Continuing the Magic of Tidying Up ~ Books & More with The KonMari Method

I have now finished reading the book "The Life Changing Magic of Tidying Up" by Marie Kondo. After working on my clothes (see this post), I started with the books. 

First, a cute little picture of our seashell and seaglass collection! After I finished tidying my books, I gathered all the seaglass, rocks, and seashells that we have collected over the years. I had these mixed up in several containers and places on the bookshelves. 

I decided to sort them by type and use only four glass containers. I used the KonMari method with these and kept only the ones that brought me joy. This was very relaxing after working on tidying the books! 

Here are the final four jars. The top left jar has a mix of rocks, fossils, and feathers. The top right jar has seashells. Bottom right are smaller seashells, there are some adorable tiny ones in that jar! And lastly, bottom left are all the pieces of seaglass. 

This nature collection has pieces from Ontario, Florida, the Bahamas, and Prince Edward Island. I love these and there is room for more! 

Now let's move on to the books. I was most worried about the books. I have always loved books. To let go of books is really hard for me! 

We have a lot of books because of homeschooling, and my kids all love to read. I decided to gather all the books, excluding books that my teenagers keep in their own rooms. Celeste did gather her books from her room to the main room. 

After gathering all the books, I needed some fuel! I sorted the books into two main groups, non-fiction and fiction. 

At first, it was difficult. But quickly, following the KonMari method, I was able to work quickly and go through all the piles swiftly. The keep pile and the discard pile looked almost equal to me, which meant that I almost discarded half of our books. 

Putting away all the books back on the shelves was when I saw the results of the tidying. My bookshelves were tidy and did not look overwhelmed anymore. 

We also moved one bookshelf to our eating area. I put the poetry books, cookbooks, activity and colouring books. I also stored the art supplies (paint, brushes, colouring pencils and markers) and card games. All our teas are there too! I absolutely love this change. That shelf is in the middle of the mosaic below. 

I only included a few art pieces throughout the shelves. I was able to store our microscope and science supplies box with all our science books. 

Here are some before and after photos. But I will show you the after first, then the before because I love the after! 

Here is the before. It seems so busy, cluttered and too full. 

I decided to have a garage sale in the spring, and will attempt to sell the books I discarded. We put them all in storage bins in our basement until then. A bit of a different method than the book but it will hopefully work. 

After the books, I helped my husband with tidying his clothes. We gathered all the clothes, shoes, and coats. 

The before took over most of the floor! 

I helped with sorting by categories. 

He was able to sort through his clothes very quickly. He couldn't relate to the KonMari method of "does this bring me joy?" because for him clothes are practical. He did handle and think about each item. 

Two huge recycling bags and two smaller bags filled after the tidying. He uses a hanging closet for all his clothes so we roughly folded his clothes just so I could take a quick photo! We were both very happy with all his tidying. His closet is so much more efficient now. 

Lastly, I "attacked" my desk! The papers is next on the list of tidying. My desk is a main magnet of papers. I have cleaned up my desk countless times but it always gets messy. This time I used the method and recycled many papers! I put things away where they belonged and discarded many others. Three days later, it's still very tidy! 

I will continue working on papers then on to komono which are miscellaneous items). 

You can read more about this method in my first post in this series: The Magic of Tidying Up ~ The KonMari Method.