Must DONE ::: Great Closet Cleanout 2013

All photos by and for {accordingtoame}

I finally accomplished a task I managed to avoid most of the year. It took me an entire holiday weekend, too.  That header was supposed to have DO crossed out and say Done, but Blogger didn't play nice so it just says Done and I gave up. 

As you can see from that photo, it was a big undertaking.  When all was said and done, a little over three trash bags of old products were taken down on trash night, several Ebay auctions of unused (all brand new, all special and limited editions) cosmetic products were sent to happy new homes (with a few horror stories to go with them...never. again.), and I had filled an entire giant wheeled-trash-can sized recycling container with packaging. And really, I could probably get another bag full of stuff out of here, if I wanted to be more harsh with my editing, and I might spend another afternoon/evening doing that one day soon. I don't really know why I pile things the way that I do, I just manage to do so. And I know that I am seriously super guilty of being sucked in by sales and coupon codes. So that helps me stockpile worse than ever. 

The closet, before.

That lead in photo above is the halfway point. Right above are all before I had started sorting and unloading. So a true before...Astounding. Embarrassing.  You can even see in the background there a giant amount of stuff lining the hallway, because I couldn't put it in the closet. 

So as I unloaded, I had to leave a hole for myself to walk and sit for sorting. As I went I sorted by category. Hair, Skincare, Makeup, Medical, Husband, etc. 

And here's a midway point, where I had gotten about one and a half bags full of trashed stuff. Anything that was to be sold was set aside in advance. 

Along the way I discovered what would become an absurd makeup brush collection.  I even had some that weren't even opened after I bought them, which I sold several of. 

That, my friends, is when you know you have a problem!  I sorted them and got rid of any that had damaged or worn bristles or bad ferrules, then cleaned the keepers later that night and laid them all out to dry. 

Once I had a handle on the sheer amount of stuff, and had almost everything separated between keep, sell, toss, I turned to the makeup, and what was going to make the cut.  For as bad as the makeup brushes and hair collection had gotten, the makeup one was not as bad as I expected, and was significantly easier to ween, especially since some of it already went into the sell pile in the beginning.  

What was left went into my finally-used Muji drawers, by category. Foundation/concealer in one drawer, setting powders in another.  Blushes/bronzers/the four lip products I own and never use in one other drawer, brow related stuff in another, Naked palette and shadow liners in one more, Bare Minerals Ready shadow quads and liner shadow duos in another, and liners and my Yaby and MaryKay shadows in another.  In one of the other units, I put brushes for eyes in one drawer, face in another. I saved the last unit for skincare related stuff, samples and related. My stockpile of mascara is so big that it went into another container that is sitting on top of my Mujis in the closet.  

Once it was all finally sorted well, I started to load back up...from this: 

  
 To this:

I put anything medical/dental/eye related on that bottom shelf, with my soaps and body washes and jewelry cleaning supplies. I have not decided if that will remain permanent. It is pretty crazy how much is on that shelf.  I am doing a good job of keeping that makeup shelf clean, though I think my stockpiling is out of control. I have three Acure leave-in sprays there, and since taking that photo, I got a full size of the shampoo and conditioner that is now on that shelf also. Uh, problem forming already.  

Above that is my husband's stuff, and the hair dye supply shelf, bottles, and brushes as well as my supply of Ted Gibson conditioner. I usually would keep that with my shampoo and conditioner supply but its really more of a dye product for me so I decided to move it up.  The very top shelf is where all my dye goes, and used to go before it got out of control in there and it was moved to the hall and office. I like my recipe to stay "my recipe" so I blurred the boxes in each photo.

One of my big goals for this coming year is to use what I have in there, and try to not replenish anything I don't TRULY love until I absolutely need to.  Hopefully I can stick to that. 

Have you taken on a big cleaning project lately? How are you doing maintaining the results?

Be sure to follow according to ame on 

Twitter ::: Facebook ::: Instagram ::: Pinterest  ::: Bloglovin'