Help a Reader Out — How to Stop Holding Onto Stuff?

by Katy on August 31, 2011 · 75 comments

Yesterday, Naomi, a Non-Consumer Advocate reader posted this question over at the Facebook group:

“While I absolutely believe that less is more, and aspire to a more minimalist approach, the fact that I also like to not purchase stuff means that I tend to hang onto things ‘in case’ they are useful. I end up with piles of shoes that have a little bit more wear left in them, spares for when things do break down, clothes that I mean to get round to altering, and random stuff that was donated by friends who know I am ‘thrifty’. So I end up with more stuff than if I were to just go out and buy new when I needed it. If anyone has any advice on how they deal with this dilemma it would be much appreciated. Thanks.”

Non-Consumer Advocate group members have been putting their two cents in like crazy, but I thought I would open it up to blog readers at large.

I know that I struggle with this as well, although more so in the past than at present. Buying only used and focusing on frugal definitely steers me towards holding onto stuff “just in case.” On the other hand, that “just in case” mentality can lead to a cluttering up a home with piles of unnecessary stuff. (Mind you, my house is still clutter-y, but massively less so than in the past.)

I am lucky enough to live in a big house, which means that I do have room for backup possessions. But that doesn’t mean that I should fill it to the rafters. Just last week I was going through the dresser that my husband and I share. His T-shirt drawer had become so full that it was hard to close. So I dumped everything out onto the bed to discover that my husband was holding onto a dozen or so stained and paint encrusted T-shirts for when he’s working on the house. So I asked him:

“Do you really think that you’ll be in a situation where you’re going to work on the house 12 days in a row without the option of doing laundry?”

Saying this out loud made my husband realize that it was not necessary to keep these shirts just in case. And now, there are a perfect number of shirts in the drawer, which opens and closes with ease.

What advice do you have for Naomi? How do you address the issue of holding onto stuff “just in case?”

Katy Wolk-Stanley

“Use it up, wear it out, make it do or do without”

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The Daily-Ness of Non-Consumerism

by Katy on August 30, 2011 · 8 comments

Living a non-consumer life has a rhythm neither rising too high nor lowering too far. I putter around the house, find free entertainment and activities and slowly but surely try to sell my unneeded possessions to the highest bidder.

And yes, I occasionally go to work.

So when I had a brief but dramatic kitchen fire yesterday, (I had let the olive oil get too hot, so when I added the frozen chicken breasts, flames suddenly and quite dramatically leaped up at least 2-1/2 feet in the air. Luckily, I had a tempered glass lid at the reach, which quickly extinguished the flames.) I did not pick up the phone and order pizza. I let the pan cool down and continued on with preparing the pesto with chicken for the six hungry mouths that congregated at my dinner table.

And when my son and his friend got bored, I took everyone to the nearby arcade. This was a frugal choice, as they send out free passes, which include $4 apiece in nickels to play the games. And as always, I admonished the boys to “make these last!”

We didn’t go see any movies, we didn’t eat out, we didn’t pay for anything.

Just another day in non-consumer land.

My poor, poor children.

Katy Wolk-Stanley

“Use it up, wear it out, make it do or do without”

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The Mini-Economy of a Neighborhood

by Katy on August 29, 2011 · 24 comments

You feed my cat, I’ll feed yours.

I live in a great neighborhood. It’s walkable to important services like microbrew movie theaters, the library and schwanky grocery stores like New Season’s Market. (Where I scared the clerk yesterday by making a weird gurgle-y sound when my head of garlic rang up at the exorbitant price of $1.80.) But aside from all this retail frippery, my neighborhood is chock filled with great people. Young families, older families, retirees, singletons, we’ve got it all.

And best of all, my neighbors and I all frequently exchange goods and services. Not in any official manner, that requires keeping track of who did what for whom. But in a casual and easy style that fits naturally to each of us. I guess you could say that we’ve created our own mini-economy. 

I borrow your patio table when hosting a barbecue, and then I feed your cats when you visit your parents. You lend me an extra bicycle when I have a foreign exchange student, and then I water your plants while you hit up the beach during a hot spell. Everyone knows that my house is your go-to source for ladders, and that our mini-van can be borrowed to pick up large craigslist finds. And my next-door-neighbors’ kiddie wagon? It’s perfect for taking returnable beer bottles back to the store.

Not only does this culture of sharing save us a ton of money and storage space, (imagine if we all had to own our own wheelbarrows, ladders and onions!) but there’s a certain comfort in knowing that we’re all in it together.

J.D. Roth from Get Rich Slowly posted a column about what he terms “Social Capital.”   You help others, they help you. Essentially the same thing, although going beyond the immediate neighbors.

Whatever you choose to call it, making your stuff and efforts available to your friends and neighbors can only serve to strengthen your community. Which is the kind of economy I am happy to fully participate in.

Is your neighborhood participating in its own mini-economy? Please share your thoughts in the comments section below.

Katy Wolk-Stanley

“Use it up, wear it out, make it do or do without”

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Spinning My Wheels While Acheiving my Big Picture Goals

by Katy on August 28, 2011 · 12 comments

Sometimes I feel like I’m spinning my wheels. Like Sisyphus, my to-do list fills with tasks that have to be repeated on a daily basis, and I never pull ahead. Wash laundry, hang dry the laundry, put away laundry, make dinner, clean up from dinner. You get the drift. So I try to accomplish something, heck anything on a daily basis that pulls me forward towards the grand goal of being completely on top of my life.

You know, the house completely organized, all my work commitments met, a full and satisfying social life and thousands upon thousands of extra dollars leftover at the end of each and every month.

Laugh if you will, but I feel like goals cannot be reached unless you actually reach for them. Like I try to explain to my sons, there’s no way you can get an “A” in school if you’re only trying for a “B.”

This may make me sound like an insufferable perfectionist, but I assure you that I am far from this category. My built-in buffet resembles a sculpture made from unrelated items, and it was a bad day when I discovered that my piano bench was a flat horizontal surface.

“What, I can clear the dining room table for dinner by piling everything onto the piano bench? Genius, pure genius!”

And before you start noting that the bulk of the household chores seem to be resting on my supposedly feminist shoulders, please note that my husband and I have an unwritten rule that whichever of us is working that day gets a break from household drudgery. Which means that I get two days a week off, and he gets the rest.

We are currently hosting a Japanese exchange student for a couple of weeks, which means that we are on our best behavior. We’re shutting the bathroom room when in use, abstaining from yelling at each other and cleaning up the dinner dishes directly after the meal. For other families this might not be a change from routine, but for us it is. However, I feel like I am so busy with the daily tasks of life and playing tour guide to my city, that I am not working on the big picture stuff that keeps me from feeling like I’m spinning my wheels. 

So last night I actually made a mental list of my accomplishments for the day:

  • Hosted a Japanese exchange student, which gives my younger son much needed opportunity to practice his Japanese.
  • Did earn a $120 “stipend” per week of hosting, which has already been deposited into my sons’ Japan trip savings accounts. (One son will go to Japan in the spring for two weeks, while the other will go for five weeks in the summer. *Gulp*)
  • With the help of my husband, I rolled out our old and somewhat rusty propane barbecue to the curb with a “Free” sign on it. It was gone within five minutes!
  • I gave the silverware drawer a much needed wipe down and organization while chatting with my husband in the kitchen.

This list may not seem impressive to the perpetually productive among you, but since I also took everyone to the zoo, provided transport service to my older son for work, made and then cleaned up from dinner, (yakisoba noodles with smoked pork, broccoli, carrots, cauliflower and snow peas) completed a laundry cycle, (wash, hang dry, put away) watered both own and neighbor’s plants and wrote a blog post.

Just the tiny accomplishments of organizing a drawer and getting rid of the barbecue support my goals of an uncluttered home. Which moved me one teeny-tiny step towards my goal of being completely on top of my life.

Hey, I can’t achieve it unless I reach for it. Right?

Now, about that piano bench . . .

Katy Wolk-Stanley

“Use it up, wear it out, make it do or do without”

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The Food Scavenger Strikes Again

by Katy on August 27, 2011 · 10 comments

Note the two types of pasta? The last tenant at my mother's rental cottage left behind two half-used boxes of pasta, (penne and lasagna) so I brought them home and combined the two. Sure, I had to break the lasagna noodles into pieces, but it was well worth the effort. 40% of food is wasted in the U.S. You too can make a pledge to cut food waste in your household. Join the "Waste No Food Challenge" today and say goodbye to filling your bin with perfectly good foodstuff.

Katy Wolk-Stanley

“Use it up, wear it out, make it do or do without”

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School Supplies — Don’t Buy, Use What You Already Have

by Katy on August 26, 2011 · 21 comments

Why buy new?

It’s school supply time and despite the glossy ads featuring pretty new pens, pencils, binders, scissors and whatnot, it’s actually okay to *gasp* reuse the stuff you already have. That’s right, fellow non-consumers, last year’s scissors will still work this year, and that slightly used pencil can be resharpened. And that grubby binder? Try giving it a scrub and laying it out in the sun to dry. You’ll be surprised how fresh it can look.

Sure, there are some school supplies that do have to be bought new such as 3-ring notebook paper and boxes of Kleenex, (Umm . . .  not sure how you would buy used Kleenex.) But I’m usually able to get away with only buying a couple of things for back-to-school.

So dump out and organize your pens, pencils, scissors and general office-y mayhem; scrub out your binders, backpacks and winter coats and make do with what you already have. You’ve already paid for it, it’s already been manufactured and any excessive packaging has already happened.

It’s one of those win-win situations. It’s sustainable and will save you money. And you don’t have to be a member of The buy-nothing-new Compact to make these decisions.

So happy shopping . . . from your own stash!

Katy Wolk-Stanley

“Use it up, wear it out, make it do or do without”

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Everything Else is Just Stuff

by Katy on August 25, 2011 · 13 comments

An story about the all engulfing fire of billionaire Richard Branson’s Caribbean home caught my eye this morning. In the article, actress Kate Winslet is quoted as saying:

“I will never forget Richard placing his arms around both my children as we were watching the flames, and saying, ‘At the end of the day, what you realise is that all that matters is the people that you love. Everything else is just stuff. And none of that stuff matters.’ ”

That’s right, Everything else is just stuff.

From a billionaire’s mouth to your ears.

Katy Wolk-Stanley

“Use it up, wear it out, make it do or do without”

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What Would YOU Do With a Month Off?

by Katy on August 24, 2011 · 24 comments

I wrote yesterday about how a change up in scheduling at work has meant that I am only scheduled to work two eight hour shifts over the next month. (I normally work two shifts per week.) Sure, I could put the word out among my co-workers that I’m looking to pick up shifts, but instead I welcome the opportunity to take a break from my job as a labor and delivery nurse. I also plan on challenging myself to make an extra thousand dollars reselling stuff and doing side work. (Although I will lose out on more than a thousand dollars, but money is not my main motivator in life.)

During my month off, I would like to see myself finishing a few household projects, such as getting our bedroom in order, (it has become a catch-all for crap) and repainting the living room. I also want to put a focused effort into my writing and work on an eBook. I’m also looking forward to restarting a routine of going for daily walks and getting together with friends.

Which brings me to this question:

What would you do if you had a month off from work? Do you have projects to tackle? Friendships to rekindle? Naps to take?

Please share your thoughts in the comments section below.

Katy Wolk-Stanley

“Use it up, wear it out, make it do or do without”

 

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Non-Consumer Mish-Mash — Bedrooms, Money Makers and Productivity

by Katy on August 22, 2011 · 20 comments

It’s time for Non-Consumer Mish-Mash, where I write a little bit about this and a little but about that.

Where Children Sleep

The NY Times blog recently ran an extremely moving photo essay and review of James Mollison’s book Where Children Sleep, which chronicles the bedrooms of children throughout the world. From the opulence of a preschooler’s beauty queen bedroom, to a seven-year-old strip miner’s one-bedroom house in Nepal, these masterful photos will challenge any preconceived notions you may be harboring of children’s wants versus needs.

Click HERE to read the book review and look through the photo essay. I highly recommend that you click on the full screen option.

My Thousand Dollar Goal

I somehow ended up with only two eight hour shifts over the next four weeks, as opposed to the regular eight that I would work. (I try to work two eight hour shifts per week in my job as a labor and delivery nurse.) And instead of wailing and moaning over this circumstance, I’m actually kind of excited to figure out some alternate income during this time period. I have decided to see if I can make an extra thousand dollars from all my various sidelines.

Here’s how I think I’ll work to make my money:

  • Sell various items on eBay, such as some vintage Tonka trucks I recently picked up for $1 apiece at a garage sale, as well as some older Macintosh programming disks.
  • Make myself available to help my mother clean out her rental cottages.
  • Sell a cool, but unused vintage tandem bicycle that’s sitting in my basement.
  • Make ourselves available to do short term foreign exchange student hosting. (We’re currently hosting a Japanese teenager, which pays $120 per week.)
  • Take a box of books that I set aside last month to sell over at Powell’s bookstore.
  • Start researching how to write and publish my own eBook.
  • Continue to keep an eye out for Goodwill bargains that I can turn around for a profit on eBay or Craigslist.

I think I should be able to cobble together enough money to get through this time without feeling the pinch. And frankly, I’m kind of excited to essentially have a month off from work. And you know me — I like a challenge!

My Patent Pending Productivity System

I recently found myself in the rare situation of being all by my lonesome in the house, and my first temptation was to flop in front of the TV and enjoy hour after hour of delicious Mad Men on Netflix. Unfortunately, I had a house chock full of unpleasant chores vying for my attention, so I chose to implement a productivity system that I dubbed:

Three Hateful Chores and a Treat.

  1. Put laundry in the wash.
  2. Unload dishwasher and dish drain.
  3. Scoop litter boxes.
  4. Mad Men

And then . . .

  1. Vacuum out the crap from the heat registers.
  2. Hang laundry.
  3. Tidy entryway and coat closet.
  4. Mad Men.

It was amazing how much I was able to get a fair amount done in the house, while also making sure to give time to my old pal, Don Draper. I will definitely be employing this tactic in the not so distant future. It was awesome!

Katy Wolk-Stanley

“Use it up, wear it out, make it do or do without”

 

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The Mysterious Adventures a 26-Year-Old Wallet

by Katy on August 21, 2011 · 19 comments

 

 

Like bumper stickers on the back of a car, one can usually tell a fair amount about a person by the possessions they choose to carry around.  High heeled shoes and a tall venti latté, or Birkenstocks and a mason jar of yerba maté? Whether we like to admit it or not, we are at least somewhat defined by our possessions.

I recently had a time capsule of my fifteen-year-old self enter back into my life in the form of a lost wallet. This 26-year-old relic arrived at my father’s house on Christmas Eve and was handed to me as a gift.

The wallet included an anonymous letter, written in a handwriting not usually found with those under the age of seventy, which read:

Dear Mr. Wolk:

I believe this wallet belongs to your daughter Katherine Wolk-Stanley — I found it on the Burnside Bridge many, many years ago. I recently found it in a drawer that I was cleaning — I had always meant to return it but had neglected to send it to you. I apologize to your daughter. Please see that she receives this —

Thank you

I have no memory whatsoever of losing my wallet in 1983, and I certainly don’t remember having one stolen, but the evidence outweighs my shoddy memory.

But one thing is clear, 15-year-old Katy is a lot different than 42-year-old Katy.

Let’s start with the wallet itself, which is made from a traditional Guatemalan huipil. The signature, nee stereotypical wallet of hippies worldwide. This is not a wallet I would carry anymore, and I’m surprised I had one to begin with.

The wallet contained:

  • One tenth grade student ID

  • Two house keys, one of which was bent by the psychic Uri Geller, but still continues to function.

  • A magazine photo of a girl looking off in the distance and superimposed with her grinning wildly at the camera. Was this some kind of inspiration to me in 1983?!

  • A school picture of my Amanda.

  • Two fortunes from Chinese fortune cookies. They read:

  • “You will do to expand your business”

  • “Genius does what it must, and talent does what it can.”

  • A slip of paper that reads, “Deposito por Envases, ¢1200 Montelimar.” (I spent the summer of 1983 in Costa Rica on an exchange program.)

  • A note on 3 X 5 card that reads, “Please excuse Katy Wolk-Stanley for missing school on Friday — she was with her sister who had just graduated from High School — Tony Wolk.”

  • A calling card from “Elaine Lustig G.”

  • My mother’s business card from the Oregon Journal as an “Entertainment Writer.”

  • Two youth membership cards from The Jewish Community Center.

  • A receipt from the “Banco Nacional de Costa Rica.”

  • Two receipts for traveler’s checks.

  • Two bus passes for March and May of 1983. (What, no April?)

  • A credit union withdrawal voucher for $30.

  • A Multnomah County Library card with an expiration date of September 7, 1977.

  • One Canadian 1979 quarter  and a 1995 nickel.

  • A 2003 five dollar bill and a 2006 one dollar bill.

This wallet was a criminal’s dream. Not only did it contain my father’s address, but it also held still-working keys to his house. It also had the number of a credit union account that I used until just a few years ago.

I don’t believe for a minute that this wallet was “found on the Burnside Bridge” and then put aside for 26 years. My theory is that someone either stole it and is now making amends, (hence the post 1983 cash) or that someone found a stash of wallets from a son or grandson and is trying to reunite them with their original owners.

Despite the creepiness of having a wallet anonymously mailed to me, I actually like the snapshot of my 15-year-old self. A girl who traveled, exchanged currency, visited the J.C.C. and still got her dad to write excuses for school absences. (Although I apparently didn’t turn them in!) I even enjoy the bizarrely flat affect of my school I.D. and especially enjoy my childhood library card.

My 42-year-old lady wallet is much more serious, filled with work related licenses, a debit card, credit cards, gift cards and such. It may not have been an official time capsule, but it’s awakening the fifteen-year-old-girl inside of me.

Katy Wolk-Stanley

“Use it up, wear it out, make it do or do without.”

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