Closet Rehab

At the beginning of the new year, I started going through every cabinet, closet, storage-ish area I could find in my house. Mostly because I am about to put my house on the market and wanted to appear uncluttered however, after starting I could not stop. Then I ran across this post on Pinterest that someone repinned this year.

What a great idea! How many of you have items in your closet that you rarely wear? I hate to say it but I have tons of items. My closet is so full sometimes I cannot even find the one item that I am looking for. When I ran across this idea I thought that this would be more fun that the usual sort and toss. The idea is to turn all of your hangers around backwards and as you wear an item place it back in your closet (preferably clean!) the right direction. Then on June 1st pull out those times that have not been worn and donate them.

This is what my closet looks like as of January 15th.

Wow, I cannot believe I just posted pics of my closet! Welcome to my clutter :-)

Now, I am the first to admit that the separation from those items on June 1st gives me a little anxiety. Also, we have four seasons here in TN where I live. I cannot imagine having gone through a reasonable amount of my clothes by June 1st. With that said, I plan on assessing how many items I have actually worn every three months and doing a final sort and toss at the end of the year. I can already see a pattern in what I wear and I have to admit by doing this it is causing me to be a little more creative in picking out my clothes each day.

I few things I learned while recreating this pinned item:

• It's not easy to hang your items backwards. Seriously, you feel like you are doing something extremely wrong especially if you are OCD. And with my closet racks it causes the items not to glide as easily so you have to space your items accordingly.
• It's even harder when your vertically challenged! I forgot exactly how short I was then I started on the top row of clothes. Hopefully you are as lucky as me and have a wonderful husband willing to help you like mine did or perhaps a tall friend. 
• You will find items you didn't even know you had. Seriously, I found items that still had the tags on them. How sad is that? 

I hope by doing this it not only raises my awareness of my compulsive shopping problem but also how many items I actually 'need' verses want. How many of you have a system in periodically cleaning out your closet?