Jump Start January: Declutter Week: Day 3

Another day, another micro-resolution that lasts less than an hour. Today I’m sorting out the bathroom cabinet. These regularly get filled up with things we don’t use, and they get in the way of the important things we need to get at in a hurry such as first aid kits, everyday toiletries and medicines, and, er, hangover cures.

My declutter took an hour, but most of that was drying time because I didn’t want to shut the doors on a load of condensation. If you were in a hurry you could use a dry cloth or some kitchen paper. Anyway, here goes:

• Get everything out of the cabinet and take everything off the top too
• Give the cabinet a good scrub, allow to dry and clean mirrors with glass cleaner or white vinegar and newspaper
• Go through medicines and first aid stuff, checking dates – BIN IT if it’s out of date, and put things on a shopping list if they truly need to be replaced. Speak to your GP surgery immediately if you have run out of an essential medicine, or your stock of it has gone out of date.
• Go through toiletries: bin everything that’s been opened and then not used for over two years, get rid of things that you don’t really use/like, and get rid of everything that you know you’re unlikely to start using within the next 12 months (move it to stockpile storage today, or sell it or give it to charity within a week)
• Toothbrush: if you keep your toothbrush in the cabinet (this keeps dust and many germs off it), look at the state of it and be honest, is it time for a new one? Don’t be cheap with your teeth, think of the dental bills bad teeth can rack up.
• Makeup: if you keep yours in the bathroom cabinet, limit it only to products you use every day. Put the special occasion stuff somewhere else, and throw away old mascaras that have been open for over six months.
• Add in extra storage to group things together, so you can get to important items quickly – I’ve used empty clear plastic cotton bud cases to make places for painkillers, cough and cold meds, and first aid items etc
• Wipe bottles, tubes and jars if needed, and get the essentials put back into the cabinet

The real opportunity to make money here is if you find unwanted perfumes and aftershaves. You can often sell these on auction sites for a few quid even if they’ve been partly used, especially if they’re spray-top bottles.

Also, if you’ve been saving luxury bath and body products ‘for best’, remember that they won’t last forever, however posh they are. You might as well start using them from time to time, rather than letting them go to waste. Enjoy your treats.