I’m blessed with many many years of my father not being able to handle the sight of clutter. While his anti-clutter rants drove me bonkers in high school (and got my room “shitcanned” by him on multiple occasions) it forced me to learn how to declutter. (Ironically, he taught me too well — as I got older he’d start going through the trash and questioning whether I really wanted to throw out stuff that he assumed had sentimental value to me — or four-inch long pencils. Man has a pencil problem.)

One of the interesting things about decluttering for me is that I’ve learned my triggers… which include Christmas in a big way.

1. I don’t really have decorations in my house year-round because you need to dust them. Having decorations all over the place drives me batty. On the other hand, not-decorating drives me battier.
2. There’s a tree in the middle of my livingroom. Fine. It’s now surrounded by a two-foot-tall wall of clutter. Not fine!
3. Good gifts usually mean I don’t need some of the old crap sitting around my house that I was too lazy/cheap to replace/throw out previously.

The end sum is a bad case of “Where’d my livingroom go?”

Add to that the fact that I gained three (whoo!) new kitchen appliances this holiday season as well as an AWESOME set of new silicone baking stuff and there’s no room in the kitchen and I’ve got a decluttering problem to solve.

Fortunately, it’s Thursday and I’m still off until Tuesday. Hello, shitcan.

43 Folders has a great post up right now that a) covers what to do with all those books and b) gives links to a full series of posts on decluttering your space. I recommend it.

There’s not much more satisfying than starting the year with a clean house.