Frugal Zeitgeist: Decluttering and Closets

As usual, I'm right in the zeitgeist, along with everyone else. I spent a hard day reorganizing a closet (Mr. FS's, still not done). Like everyone else, we have too much stuff. We live in an old house with very paltry storage space. Even so, we have too much stuff. Thank HEavens for tiny closets, I say. Big closets would just attract more stuff.

Anyway, I seem to be in synch with everyone else. According to the Wall Street Journal, Baby Boomers are trying to unload their household goods and there aren't too many takers. The couple profiled has more and fancier stuff than I do. It's good to know that we can upgrade if we so desire, but I confess I love my scruffy stuff.

One motivator to declutter all by yourself comes from contemplating what it would cost to hire someone to help you. Similarly, fantasies of closet renovation are dashed when you consider the likely price tag. Once again, the Wall Street Journal has just the article you need.

I save the cost of a professional organizer by consulting my hero, Don Aslett.

What's your best motivator?

Frugal Cleaning Products

As always, I am inspired by Funny About Money, fave blogger, who put together a post on frugal and green cleaning supplies. Anyone who knows me is rolling on the floor laughing at the thought of my expertise in anything domestic: I am probably in the bottom 1% of the population in terms of housekeeping skills.

Still, no one would deny my reading skills. And it was a happy day when I discovered Don Aslett, cleaning expert and scourge of clutter. I find his books real motivators. Nothing like owning a cleaning service (as Don does) to make you see the true cost of clutter.

Don is also a wonderful writer. He has zillions of books now. In fact, my one gripe with him is that his numerous books (many on overlapping topics) constitute a kind of clutter in themselves. His two greatest are

From the first you learn to de-clutter. From the second, you learn how to clean. Don says you only need three products, all of which can be bought as concentrates and diluted.

He even sells the products on-line. Usually, I don't trust such products, but so great is my love of and trust in Don that I WOULD buy one of his cleaning kits. However, Mr. FS pointed out that you could get the same cleaners at Home Depot. Here is his Green Cleaning Kit (around $45):

* 1 Quart Foam N Flush
* 1 Quart Tub N Tile
* 1 Tub N Tile Spray Bottle
* 1 Quart Max Clean
* 1 Max Clean Spray Bottle
* 3-pack Window Cleaner
* Window Cleaner Spray Bottle
* Toilet Bowl Caddy - holds Foam N Flush & Johnny Mop
* 1 Johnny Mop
* 1 Shaw';s Pad
* 1 Grout Brush
* 2 Multipurpose Microfiber Towels
* 1 Large White Scrubber
* 1 Ready-to-Use X-O+
* Cleaning Caddy


Check out his mini-essays too.

I spend a lot of time reading, including much that is obscure and high brow. But there is a place on my shelf for Don Aslett. His books have probably done as much to enrich my life as The Elements of Style.

Warm Baths and Downy Beds

You can probably surmise from the title that I am thinking about the cold weather, which has traveled to my area. It seems unlikely that anyone would disagree that "warm baths and downy beds" are the best antidote to cold weather, especially the downy beds.

Yet someone has. Yes. The Wall Street Journal ran a column in which their style editor urged us to get rid of the down comforters and re-learn hospital corners and tightly made up beds. Why is the writer against down? Because it looks "messy" and because it's "hot." Commenters rightly pointed out that if you are hot under your comforter, turn down the heat and save the planet (a little). As for "messy"--who's coming in your bedroom to inspect it anyway?

My mother was born in Vienna and so I brought down comforters into my marriage. The acrylic blankets and foam pillows of Mr. FS's childhood were no match for the cozy comforters and feather pillows of mine.

In the 60s or 70s, down comforters were brought to US consciousness by--I think--Terence Conran, who brought style to the masses. I remember seeing ads titled "the 30 second bed" showing that you could shake your comforter and lay it on the bed. Who cares if it's lumpy?

I notice that the controversial article on down was published in early January. I hope people weren't too quick to donate their down comforters before the cold winds blew in.

While I haven't weighed in on the ridiculous "Tiger Mother" "controversy" (engineered by the media, no?), I feel that the down comforter controversy is too important. So I have spoken out.

By the way, the title of the post comes from a translation of Homer's Odyssey. Alcinous, ruler of Scheria, kind of an earthly paradise where Odysseus washes up, says this:

we set great store by feasting, harpers, and the grace of dancing choirs, changes of dress, warm baths and downy beds

Are you a down lover? How are you keeping warm?

A Wonderful Decluttering and Organizing Tool: Flocked Hangers with Hooks

Another post that sounds like an infomercial. I suppose you all have those flocked hangers, right? The ones that don't let clothes slip off? I was late to the party on these, because they were kind of expensive in their first incarnation: eventually, I bought a set at Bed Bath and Beyond (not a store I like, particularly), then some at Big Lots, and then at Dollar Tree.

These hangers--aside from keeping things from slipping off--supposedly let you get more in your closet because they are "slim" as opposed to "fat" like regular hangers. More closet space may be a mixed blessing. When I moved to the basement as a teenager, my parents (shopaholic mom, packrat dad) took over my closet. Then, when I left for good, they took over the basement closet too. The walk-in bedroom closet in my mother's condo is bigger than all my closets put together. I think that big closets encourage you to fill them up, hence my feeling that they are a mixed blessing.

Still, my current closet is small: I have a single 50 inch hanging rod--for everything. Then I get a share of a 36 inch hanging rod that needs to accommodate all our outerwear.

So usually we have some kind of closet crisis going on, the most recent precipitated by Lucy's return from college and the return of the items she borrowed from me. Plus, anyone who is a teacher knows that your summer vacation is when you do all the tasks you couldn't get around to all year (because you spend your weekends and evenings prepping and/or grading).

On our way to the airport to pick up Frugal Son, we stopped at Bed Bath and Beyond, so I could get another pack of hangers, meant to be split with Lucy M, who has an aversion to tubular hangers. Well! BBB has a new kind of flocked hanger, with a hook, so you can cascade your items.

This is good not only because it gives you more room, but also because, if you cascade with any degree of organization, you will see how many you have of certain things. So: no more black cardigans. No more black tee shirts. I have three nice red tops, but perhaps should only keep the two best.

Many (most?) American women have the problem of buying the same thing over and over. We all vow to be "French-" or "European-" style shoppers, who buy only a few items per year. Somehow, most of us never do it. I'm as bad as the next person. Nay worse, given the example of my parents. If I buy less than my peers, it's probably because I am a total cheapwad, because the selection of acceptable-to-me items at my chosen shopping venues is necessarily limited, and because I have a closet rod of only a little over 4 feet.

OK. Here is the link to the Bed, Bath, and Beyond hangers I bought. If you really want to waste your day, you can watch the little video. I swear I do not have any stock in BBB. But I do wish I had bought Talbots stock when I wrote about it: it was $1.60. I would have almost octupled my investment.

In the Pantry with Mr. FS: The Dark Forest

Nel mezzo del cammin di nostra vita
mi ritrovai per una selva oscura,
ché la diritta via era smarrita.

Oh, those beautiful first lines of Dante's Inferno.

Now in the middle of our life
I awoke in a dark forest
For the straight path had been lost.

To go from the mountain that is Dante to the molehill that is my life (OUR life, which we are in the middle of) is to go from the lofty thoughts with which I should be occupying myself to the selva oscura that is my pantry.

Mr. FS has taken it upon himself to reorganize what is a medium-sized, misshapen closet. When we moved into our house, the pantry was empty, and truly we had hardly anything to put in it. Fast forward to now and there is food of all sorts, cookbooks of the second rank, and Mr. FS's household tools. Oh yeah, and brooms. And work clothes (not for me, for Mr. FS).

I'm trying to avert my gaze. I did notice some Crosse and Blackwell mincemeat that I bought for a quarter several years ago. And some tea that a student gave me. And some English pudding given to me by--this is true--a cross-dressed attendee at a library program on Queen Elizabeth I that I led with a colleague. (This is funny because Queen Elizabeth herself was noted for her genderbending strategies.) Easy enough to throw the expired mincemeat in the trash. Not so easy to trash the sundried tomato relish that MUST be outdated because I can't even remember where I got it. Mr. FS said he threw several things out. He won't tell me what, however.

Mr. FS made some new shelves that will hold dishpans--the kind you get for $1.00. These are the cheapest organizing equipment. They will be labeled by cuisine, type of cooking, type of food: Mexican, Asian, tuna, baking needs, and so on. We had done this earlier, but with the passage of time, the tuna ended up under something else, and the old, should-be-thrown-out food was hidden behind the newer stuff.

Don't I sound reasonable? Like Dante, who travelled for a while with his beloved Virgil, reason is what you need for your journey through the dark places--like pantries.

But then I come to my cookbooks. Reason wavers. To turn to another mountain, John Donne, we learn

Reason, your viceroy in me, me should defend,
But is captived, and proves weak or untrue.

Donne is talking about admitting God into his life; I, in the molehill version, am trying to restore (let's be honest, initiate) order in a pantry.

Has everyone else finished spring cleaning? I will post updates on my journey through the pantry.

Hanging Laundry with Funny and Lillian

Funny About Money wrote a paean to hanging laundry. She correctly realized that the practice is valuable not for the tiny amount of money it saves, but for the priceless stress-relief it provides. I hang laundry now and again, but, living in a high humidity environment means that sometimes items NEVER get dry. When I visit in-laws in California, I delight in hanging laundry. Even wool sweaters dry as if by magic. My in-laws, not fully appreciating the low humidity, do not engage in the practice.

I recall a description of hanging laundry in an even higher humidity place: the Hebrides. There is a wonderful series of books by Lillian Beckwith about her life in the Hebrides, where she went to rest on doctor's orders. I can't locate the exact part I remember, which is about hanging laundry in an environment of almost constant rains, resulting in continual re-rinsing and sun-bleaching of linens until the blessed moment when one can take in the laundry.

The following passage is from Bruach Blend, not the one I am thinking of, but pretty close:


The earth dykes around my croft were draped with sheets bleaching in the sun; newly washed blankets hung from the clothes rope where they responded to the caress of the breeze which, as it dried them, teased their fibres into downy softness and filled them with the good fresh smell of pure Highland air.

Perhaps because sunshine is scarcer in the Hebrides we tended to assess its qualities seriously. Thus May was traditionally the best month for bleaching and blanket washing. The hot summer sun, if and when it came, was welcome for drying the peats, but it turned woollen blankets yellow and hurried the drying of linen. To bleach successfully one needed the slow-drying, spring sunshine. A sheet put out to bleach in June or July would need to be sluiced frequently with clean water to ensure it did not dry too quickly, and as clean water had to be carried from the well it was far too precious a commodity for such ministrations. So we made the most of any good May weather, leaving the spread sheets out over several days and nights to be soaked repeatedly by the abundant May dew and subsequently dried by its benign sunshine. When the time came to gather them in, even the most obstinate stains had disappeared and the sheets were almost eye-dazzling in their whiteness.

Such knowledge I had of course acquired since living and working with the Bruach crofters, for once they realized I was in earnest they were eager enough to teach me not just the essentials I needed to know and practise to survive the crofting life but the simpler more esoteric crofting lore.

I highly recommend Beckwith's books, which are in the genre of city-lady-goes-to-country-and-falls in love with place-and writes about it. Is there a better name for the genre?

What are your small stress relievers of the frugal variety?

P.S. I just checked Amazon and the Beckwith books are in print once more: Try Hills Is Lonely">.

Decluttering: Abundance and Memories

It's getting to be spring, plus my mother will be visiting in a week or so. Time to declutter.

I live in a little house that is almost 100 years old. There's little storage space and what there is is ad hoc. Not only do I not have a linen closet, but I don't have a real laundry area. The washer and dryer are in a small closet off a hallway. My linen storage is above, on shelves. It's a good thing I don't iron, because there's no place to do it.

Experts say to start with what bothers you the most. Because my house is small and I have so little storage space, things reach a critical mass with unsurprising regularity. Well, the laundry area has gotten so bad that I had to avert my gaze.

Mr. FS built a small storage area off a little building in our yard. It used to be a kindergarten. Mr. FS has claimed that as his study. He says the storage area is mine, however.

One rule of organizing is to only have things you use regularly in prime space. Well, all the storage in my house is "prime," owing to its scarcity. So I now have boxes to go in the storage shed.

Even though the process is a painful one for a clutterbug like me, I had an emotional afternoon. There were the tin soldier quilt covers my kids used; there was the beautiful baby quilt my old friend made for my son; there were the dancing duck pillow cases my son loved; there was the Japanese shibori fabric I bought at a fundraiser before Katrina that was donated by neat people who moved away; there was the old table cloth from the 40s that I bought at a yard sale when I was in graduate school; there were the toile sheets with hidden cherubs that fascinated my children when they were little. There was the Marimekko fabric I bought in Finland when I was 18 (shout out to Metscan). For a few years, it served to hide my doorless closet in college. That's just for openers.

I hope you don't think I'm getting rid of any of this. I see though that I won't need to acquire anything for a while. What wonderful things I found!

P.S. I did find a few things to donate.

Too Much Dishwashing Detergent Is Bad for Your Machine

First, it was the Wall Street Journal on laundry detergent. Now the venerable New York Times has spoken. We are using too much dishwasher detergent, which messes up the machine, necessitating expensive repairs. Ditto for dryer sheets in the dryer. Ditto (as we've already figured) for laundry detergent.

An expert--someone who does repairs and hence does not benefit from your detergent use--suggests we use between 8 and 10 times too much! That would mean--for laundry detergent--that my 3 bottles of generic purchased for $1.50 each, would provide not 50 loads as promised, but at least 400. I guess I'm set for a while.

Ah, and note to Mr. FS who is obsessed with saving water: You are NOT supposed to rinse dishes before putting in dishwasher. That is an order, backed up by scientific fact.

Who Cares What It's Called

A Happy Lundi Gras to all


My second post with a "Who Cares" title. Perhaps this will be a series. A while back, Funny About Money was passing on various frugal household tips, some of which had to do with dish towels and napkins. In the safety of the comment section, I confessed. As a child, I hated napkins and used the nice big terry dish towels. My mother "allowed" me to do this and even told others about my peculiar predilection.

Fast forward to adulthood. As the boss of certain aspects of my household, I have declared dish towels the required napkin for the whole family. Why use skimpy cloth napkins that require ironing and look bad after a few washes when you can luxuriate with a large towel that always looks nice? Who cares that it's called a dish towel? I mentioned that I had come out of the (linen) closet on this domestic issue.

However, I know that some would be repulsed by this, so we do keep a small stash of paper napkins for guests. It's hard to go against convention. And my convictions waver at times.

We have had some terrible cold spells this winter. So I thought about getting wool long underwear. Those babies are expensive! Then I remembered that I had a pair of Eileen Fisher wool knit pants. I bought these at a very upscale consignment shop in Wellesley MA, as we waited for my mother to emerge from her high school reunion. The pant were 80% off ($6.00) and I bought them to test run the famous Eileen Fisher waist band for the middle-aged.

Who cares if I'm wearing Eileen Fisher pants as long underwear or even pajamas? They go just fine with the thrifted cashmere sweaters I already wear around the house when it's cold.

But, of course, often people DO care. I was invited to a baby shower for an adopting single mother a few years ago. I did not have baby shower wrapping paper, but, since the mom is Jewish, I used some Chanukah paper that I did have. The baby was still in Guatemala at that point and I'm sure she didn't care. But the mom did care. Every other gift was wrapped in pink paper and most of the invitees were also in pink (I didn't know this was a custom). When I handed over the gift, the mom started laughing and showed the paper to various people. I was embarrassed at further consolidating my reputation for awkward eccentricity.

Do you have any "Who cares what it's called?" habits? Have you ever offended anyone?

Frugal Laundry Detergent: A Quarter Teaspoon or Even None?

The intrepid Funny About Money rose to the challenge and undertook the detergent-free experiment. I didn't trust myself to do it. Since my housekeeping standards are very low, I don't expect anyone to agree with my conclusions. Funny, I'm sure, is more reliable.

So if it's true that you need--at most--a tiny bit of laundry detergent, that means that detergent is not a huge household expense. I myself buy--perhaps this should now be in the past tense--the cheapest generic stuff when it is Buy One-Get One. That brings it to about 3 cents/load. And, since, owing to my soft water, I always used half the recommended amount, that gets the per load cost down to 1.5 cents.

With this cost, even if I did one load of laundry a day, I would be spending about $5.00/year on detergent. Hence, though I was philosophically attracted to the idea of making my own detergent (which was ALL OVER the FRUGALITY internet sites last year), I didn't see much point in doing it.

The height of my laundry responsibilities came around 18 years ago, when I had TWO children in cloth diapers. During those halcyon days (I'm not kidding. I loved washing diapers), I used a few more bottles of detergent a year, along with a few containers of bleach.

But what if we all stopped using so much detergent? First of all, we would be doing the environment a big favor. Detergent is not good for our waterways.

Second, we would save money, which we could put toward ...well, whatever we wanted.

Third, we could stop clipping coupons for detergent.

Fourth, we could do our wash even if we had run out of detergent, saving time and gasoline, since we wouldn't have to run to the store.

The only bad thing I can think of would be the horrified looks of your relatives, co-workers, and friends; they might recoil in horror, assuming that you were germ-laden and probably contagious. Then again, maybe that's not a bad thing.

Has anyone else taken the no or low detergent pledge?

Could It Be True? You Don't Even Need Laundry Detergent

Hot off the Wall Street Journal presses: Americans use way too much detergent, which makes their clothes dingy and causes problems for the machines.

The finale of this article is this shocker: Seventh Generation's co-founder, Jeffrey Hollender, wonders why more people haven't stumbled upon laundry's big, dirty secret: "You don't even need soap to wash most loads," he says. The agitation of washing machines often does the job on its own.

As with most of my household "routines," my laundry is done lackadaisically at best. I am definitely going to test out this new concept.

Anyone else daring enough?