PRODUCT JUNKIE TO MINIMALIST - Week #6 - Discovery of PROJECT 333

The goal I set for this week was simple:  Get the two crates of decorations in the hallway inventoried and eliminate another 177 items (to bring the total eliminated to 4200 even).

Saturday - Day #36

Went up and saw my nephew this morning for about 4 hours.  He's less than 2 weeks old, so obviously he just sleeps most of the time, but I did get to hold him and feed him (and even change his diaper).  Words cannot describe how much I love this little guy and what a blessing he is to our family.  I never really could see myself having children until he came into our lives and now....well....let's just say he's changed my perspective.  I just turned 38 last month, so if it's meant to be, it will have to happen soon.  That's another story though!....

We ran out of a few things this week, so I had to stop at the grocery store on my way home.  I debated on whether to even post this photo because I bought some really bad food.

All I can say is, "Guess what time of the month it is?!"  It's the time where I'm craving sugar AND salt and anyone who tries to stand in my way is likely to get kicked in the shins and/or the stink eye!  I really did need contact solution, deodorant, fruit, and shipping tape though.  The Starbucks jugs of coffee were on sale this week, so I'm hoping since I got two of them, that will get me thru the next two weeks of work and I won't have to grocery shop for another two weeks.  I'm going to read about Kylie Jenner's birthday now while I eat that piece of cake and remind myself that one day her metabolism will slow down and she'll have thighs too!  

By the end of the day, I had gone through the two crates of decorations, so that was crossed off the list!  Even did a load of laundry while I was at it since I was hanging out in my now-usable (AKA - cleaned out) finished basement.  

Sunday - Day #37

Woke up early enough today that it was still dark out and I was able to light my candles in my living room that I love.  What a great way to start the day!  I read a few magazines, unloaded and loaded the dishwasher, and went thru a bag of bathroom items and a crate of items from the garage.  So far I've eliminated 56 items this week.  I looked at my long-term goals for the remainder of this year and determined I need to eliminate at least 66 items/week to reach my goal of eliminating at least 50% of my belongings by the 1-year mark of this project.  I broke it down even further to determine how many items in each category (food, kitchen, living room, bedrooms, office, bathroom, basement, laundry room, upstairs closet, downstairs storage, deck, and garage) I need to eliminate each week.  This will make it really easy when I wake up and want to purge things before work to know which room to focus on that morning.

GAME CHANGER - After my husband fell asleep watching baseball, I was searching the internet for more minimalist blogs and stumbled across something called Project 333.  It's basically where you choose 33 items including clothing, accessories, jewelry, outerwear, and shoes and wear only those 33 items for 3 months at a time.  I watched this YouTube video of the Dutch woman in the blue dress at the bottom and it just resonated with me (much like when I found my first minimalism blog).  

What's NOT included in the 33 - Wedding rings or other sentimental jewelry that you never take off, underwear, sleep wear, in-home lounge wear, and workout clothing (you can only wear your workout clothing to workout)

I went straight to my bedroom and made my list of items that I thought would be in my top 33 from memory.  Then, I went thru my closet quickly leaving only those pieces and a few more.  The rest went into another closet.  Of the items that made the cut, I turned those hangers around backwards so I can see what (if anything) I didn't wear at the end of those 33 days.

Here's what made the cut:

Bottoms:
1.  White denim Capri pants (my go-to pair of pants this summer)
2.  Regular (dark denim) jeans
3.  Grey stretchy jeans
4.  Black dress pants
5.  Black leggings Dark charcoal grey work pants (see "Wednesday")

Tops:

6. White 3/4 sleeve top
7.  White & navy "rope design" 3/4 length sleeve shirt
8.  Fuschia pink short sleeve top
9.  Burnt orange sleeveless top
10.  Goldenrod yellow top
11.  Mint green v-neck top (see "Thursday") - Solid grey GAP long-sleeve top
12.  Navy/blue sleeveless top
13.  Navy solid 3/4 sleeve top
14.  Black short sleeve top

Cardigans:
15.  Navy cardigan
16.  Black/white striped cardigan
17.  Black stretchy dressy cardigan
18.  Burnt orange cardigan

Shoes:
19.  Black wedges
20.  Brown boots
21.  Platinum Sperry's
22.  Blush flats
23.  Grey TOMS
24.  Black flats

Accessories:
25.  Black/silver infinity scarf
26.  Lia Sophia goldenrod/green/blue/silver long beaded necklace
27.  Lia Sophia acorn earrings
28.  Silver watch
29.  Black/white/silver long necklace
30.  Silver/clear crystal dangle earrings

I still have three more items that I can add.  I'm going to wait and see what I come across that I need/want to wear over the course of the next three months and add the last three items in then.  Coats are supposed to be counted on this list, but realistically, I hate wearing a coat even when it's snowing outside, so we'll see if I feel the urge to wear one by the end of November.

Monday - Day #38

I woke up all excited to decide what of my 33 pieces I was going to wear today.  Something that made this "Project 333" project challenging is that I live in Ohio and the seasons are about to change from Summer to Fall.  Today in fact, it was below 80 degrees and I wore this to work:

Tuesday - Day #39

I cannot believe how happy it makes me to walk into a cleaner closet without all the clothes packed into it!  (This coming from the girl who used to choose apartments based on how big the walk-in closets were and would have the entire thing packed).  Having less options to choose from really does make getting dressed a lot faster!  Plus, I don't get irritated looking at clothes that don't fit or don't make me feel good.  Everything that's in there now are my favorite pieces!  Here's what I wore today:

I know the "no white after Labor Day" rule technically went away several years back, but I'm old enough to still have that as my mindset.  So, I'm going to wear my favorite white capris and nautical 3/4 sleeve top as many times as I can between now and mid-September.  I debated on whether to keep these two pieces on my "33 list" since I won't wear them for the whole three months and that's 2/33 slots they're filling, but they're both so comfortable and I feel good wearing them.  I paired them with my navy cardigan and boat shoes and had a nice "Tuesday with no meetings" work outfit.  Normally I wear a golden, nautical-themed long necklace with this outfit too, but it didn't make the cut for Fall pieces.  Instead, these are my jewelry options for the next three months.  (The small, diamond/pearl necklace was my gift from my husband for our wedding and is what I normally wear daily, so it didn't have to be counted).

Now I'm going to work on eliminating some more items.  I'm at 4118 now and I still have 82 more to go by the end of the day Friday.  I'm going to check out the pieces that didn't make the Project 333 cut and see what can go to eBay/out of my closet permanently.

Wednesday - Day #40

No meetings scheduled again at work today, so I wanted to wear comfy, soft clothing.  This outfit definitely fit that bill!

I REALLY debated on if it was appropriate for an Executive Director to ever wear leggings to work.  Even though the agency I work for is pretty small and the amount of people who would even see my outfit was less than 20, I still felt funny about it.  My husband said he thought my outfit looked cute, but the more I look at this photo, the more I think these leggings are getting pulled from my 33 items.  Instead, they're getting replaced with dark charcoal dress pants (which I ended up wearing on Thursday).

After work, I went and got a pedicure, which was so nice!  Purged 5 more items from my closets too!

Thursday - Day #41

Today I had a meeting with one of the families we serve and with someone from the local County Board, so I needed to dress up more.  This was today's outfit:

Did I mention this little project is tougher than it looks?  During any given week in the Spring and Fall, it is not uncommon for the temperature to fluctuate by 40 degrees.  You really have to think hard about the pieces you choose because you don't get a lot of options!  I thought I had my wardrobe all figured out Sunday night, but once again, after looking at this photo, I've decided this shirt is getting pulled too.  It doesn't look flattering right now and the necklace I normally wear with it (a short silver and green statement one) didn't make the Project 333 cut.  This black/silver necklace kept falling into the crack of my chest and REALLY made for an unflattering look.

Friday - Day #42

Here's today's "casual Friday" look:

This is a very comfy (although not so flattering around my waist) outfit!  I love the necklace too!  The colors are perfect for Fall!!

Came home and finished purging to make my goal for the week.  For some reason, this week was tougher than all the other weeks.  It's probably because I've been through everything at least once already.  I thought my clothes especially would be easier since I pulled most of them from my main closet, but what's left are pieces I really do like.  Clearly I still have some work to do on changing my mindset and letting go of things!

Totals for this Week:

Current Inventory - 10,645

Items Purged - 2762
Items Donated - 977
Items Used - 394
Items Sold/Returned - 71 
TOTAL ITEMS ELIMINATED = 4204

(4204/14849) = 28.3% of items inventoried have been eliminated so far

Next week's goal:  I don't want to stress about focusing on a number of items to purge this week!  I'm going to make my goal the minimum number needed to make my annual goal (69 items) and then if I go over that, great!

What do you guys think of Project 333?  Have any of you done it before?

XOXO,
Stephanie