece.  Please note though that I don't like entertaining guests (it's the introvert in me) which explains why I only need one chair very little. 😂

My La-Z-Boy

In those 6 months when some close friends dropped by my place, they had to take turns in sitting on my one and only chair while the rest had to sit on the floor.  😂 😂 😂

On the seventh month, I was forced to buy a table and chair coz I had to finish a case study for a short course I enrolled in.

My TopTop Table and Ghost Chair

The table looks big in the photo above but that's only 27 inches in diameter which means it's really good for one person.  And which means I have to empty the table every time I work and every time I eat coz it's both my work table and dining table. 😂  And which also means it can't be used for duck, cover and hold purposes during an earthquake.  I actually tried and I think I have better chance of surviving under the mattress. 😂

So for the last 4 years, those are just my pieces of furniture.  I never bought a bed frame or any other piece coz I realized it was easier to clean when you've so little.

And then last month, I went to Shanghai with friends and we stayed at the Fairmont Peace Hotel.  In the evenings, I had to do some work and I super loved the big work desk in the room! 😍    I knew then I had to get a proper work desk (which also means my other table would officially become a dining table).  😂

So last weekend, I went around to look for my work desk and the store delivered it today. Yay! The furniture store though forgot to bring the chair so I have to use my one and only movable chair in the meantime.  😂  

A proper work desk - finally! 

I had to take a photo of my new desk while it's still uncluttered coz I don't know how my desk would look like by next week.  😂

BTW, see the cork board on the wall? That is my Kanban board.   When I started using the Kanban method last year, I started with post-it notes on my wall.  😂     I strategically put the cork board on that spot to cover the bracket holes of my old TV  - which I also gave away coz I realized I rarely turn it on.   I'm happy watching on a small screen - my iPad.  😂

So no sofa,  no dining set, no TV....  I wonder - is this minimalism or is it just a an introvert's space designed for one's self and not for entertaining guests?  And I haven't even started talking about my dishware - my 2 sets of plates and bowls.  😂

What to put in an Emergency Backpack

Source

The 6.2 magnitude earthquake last week reminded me that it's time to re-assemble my emergency backpack.  I actually had one before but every now and then, I would take out an item.  Like when I forget to withdraw cash, I ended up getting from the emergency stash. And when I get hungry at night,  I got snack supplies from there too. 😂   I used the individual items for all sorts of self-declared emergencies until all what was left was just the bag! 😂  

Anyway, I did a quick research on what to put in an emergency backpack coz I think the content of my first emergency backpack was just food, water, whistle, flashlight... and more food.  Ok, it was mostly food.  Haha...    

While I was browsing through the lists, I realized some lists are so long that I couldn't imagine how all the items would fit in a backpack (requires more like a trolley 😆 ).   Plus if you had a lot of items, the weight could actually affect your mobility in an emergency situation.  So I came up with a trimmed down list which I might further trim down if they won't fit in a small backpack.  

Sharing with you my bare minimum list for an emergency backpack:

• Alcohol 
• Candies
• Candle + a box of matches
• Clean Metal Can (dual purpose - for drinking and cooking)
• Compact blanket
• Duct Tape
• Emergency Contact Information
• Extra set of car/home keys
• Face Mask
• First Aid Kit
• First Aid Guide
• Flashlight + batteries
• Food like power bars
• Medications (if any)
• Money - bills and coins
• Paracord
• Pocket Knife or multi-purpose tool
• Pocket Radio + batteries
• Personal Hygiene items
• Protective gear e.g. cap, raincoat
• Small resealable bags 
• Something for inspiration e.g. spiritual items
• Tissue and wipes
• Towel (lightweight)
• Trash bags
• Water
• Whistle

And then for basic supplies that you need to have, Red Cross recommends the following:

For evacuation purposes:

- 3 days' supply of water at 1 gallon per person per day 

- 3 days supply of food e.g. non-perishable, easy-to-prepare items

For the house: 

- 2 weeks' supply of water at 1 gallon per person per day 

- 2 weeks' supply of food e.g. non-perishable, easy-to-prepare items

I know I wouldn't be able to keep myself from digging into the food supplies in some way or the other but this time, I will try hard to replenish after so I don't end up carrying an empty backpack (!) in an emergency situation. 😂   Or maybe, I could schedule reminders when I could dig in - such as before the food items expire! 😜  😂

Best Veggie and Fruit Wash Solutions - Salt Water and Pure Vinegar

I used to wash fruits and veggies by soaking them in diluted vinegar until I read Dr. Greger's book, How Not to Die.  He compared the results of using different solutions to wash vegetables and fruits.

Here are the results:

Using plain water:

Soaking potatoes in water removes between 2% to 13% of pesticide residues

Using diluted vinegar:

Diluted vinegar only seemed marginally better than tap water in removing pesticide residues.

Using 5% acetic acid solution (aka full strength plain white vinegar!):

Using undiluted plain white vinegar removes up to 100% of pesticide residues.

Vinegar (Source)

What's another alternative to pure white vinegar that yields the same effective results and is cheaper? Salt water!  

Using salt water:

A 10% salt solution removes up to 100% of the pesticide residues.  

The indicated time for soaking is between 5 to 20 minutes.

Salt (Source)

So how do you make this best ever veggie and fruit wash?  Mix up about one-part salt to nine-parts water e.g. 1 tbsp salt to 9 tbsp water, 1 cup salt to 9 cups of water.  That easy! :)  Just make sure to rinse the vegetables and fruits thoroughly after soaking them in salt water.

When I went grocery shopping, I couldn't find rock salt in store shelves. There were only iodized salt and table salt.  I googled what kind of salt you can use for cleaning and found out that any salt - rock salt (unrefined salt), table salt (refined salt) and iodized salt can be used for cleaning (excluding Epsom Salt since this has a different composition).   (Source: FoodMatters) 

NutritionFacts.org, which Dr Greger founded, recently published an article that comprehensively talks about this topic including some studies on commercially available fruit and vegetable washes.

So pure white vinegar and salt water are the best vegetable and fruit wash solutions you can use.  Though pure vinegar costs more than salt, pure vinegar is more practical if you want to save on time since it's just soak and rinse. Whereas for salt water, it requires you to follow certain measurements, you need to dissolve the salt first and you need to thoroughly rinse the fruits and vegetables with plain water after soaking since too much salt residue is bad for the health especially if you're prone to UTI.  But either yields the best results so it really just depends on your preference. :)

How to use eggshells and tea leaves to fertilize plants

Wow, it's been more than 2 months since I last posted!  I've been super busy the past couple of months and even if I've wanted to write a lot of things in the past, I had to practice some self-discipline.  I've made a resolution before that when I have very little spare time and it's a choice between blogging and getting enough sleep, sleeping would be my priority. No contest.  Haha...

My blog backlogs have piled up.  I've yet to write about my London adventure in October (before I start forgetting the details) and an unexpected trip to India in November.

Anyway, I'll start with the short and easy backlogs first.

I recently found out from a friend that you could use eggshells and tea leaves as fertilizer.  I regularly consume eggs and drink tea so it's perfect for me. At least they'll serve a better purpose than just throwing them away.

For the eggshells, all you need to do is to crush the eggshells.  The finer/powdery it is, the easier and faster it would decompose.  But if you don't have the time to crush them to a powder form (like me!), it's also ok.  The eggshells would still leach calcium and other nutrients into the soil as they decompose.  

You can can mix the crushed eggshells with the soil or just put the crushed eggshells on top of the soil around the base of the plant to make your plants grow healthy and strong.

For tea leaves, you can just remove the tea bag and add the tea leaves to the soil. Super easy!

My plants do look happy. And one of them just sprouted twins. :)

My friend said he has put a lot of crushed eggshells and tea leaves into the soil and he noticed that the newer baby plants grew faster and are now taller than the older baby plants.  Our conclusion was that with all the crushed eggshells and tea leaves in the pot, it's like the plants are having a buffet everyday.  Haha...

12 bridesmaid gowns and how to let go of items with sentimental value

It's been almost 3 years since I became a minimalist.  

My original plan was get rid of my furniture so I can renovate but when I gave away my furniture, I loved the freed up space and I also realized it's so much easier to clean! Haha... So for almost 3 years now, I only have 1 chair, a small table, a La-Z-boy and a mattress on the floor (plus basic appliances).  This is the reason why I don't invite friends over to my place - they either have to sit on each other's lap or sit on the floor. Haha...

But visiting an Ivatan house during my recent trip to Batanes made me realize that even if I consider myself a minimalist, I still am not compared to the Ivatans.  

Here's inside the Ivatan main house (the kitchen and toilet & bath are independent structures).

It's an open space like my place but look, they only have 3 chests for their personal belongings.

There are 3 people who live in this house - the parents and one child - so I am assuming each one has his/her own chest.  I am definitely far from this - my only stuff that could fit in one chest are my books! Haha...

Anyway, since I did my annual purge, I had to exert more effort this time to shave off more stuff.  

After reading "The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying up: The Japanese Art of Decluttering and Organizing" by Marie Kondo, I was ready to deal with items that have sentimental value like bridesmaid gowns!  I have 12!  Crazy, right?!  It's almost half of Katherine Heigl's in 27 dresses.  Haha...    

So for posterity, I just took photos. Here they are -

These are from weddings of 2 family members, 4 cousins and 6 friends.   I could clearly identify what I wore in 9 of the weddings but there are 3 which I am mixed up (especially the 2 orange ones because they look similar).  Memory lapse. Haha... 

What made it easy to part with them is what Kondo said - what prevents us from parting with things with sentimental value is that we'll lose precious memories along with them but memories don't vanish even if we discard the objects associated with them. Totally agree.  Actually, what's funnier in my case is even if I have kept the physical objects, I still forgot to which weddings 3 gowns are associated with!  I know who the 3 friends are but I can't assign what gown I wore in each of their weddings.  Wahaha....

Clearly, time to let go. Besides, I'm far from walking down the aisle (still missing a groom! Haha...) and I'm far from doing a 27 Dresses' theme wedding because my concept of a wedding is a super small wedding and strictly no gowns (not even a bridal gown), only practical dresses which you can wear again are allowed.  Haha...

If you want to dispose of your old bridesmaid gowns but you don't know anyone with the same body size as you are, you can either donate them to Caritas Manila's Segunda Mana Project or donate them to a random gown rental shop.  Maybe because of your good will, the gown rental shop owner might rent them out for less or even lend them for free to people who can't afford to pay. 

The other stuff I got rid of are trophies from golf tournaments. Years ago, I got into golf and I was really bad at it!  But even then, my friend and I joined tournaments. My friend was really good at it and she usually bagged the championship trophies.  You might be wondering how I got to be runner-up.  It's because there were just 4 female players - which means the 2 other players were worse than me! Wahaha... 

There was also a time when I got the trophy for lowest net.  How? Because I had the highest handicap! Wahaha....  Other than winning trophies, you know what else I won during golf tournaments?  Major prizes like appliances in the raffle. Haha...  

I won't post the photos of the trophies here anymore because they are more of comic relief than symbols of achievement. Haha.... 

Anyway, when de-cluttering and purging, it's important that you overcome your emotional attachment to material possessions.  Once you've overcome your fear of letting go items with sentimental value, streamlining your other possessions should be a breeze.  I was able to fill up 7 more bags of assorted stuff.   But nope, I am still nowhere near the Ivatan chest level. Haha.... :) 

The Japanese Way: 5 New Techniques on how to organize and save space the KonMari method

The Japanese are probably the most efficient when it comes to organization and space use.  When I came across "The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying up:  The Japanese Art of Decluttering and Organizing" by Marie Kondo on Amazon, I got curious and downloaded it on kindle.
 
Here are some of the new things I learned from the KonMari (a combination of the last and first names of the author) method when it comes to organizing and de-cluttering:

1.  When you organize, you have to do it completely in one go because this is when you experience the dramatic transformation of your organized space.  This major transformation has a profound effect on your emotions and mindset that will inspire a strong aversion to reverting to your previously cluttered state. The same impact won't be achieved if the process of tidying up is done gradually.
 
2.  When we store folded clothes, usually they are stacked vertically so the tendency is we often wear whatever's on top.  To avoid this, clothes should be stacked on edge, side by side so that when you pull open your drawer, you can see the edge of every item. And don't worry about wrinkling because the book says that it is not the number of folds that causes wrinkles but the amount of pressure applied on the clothes.

How to fold the clothes?  First, fold each lengthwise side of the garment toward the center (such as the left-hand, then right-hand, sides of a shirt) and tuck the sleeves in to make a long rectangular shape. It doesn’t matter how you fold the sleeves. Next, pick up one short end of the rectangle and fold it toward the other short end. Then fold again, in the same manner, in halves or in thirds. The number of folds should be adjusted so that the folded clothing when standing on edge fits the height of the drawer. 

Source: Pinterest

Vertical is the best orientation when it comes to storage based on the KonMori method.  This applies to not just clothes but also to socks, scarves, stationery supplies, etc. I actually tried organizing most of my stuff vertically and successfully vacated a lot of shelves. :) 

3.  If you love books (like I do!), you know it's hard to part with books.   But here's a nice insight from the author - 

The true purpose of books is to be read and to convey information.  It’s the information they contain that has meaning. There is no meaning in their just being on your shelves. You read books for the experience of reading. Books you have read have already been experienced and their content is inside you, even if you don’t remember. So when deciding which books to keep, forget about whether you think you’ll read it again or whether you’ve mastered what’s inside. Instead, take each book in your hand and decide whether it moves you or not. Keep only those books that will make you happy...the ones that you really love (your Hall of Fame books).

If you have books you intend to read someday but you've never gotten around reading them, it's time to let them go too.  I agree with the author that there's such thing as perfect timing when it comes to books.  She said the moment you first encounter a particular book is the right time to read it. To avoid missing that moment, I recommend that you keep your collection small.  So true! That's why I stopped hoarding physical books during sale even if they are so cheap because some are left unread and forgotten for years!   

Kindle really works for me since I only purchase books one after another (no temptation to hoard), thus, I never miss a moment.  I also technically get to keep all the books I want because they don't occupy physical space. :)

4.  Discarding sentimental items is probably the most difficult task.  Here's something to help you loosen up -

The thought of disposing sparks the fear that we’ll lose precious memories along with them. But you don’t need to worry. Truly precious memories will never vanish even if you discard the objects associated with them. When you think about your future, is it worth keeping mementos of things that you would otherwise forget? We live in the present. No matter how wonderful things used to be, we cannot live in the past. The joy and excitement we feel here and now are more important.

The same goes for letters.  The purpose of a letter is fulfilled the moment it is received. By now, the person who wrote it has long forgotten what he or she wrote and even the letter’s very existence. 

That is so true. I have kept old letters from friends (and vice-versa) and when we talk about their content, neither remembers what we were talking about.  Haha...  But I guess if you really want to keep the letters without occupying too much space, you can always scan them and keep a digital copy.

If you're still not convinced, here's another beautiful insight from the author -

It is not our memories but the person we have become because of those past experiences that we should treasure. This is the lesson these keepsakes teach us when we sort them. The space in which we live should be for the person we are becoming now, not for the person we were in the past.

5.  Are you the type who change office bags regularly?  Try this tip - empty your bag every day.  Find a box and place the items vertically inside it. This way, if you need to remove an item from your bag for the day you won't forget.  And if you don't need all the usual items for a specific day, you don't have to carry excess baggage as well.  I've been practicing this for a week and it does work because I have now become more mindful on what I only need for the day.

One last important thing - the top 2 main causes of clutter are:  (1)  too much effort is required to put things away and (2) it is unclear where things belong.  If we fail in either of these, clutter is likely to come back.  Thus, the key is we need to find a way to reduce the effort to put things away.    (Still working on this one since I am always on clutter rebound and that is why I occasionally read books like this!  Haha...)

De-cluttering and where to donate stuff you no longer use

I've noticed my shelves are getting packed already so it's time to purge and de-clutter.  

Before the purge, it's also important to get in to the right mindset so you'll be more objective and detached as you sift through your items and decide whether to keep or give them away.

So I quickly skimmed through the pages of an old book (which I've had for 10 years already) called "Living the Simple Life" by Elaine St. James.   A perfect read for those who want to scale down - whether you want to free up some physical space in your home or free up some time in your life so you have more energy to do the things that you really want to do. 

Here's how the author puts it -

Source

"Getting rid of clutter is not about letting go of things that are meaningful to you.  It's about letting go of the things that no longer contribute to your life so you have the time and the energy and the space for the things that do."

One of the hardest things when you're de-cluttering is holding on to some things with the thought that we might need them someday.  What happens is we put them in the back shelf and on the next purge, guess what?  They are still there and they still have never been used!

Here's the author's advice:  If you ever find yourself tempted to put on something on the back shelf just because you think that you might need it someday, remember that replacing it (and all the other things on the back shelf you think you might need) is probably a lot easier than maintaining the space required to store it all.  

So keep that in mind the next time you're torn and about to keep something again for future use.  :)

The other 2 books which help me get in to the right de-cluttering mindset are “It’s All Too Much” by Peter Walsh and “The Joy of Less, A Minimalist Living Guide: How to Declutter, Organize, and Simplify Your Life” by Francine Jay.  Here are my favorite guiding principles from these books:

• Just because you have the space doesn’t mean you have to fill it with stuff.

• Everything in your home should have real function or one that you can explain without making excuses.

• When you’re not sure whether to dispose an item or not, ask yourself – Do I use this? Will I use it again? Is it worth the space it takes up?

• If you bought something and regretted getting it, don’t force yourself to use it or keep it. Accept your mistake, sell it, or pass it on to someone else who may find good use of it.

I particularly like the last principle - when we buy something we regret buying, most of the time, we hang on to it especially if it's expensive.  But just like any mistake, we could move on by selling it or passing it on to someone who may have good use for it (instead of the item just gathering dust, left underutilized or worse, left unused inside the shelf).

So after all the de-cluttering, where could you donate your old and excessive stuff?

I recommend Caritas Manila's Segunda Mana Project especially if you have assorted stuff and some of which may not be suitable to give away to beneficiaries (e.g. specialty books, high heels, fashion accessories, winter clothing, home decors, etc.) because the last thing you want to happen is to give away stuff that would also end up as clutter in someone else's home.

How does Caritas Manila's Segunda Mana Project work?   Donated items are sold in Segunda Mana stores.  This way, people who have a real need for the items buy them.    The cash proceeds from the sale of the goods are then used to fund programs of Caritas Manila like educational programs for the youth, health care for the poor and ministry for prisoners. 

How can you donate to Caritas Manila's Segunda Mana project?  It's very easy.  Just contact them and give them your phone number and the address where the goods should be picked up.  They will then advise you when the Segunda Mana truck can pass by your area to pick up the stuff.   On the day of the pick-up, please also prepare an inventory of the items you're donating to save on time so the staff doesn't have to inspect all your items when he issues an acknowledgment receipt.

Here are Segunda Mana's contact details:

DonorCare Team, Caritas Manila
2002 Jesus St., Pandacan, Manila
Email:  donorcarecaritas_manila@yahoo.com
+632 563 9311
+632 564 0205
+63 999 7943455
+63 905 428 5001
+63 929 8343857

If you're based in Makati, there's also a Segunda Mana drop box at the Greenbelt Chapel so you can easily drop off your donations.  However, the drop box has a limited opening so if you're donating big-sized items, breakable items, bulky items or in big volume, better arrange a pick-up with the Segunda Mana office.  But if you're donating small items like books, accessories, a few pairs of shoes or a paper bag of clothes, they should fit in the drop box.

Segunda Mana drop box at the Greenbelt Chapel

De-clutter when you find the time.  It does feel liberating when you have more freed up space and fewer stuff.  :) 

How to remove hardened Mighty Bond or Epoxy from the skin

I was fixing something with Mighty Bond and I accidentally touched the super strength glue.  Uh-oh....

Anyway, hope this doesn't happen to you.  But just in case it does, don't panic because there's an easy solution.  All you need is petroleum jelly and a nail file.  Just rub some petroleum jelly on the affected skin (keep on rubbing until the hardened spot softens - this takes a few minutes), then gently scrape off the glue using a nail file.

Petroleum jelly

Nail file

I actually panicked when it happened. I tried wiping the glue but it ended up spreading on my fingers.  Waaa.... I washed my hands and the glue hardened that I could no longer feel any texture on my fingers.  I reached for my phone to google for a solution but my phone couldn't recognize my Touch ID because my thumb was covered with the hardened glue!  Good thing, I set up my phone to accept an alternative passcode so I was able to quickly google for a quick fix.  (So if you also use Touch ID, make sure you always provision a passcode in case of emergencies like this.). Then I had to quickly walk over to Watson's to buy petroleum jelly and a nail file because I didn't have both at home.  Haha...

And yes, after scraping off all the glue from my fingers, my phone recognised my thumbmark again.  No damage on my skin.  Whew...

How you talk to kids affects their intellectual development

I’m currently reading “How will you measure your life” by Clayton Christensen, a Harvard Business School Professor. Though the title of the book sounds like another self-help book, what sets this book apart is it cites a lot of case studies and scientific research and draws out learnings and correlation to life.

I’m not yet finished reading the book but in the meantime, I wanted to share a very interesting research about how talking to children in the first two and a half years of their lives affects the intellectual capacity of the child. I am not married yet nor a mom but I just thought this is really worth sharing to all the parents out there.

Source: www.freeclipart.com

Based on a research by Todd Risley and Betty Hart, parents speak an average of 1,500 words per hour to their infant children. Talkative parents spoke an average of 2,100 words to their child and parents from less verbal backgrounds spoke only an average of 600 per hour.   If you add that up over the first 30 months, the child of talkative parents heard an estimated 48 million words spoken, compared to the disadvantaged child, who heard only 13 million. The most important time for the children to hear the words, the research suggests, is the first year of life.

The two researchers monitored their subjects as they grew up and found a strong correlation between the number of words the children heard in their first 30 months and their performance on vocabulary and reading comprehension tests as they got older. And it’s not just about the words but “how” the parents spoke to a child which made the most significant effect.

The researchers classified the way parents talk to children into two:

1.  Business language which makes use of straightforward phrases like “Finish your milk”, “Time for a nap”.

2.  Chatty, grown up conversational style (commenting on what the child is doing or what the parent is doing or planning to do) such as “Do you want to wear the blue shirt or red shirt today?”, “Do you think it will rain today?”, “Wouldn’t be nice if …”. 
The researchers concluded the business language had limited effect on cognitive development whereas the conversational style invites the child to think deeply on what is happening around him.  This results to more synaptic pathways in the child’s brain being exercised and refined. Synapses are the junctions in the brain where a signal is transmitted from one never cell to another. The more pathways are created between synapses in the brain, the more efficiently connections are formed, thus, making subsequent thought patterns easier and faster.

Thus, a child who heard 48 million words in the first 3 years won’t just have 3.7 times as many well-lubricated connections in its brain as a child who has heard only 13 million words.

As the author cites, many parents think they can only start focusing on their children’s academic performance when they hit high school. It actually starts in the first 2 1/2 years of the child’s life.

How I ended up buying a La-Z-boy, TopTop Table and Ghost Chair

Sometime in February, I gave away all my furniture - dining set, sofa and my bed frame. I was thinking of repainting and redesigning my place.

In March, while looking for new furniture, I ended up getting a La-Z-boy Rocker Recliner and it's so funny how I ended buying one. I actually placed an order for a dining set already but while waiting for the OR, the sales personnel offered me a seat - a La-Z-boy! To cut the story short, I ended up cancelling the dining set and got a La-Z-boy Rocker Recliner instead. Haha....

I was super happy with my La-Z-boy that I didn't feel the need to buy any other piece of furniture and discarded the thought of repainting. All I needed were a La-Z-boy and a mattress. For 6 months, that's all I had with some appliances, cabinets and shelves.

But in September, I finally decided to get a table and chair while I was doing a case study for a short finance course I took. I just knew I was never going to finish my case study on time without a table and chair because all my reference materials were scattered all over the floor. Haha....

I ended up getting compact and light furniture since I wanted pieces I could easily move around when I clean and that wouldn't take up much space.

I got a white, round TopTop Table (only 27" in diameter!). It's the smallest, sturdy-looking round table I could find. I could use it as a dining cum study table.

And I got a Louis Ghost Chair. Kartell has the 10th year anniversary edition but it sells the same price as the regular model.

The Louis Ghost chair is comfortable to sit on but before buying, I still researched online for reviews to check if it's sturdy enough over prolonged use. Most reviews said the Ghost chair is sturdy and also cited that the material easily scratches but still looks good anyway. Function and form. Philippe Starck's signature style.

What I like most about these two Kartell pieces both designed by Philippe Starck is that they are space-saving. Other than they are compact and lightweight, they are also see-through so they give you an illusion that they don't occupy space. Check out these photos I got online. Aptly named a Ghost Chair. 

Source:  weheart.de

Source:  busybeephilly.com

There are also colored Louis Ghost chairs but I think the classic transparent is still the best. 

Source: ifitshipitshere.blogspot.com

The TopTop table comes in various colors and shapes. But I opted to get the round one since it's more space-saving. The portion of the table that is see-through is the stand. At quick glance, it seems like the table is floating.

Here was Kartell's display window a few months ago where I discovered these furniture pieces.

What happened to my case study? I finally finished it (thanks to my new table and chair!) and I successfully passed the panel defense last week but not without any challenges and comic relief. Imagine, I was scheduled to present at the same time as a tv host for a business show! Cringe. So I made sure I came in early so I could present ahead of the tv host - before he becomes the benchmark! Haha...

The Joy of Less: A Guide on Minimalist Living

I don’t really consider myself a minimalist but I have been consciously trying to keep my stuff within manageable levels.  Since I’ve adopted the philosophy that it’s better to have a few stuff that you really like than have a lot which you don’t actually use,  I’ve freed some space from my shelves and closet.  And when I see my free space is getting smaller, it only means that it’s time to streamline once again.  Haha… 

If you want to take the first step to streamlining your stuff too, the best book I’ve read so far on minimalist living is “The Joy of Less, A Minimalist Living Guide: How to Declutter, Organize, and Simplify Your Life” by Francine Jay. Jay doesn’t just share practical and useful tips but also gives insights on why we sometimes acquire, accumulate or hang on to possessions for the wrong reasons.
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Here are some excerpts:
- “They tell us that more stuff means more happiness, when in fact, more stuff often means more headaches and more debt. The purchase of all this stuff is certainly benefiting someone…but it’s not us.”

- “Truth be told, products will never make us into something we’re not. Designer handbags won’t make us rich, premium lipsticks won’t make us supermodels, and expensive pens won’t make us successful executives. Pricey garden tools won’t give us green thumbs, and high-end cameras won’t turn us into award-winning photographers. Yet we feel compelled to buy, and keep, stuff that holds a promise—to make us happier, prettier, smarter, a better parent or spouse, more loved, more organized or more capable. But consider this: if these things haven’t delivered on their promises yet, it may be time to let them go.”

- “Sometimes we fear that getting rid of certain items is equivalent to getting rid of part of ourselves…. We have to remember that our memories, dreams, and ambitions aren’t contained in these objects; they’re contained in ourselves. We are not what we own; we are what we do, what we think, and who we love. By eliminating the remnants of unloved pastimes, uncompleted endeavors, and unrealized fantasies, we make room for new (and real) possibilities.”

- Ask the following of each potential purchase: “Do you deserve a place in my home?” “What value will you add to my household?” “Will you make my life easier?” “Or are you going to be more trouble than you’re worth?” “Do I have a place to put you?” “Do I already have something that could accomplish the same task?” “Will I want to keep you forever (or at least a very long time)?” “If not, how hard will it be to get rid of you?”

- "If one comes in, one goes out. Every time a new item comes into your home, a similar item must leave. For every drip into the bucket, there must be one drip out."

- "It’s our creativity in the kitchen—not the cookware in our cabinets—that make for delicious, satisfying meals. Good food doesn’t come from fancy plates and fussy serving ware; it comes from the hands and the heart, and—as any Buddhist monk will tell you—can just as well be enjoyed in one simple bowl."

- "If you tried something and didn’t like it, don’t feel obligated to squirrel it away for eternity. Just because you paid “good money” for it, doesn’t mean you have to keep it—or force yourself to use it. Cut your losses, admit your mistake, and pass it along to someone else before it goes to waste."

And here’s my favorite:

“Happiness is wanting what you have. When your wants are satisfied by the things you already have, there’s no need to acquire any more.”