#601 How to Sort Through a Loved One’s Belongings After They’re Gone Part 1

#601 How to Sort Through a Loved One’s Belongings After They’re Gone Part 1

by | Jan 23, 2024 | Clutter Free Podcast, Home, Organizing, Overwhelmed, Podcast, tips and ideas | 0 comments

Listen Now

601 – How to Sort Through a Loved One’s Belongings After They’re Gone Part 1

The loss of a loved one is a complicated road to travel. There are many layers to the grief.

One of those layers is what to do with the belongings of that loved one once they are gone. In today’s episode, Kathi interviews the author of the book Breathing Through the Grief, A Devotional Journal for Seasons of Loss. Nine years ago, Dorina Lazo Gilmore-Young and her young daughters lost their 40-year-old husband and father to cancer.

In this part 1 episode, Kathi and Dorina talk about this delicate subject as well as:

  • When and how to start the sorting process
  • How to avoid decision-making fatigue in the grief process
  • How to involve close family members

Dorina also shares ideas for ways to remember and honor your loved one.

Grab a copy of Breathing Through the Grief, A Devotional Journal for Seasons of Loss by Dorina Lazo Gilmore-Young.

 Sign up here to be notified when part 2 of this conversation about grief and clutter is released.

The Accidental Homesteader: What I’ve Learned About Chickens, Compost, and Creating Home

Homesteading [hohm-sted-ing]
noun
1. an act or instance of establishing a homestead.
2. the act of loving where you live so much that you actively ignore the fact that your house is trying to kill you on a regular basis.

For Kathi Lipp and her husband, Roger, buying a house in one of the most remote parts of Northern California was never part of the plan; many of life’s biggest, most rewarding adventures rarely are.

Kathi shares the hard-won wisdom she’s gained on her homestead journey to help you accomplish more at home, gain fresh perspective, and give yourself grace in the process. Here’s a handful of the lessons Kathi shares:

  • Prepare before the need arises
  • Everything is always in process, including us
  • Your best household solution is time and patience
  • You don’t have to do everything the hard way
  • Be open to new and better ways of doing things
  • A lot of small changes make a huge difference.
    Highly practical, humorous, and inspirational, The Accidental Homesteader will encourage you to live with more peace, joy, and contentment.

Order your copy of The Accidental Homesteader: What I’ve Learned About Chickens, Compost, and Creating Home here.

Links Mentioned:

Kathi Lipp’s Clutter-free Academy Facebook Group 

Breathing Through the Grief, A Devotional Journal for Seasons of Loss by Dorina Lazo Gilmore-Young

Dorina Lazo Gilmore-Young

 

Favorites:

Learn more about Clutter Free for Life

Have you struggled with what to do with items left behind when a loved one has died? Do you have any creative solutions for those items?

Share your answers in the comments.

Let’s stay connected

To share your thoughts:

  • Leave a note in the comment section below.
  • Leave an honest review on iTunes. Your ratings and reviews really help and I read each one.

Subscribe on iTunes or subscribe to our newsletter now.

Meet Our Guest 

 

Dorina Lazo Gilmore-Young

Dorina Lazo Gilmore-Young is an author, speaker, Bible teacher, and spoken word artist.

Her passion is helping people discover God’s glory in unexpected places and flourish in their God-given callings. She wants you to become a glory chaser with her, running after God’s glory rather than your own. This has made a world of difference in every facet of Dorina’s life.

Her happy place is near the ocean with her people or running on a trail in the mountains near her home. A foodie, Dorina loves trying new recipes and restaurants. Tears, laughter, and good food are always welcome at her table. Guests are invited to come as they are.

Connect with Dorina at www.DorinaGilmore.com, where you can sign up for her Glorygram letter. You can also find her as @DorinaGilmore
on Instagram, Twitter, and Pinterest.

 
Transcript

Kathi (00:01.518)
Well, hey friends, welcome to Clutter-Free Academy, where our goal is to help you take small, doable steps to live every day with less clutter and more life. And if you haven’t heard the story, I finished my book, Clutter-Free, on the morning of September 5th.

And about an hour and a half later, my dad passed away in the same room. And my dad is the reason that I was on part of the reason I was on this clutter free journey, because he was a hoarder. And I a lot of the stuff that I tended to keep was because of my dad. And I have to tell you, the struggle for decluttering and the removal of some of his stuff during that time of grief is one of the more difficult things I’ve gone through as an adult. And I am not an expert on this. I am not an expert on grief. I am very fortunate that I’ve had very few encounters with grief in my life, but that means that there are a lot of things to come.

And I thought I would bring somebody who has done the deep dive, who has walked through the grief, because either you’re a novice or an expert. And I’m sad to say that my friend, Dorina, is an expert, but she is so gracious that she is coming to share with us. She has a new book called Breathing Through the Grief, a devotional journal for seasons of loss.

Guys, it’s Dorina Gilmore Young. She’s an author, she’s a Bible teacher, she’s a coach. She is a master of many things. And Dorinna, first of all, welcome to Clutterfree Academy.

Dorina Lazo Gilmore-Young (02:10.542)
Kathi, it is a gift to be here with you today. Thanks so much for the welcome.

Kathi (02:15.758)
Well, and you know, it’s, I’m very excited and grateful for this new book that you have. But the path there was a very difficult one. Can you just tell us, you know, briefly your story of grief in your life? And then we’re gonna get into some practical things that all of us can do when it comes to this, this weird tension between stuff and grief.

But tell us a little bit about your journey.

Dorina Lazo Gilmore-Young (02:47.215)
Yeah, thank you for the invitation. So I could tell many different facets of a grief journey that I’ve endured in my life, but probably the most prominent is nine years ago, my husband was diagnosed with stage four cancer. And at that time he was 40 years old. I was in my late 30s and we had three little kids. Our daughters were ages two, five and eight. And we received his diagnosis

May of 2014 and he went to heaven in September of that year So even though the days felt excruciatingly long for me as I watched him suffer and his body deteriorate It was quick. It was over the course of a summer for a lot of our friends And you know sometimes you kind of check out because people are traveling and doing different things during the summer and so for friends and family it was very shocking it was a swift battle with cancer and

Kathi (03:32.558)
Yeah, that’s…

Dorina Lazo Gilmore-Young (03:47.089)
been a journey that has had a windy path as it always is. Grief is more like a tangled ball of yarn than it is a straight path, right? But I’m also so deeply grateful for the ways that God has been present with me on this journey.

Kathi (07:10.558)
that while Dorina has gone through something absolutely, you know, life changing, something that most of us in our 30s and 40s would never ever have to deal with, Dorina has a beautiful life. You’re remarried, you have three beautiful daughters, but there has to be this walking with joy and grief that you’ve gone through and continue to go through.

Dorina Lazo Gilmore-Young (07:41.359)
Definitely. And you know, I think I’m very passionate about normalizing this conversation about grief because all of us are constantly walking that line. It’s like kind of like a train track between grief and joy. Those do not come separately. They often coexist in a given day, in a given hour, in a given minute sometimes for all of us. And so when

Kathi (07:51.819)
Yeah.

Kathi (07:59.298)
Mm-mm.

Kathi (08:02.786)
Yeah.

Dorina Lazo Gilmore-Young (08:11.313)
with a recognition that God has brought great rejoicing and redemption in my life, but it also means I deal with triggers and the journey of grief daily, and that’s nine years out.

Kathi (08:25.066)
Yeah, okay, so let’s talk about triggers because I have to imagine the things in your life, the things that were your husband’s, the things that you shared, the things that are significant to your three daughters. How do you start to deal with some of those things? Because I know for my mom,

she wanted to get rid of a lot of stuff very quickly. With my dad being a hoarder, this finally gave her permission. That was not your story. You’re surrounded by all these things that bring back good memories, I have to imagine. But we also can’t continue to live with all of that the whole time. How did you start?

to detangle the, you know, I don’t want to call it decluttering, but maybe the curation, the collecting, the downsizing of some of those things. When did that start for you?

Dorina Lazo Gilmore-Young (09:33.263)
Yeah, that’s such a good question to reflect on because my husband was not a hoarder. So it is a different story. But at the same time, we lived in a home together where he actually had been a bachelor living for many years. And then we moved. We lived on the mission field in the country of Haiti. And so there are things that you sort of accumulate along the way. And then there are the treasures from someone’s life that you have to figure out when you’re the person kind of left.

Kathi (09:38.39)
No. Yeah.

Kathi (09:47.168)
Mmm.

Dorina Lazo Gilmore-Young (10:03.217)
behind, in my case I was the widow, where it’s like, okay, how can I measure right now what’s going to be important in the future and what are things that just need to be downsized and decluttered because we have to live our normal life and we can’t keep existing in the past. So I feel like I had to start going through that journey slowly. One of the things that expedited it is that I moved

Kathi (10:12.547)
hate.

Dorina Lazo Gilmore-Young (10:33.137)
home where my husband died to a new home with my daughters about a year after his passing. And so I’ve actually written about this a little bit on my website, my blog as well, but I had to decide, okay, what can I emotionally handle to declutter and what are some things that I need to just give myself permission to do at a later time. And one of my sweet friends was brilliant.

Kathi (10:52.014)
Mm-hmm.

Dorina Lazo Gilmore-Young (11:03.057)
of this process and she got a huge cardboard box and she wrote with a sharpie on the outside time capsule and it was just a thing where I had this box where I could put things into it that I could make a decision about at a later time.

Kathi (11:12.631)
Oof. Hmm.

Dorina Lazo Gilmore-Young (11:23.407)
And then there were the things where it was like, okay, I’m going to donate this, or I’m going to throw this away, or I’m going to get rid of this. But it’s so emotionally exhausting, especially on a grief journey. You get this kind of decision fatigue that happens pretty quickly. And so, you know, by the end of the first, I’ll call it sorting, I had 10 boxes remaining that were his things. And then the next time I moved, it was less, you know, and so I just kind of gave myself permission along.

Kathi (11:23.776)
Right.

Kathi (11:43.909)
Mm-hmm.

Kathi (11:47.874)
Oh wow. Okay.

Mm-hmm.

Dorina Lazo Gilmore-Young (11:53.361)
the way. But still, even today it’s so interesting. It’s like I gave away so many of my husband’s clothes thinking those were probably not important. I saved some special flannel shirts that we made into pillows for my daughters and some special t-shirts and that kind of thing. But still, my daughters today, just because of the way style is and because they love thrifting,

Kathi (12:19.585)
Yeah.

Dorina Lazo Gilmore-Young (12:23.281)
all the things that I gave away of my husbands or something sort of in that genre. And I’m like, well, why didn’t I keep, you know, those sweatshirts that were from college that I didn’t think anyone would care about five years ago or seven years ago. And now my kids are looking for that very thing at the thrift store. So it’s really kind of a funny process.

Kathi (12:32.066)
Yeah.

Kathi (12:44.85)
Yeah, but you’re so right. We try to make those decisions about what’s going to be important in five or 10 years in the midst of grief. I love that you had levels. There were things that were obviously easy to give away or throw away. But, you know, there are some people who are stuck in the thought that if I do anything with their belongings.

It’s dishonoring. And we know that’s not true. In our head, we know that’s not true, but in our heart, that can be really, really tough. Did you encounter any of that and how did you help process that?

Dorina Lazo Gilmore-Young (13:33.263)
Yeah, I mean for sure it felt stressful. I had some anxiety over this because I knew that I wanted to honor my husband and I knew I had these little girls but I did not know what was going to be important to them in the future. And I think some of what helped me was brainstorming ways to remember and honor him but not necessarily keeping the physical item, if that makes sense.

Kathi (14:01.766)
Yeah. Dorina, what was his name?

Dorina Lazo Gilmore-Young (14:03.951)
Eric Lee. First name was Eric Lee. So good southern boy with two names in the first name.

Kathi (14:05.554)
Eric, okay, okay. Okay, oh, Eric Lee was his first name. I was like, I don’t see Lee in your last name because you have four names. And so, okay, Eric Lee. So you brainstormed how to honor and keep his memory alive without it being stuff. So tell me a little bit more about that.

Dorina Lazo Gilmore-Young (14:29.999)
Well, and honestly, I collected some of these ideas along the way from other friends and from books I read and blog posts. But one example would be like making a photo memory book. The photos are just so valuable. And so I really spent time with my girls kind of curating photos that we already had. And now we’re in the midst of like printed photos, which he had from his childhood versus digital photos. But then there were even things that we knew we didn’t want to keep, but we took photos of them, like little treasures of his so that we could still kind of have those in our memory. And so that would be my advice to people is like create a sort of best of album, whether that’s digital or something you want to print, you know, through Shutterfly or another service. But you can take photos of some things that maybe don’t have, you don’t have space for in your home but you can still remember like oh you know he won this medal for running when he was a young person or he had these special shoes or you know those types of things where it’s like okay that’s actually gonna sit in a box in my garage forever or I can take a photo of it and my kids can remember it as a treasured relic that represents their dad.

Kathi (15:47.821)
right.

Kathi (15:56.126)
I love that. Okay, so speaking of kids, were they involved in this process at all? They were pretty young when your husband passed, but you know, I’m just wondering, were there safe and comforting ways for them to be involved? Or did you pretty much have to do everything and

leave your kids out of the, not leave them out. That sounds like it came with a judgment, which it absolutely 100% did not. How old were your girls when you were going through all this?

Dorina Lazo Gilmore-Young (16:31.759)
So when he died, they were two, five and eight. So yes, they were very young. Probably my oldest was the only one who could really kind of enter into some of that decision making with me.

Kathi (16:35.562)
Yeah, very young.

Kathi (16:43.624)
Yeah.

Dorina Lazo Gilmore-Young (16:44.111)
but I kind of chose certain things where I did want to include them. So I mentioned like the memory pillows. I had a friend who loves to sew and she offered to do this for us. And so I let each of the girls pick out one of his flannel shirts. And that was something special that it’s like, they got to have daddy’s shirt. And I mean, they’re teenagers now and they still have their daddy pillows as we like to call them. And, you know, one of them I can think of, it was a flannel shirt

Kathi (16:51.528)
Hmm.

Kathi (16:59.694)
It’s amazing.

Kathi (17:11.071)
amazing.

Dorina Lazo Gilmore-Young (17:14.065)
in the last family photo that we took for Christmas. And so every time I see that pillow, I think about that photo shoot. I think about the fun that we had with our friend who took our photos. I think about him wearing it. So there is such a layered kind of memory that is in this little pillow and I didn’t have to keep 25 shirts. Sometimes I wonder if maybe I should have, like I said, cause my kids are thrifting all this stuff right now.

Kathi (17:17.131)
Hmm.

Kathi (17:21.464)
Right.

Kathi (17:38.477)
Right.

Kathi (17:43.682)
Yeah.

Dorina Lazo Gilmore-Young (17:44.207)
at least we got four of his special shirts. And I actually did keep some of his other clothes in a box. And I’m so grateful that I did because my girls wear their dads sweaters and sweatshirts that we did keep now as teenagers, which you know, at two, five and eight, they really didn’t care about that. And it would have looked like a dress on them. But now they do. And so I think it’s like choosing sort of a small quantity of the actual stuff that you want to keep and then doing

Kathi (17:47.972)
Right.

Kathi (18:02.471)
Right. Yeah.

Kathi (18:12.078)
Mm-hmm.

Dorina Lazo Gilmore-Young (18:14.161)
special that maybe this represents dad, like the pillow or the photo album where we can still kind of return to those things without filling up our garage.

Kathleen Lipp
Friends, I hope you’ve been getting as much of this conversation with Dorina as I have. Whether you’ve already gone through the process of sorting through a loved one’s belongings or it’s something that we are all going to have to do in the future, I hope that with her graciousness and her care and her love and her honoring, we can all find better ways to honor the memories of those we love while taking care of ourselves at the same time.

Please come back next week where we’re gonna finish this conversation with Dorina and she offers even more hope and more healing through this very difficult process. You’ve been listening to Clutter Free Academy. I’m Cathy Lipp. And now go create the clutter free life you were always intended to live.

More Posts 

#600 Unpacking Money and Clutter: Exploring the Deep Connection Part 2 with Coach Stefania Mariaa

#600 Unpacking Money and Clutter: Exploring the Deep Connection Part 2 with Coach Stefania Mariaa

by | Jan 16, 2024 | Clutter Free Podcast, Finances, Home, Organizing, Overwhelmed, Podcast, tips and ideas | 0 comments

Listen Now

600 – Unpacking Money and Clutter: Exploring the Deep Connection Part 2 with Coach Stefania Mariaa

We all have a limited amount of our three greatest resources: time, energy, and money. Do you feel like you could be doing a better job making decisions about how to use those resources?

Welcome to the conversation, friend!

In Part 2 of Unpacking Money and Clutter: Exploring the Deep Connection, Kathi and Coach Stefania Mariaa continue the conversation about wanting to put every dollar, every bit of energy, and every bit of time into something that gives us a return. But what do those returns look like? Listen in as they talk about financial intimacy and other topics such as:

  • How to get out of shame cycles
  • How to change your mind set about mistakes.
  • How “spending by proxy” affects your financial health

Have you listened to 599 Unpacking Money and Clutter: Exploring the Deep Connection Part 1 with Coach Stefania Mariaa? Click here.

Find information about Coach Stefania Mariaa’s financial Master Class here.

 Sign up here to be notified when the next episode is released.

The Accidental Homesteader: What I’ve Learned About Chickens, Compost, and Creating Home

Homesteading [hohm-sted-ing]
noun
1. an act or instance of establishing a homestead.
2. the act of loving where you live so much that you actively ignore the fact that your house is trying to kill you on a regular basis.

For Kathi Lipp and her husband, Roger, buying a house in one of the most remote parts of Northern California was never part of the plan; many of life’s biggest, most rewarding adventures rarely are.

Kathi shares the hard-won wisdom she’s gained on her homestead journey to help you accomplish more at home, gain fresh perspective, and give yourself grace in the process. Here’s a handful of the lessons Kathi shares:

  • Prepare before the need arises
  • Everything is always in process, including us
  • Your best household solution is time and patience
  • You don’t have to do everything the hard way
  • Be open to new and better ways of doing things
  • A lot of small changes make a huge difference.
    Highly practical, humorous, and inspirational, The Accidental Homesteader will encourage you to live with more peace, joy, and contentment.

Order your copy of The Accidental Homesteader: What I’ve Learned About Chickens, Compost, and Creating Home here.

Links Mentioned:

Kathi Lipp’s Clutter-free Academy Facebook Group 

 

Favorites:

Learn more about Clutter Free for Life

Have you ever felt shame about past financial mistakes? How has listening to this episode helped reset your thinking on those feelings?

Share your answers in the comments.

Let’s stay connected

To share your thoughts:

  • Leave a note in the comment section below.
  • Leave an honest review on iTunes. Your ratings and reviews really help and I read each one.

Subscribe on iTunes or subscribe to our newsletter now.

Meet Our Guest 

 

Stefania Mariaa

Stefania Mariaa is a multidisciplinary coach guiding people back to their radiant and sovereign wealth without abandoning themselves for anything less.

Connect with Stefania Mariaa on Instagram, Facebook, TikTok @stefaniamariaa or @bank.membership, her website, or for her free teaching here.

Transcript

Kathi (00:04.398)
 Well, hey friends, welcome to Clutter-Free Academy where our goal is to help you take small doable steps to live every day with less clutter and more life. And guys, we are back for part two of this amazing conversation with Stefania Maria. On TikTok, you can find her at bank membership. We’re gonna have all the links.

down below so you can find out all about her. But last week, and if you haven’t listened to last week’s episode, go back, listen to that, and then come back here because you are going to want to have the first part of this conversation. And when we left off last week, we were talking about financial intimacy, and we defined it in the last episode. But I wanna, so how…

Can my listener give us a one, a two sentence recap of what financial intimacy is and how can my listeners discover that for themselves?

Stefania Mariaa (01:11.587)
Absolutely. So financial intimacy is the practice of getting honest and vulnerable about how you use your resources of time, money, and energy. And what that requires is actually going to look at the reality you’re living. So something as simple as like looking at your bank account, reviewing your bank statements. But beyond that, it’s not just enough to like see them objectively. It’s to ask yourself a question deeper.

What is this showing me about how I’m showing up in my life? What is the way that my calendar is structured, reflecting back to me, whether I’m respecting myself or disrespecting myself? And that continues on into money and it continues on into your energetic, like how full of vitality you are. What is this reflecting back to me?

Kathi (02:02.465)
Yeah.

And you guys, if you feel like, oh, this is weird. This is just weird. These are woohoo kind of things that we’re talking about here. Can I tell you why it’s weird? It’s because as a society, we don’t value people’s time, their energy, and that goes into money. And so we don’t value it, so we don’t talk about it. And here’s what I will say, that corporations,

marketing, all that. It is to their detriment that you look at these things because you will make wiser choices. Am I in the right ballpark, Stefania?

Stefania Mariaa (02:46.019)
Absolutely. And the greatest thing about this is that it’s not necessarily that like businesses will fail in the face of financial intimacy. That’s definitely not what I’m saying. But what I am saying is that even as a business owner, if everyone around you is practicing financial intimacy, you know that your clients are spending money with you because it’s an extension of their self-respect.

Kathi (02:47.596)
Okay.

Kathi (02:54.467)
No.

Kathi (03:00.738)
Mm-hmm.

Kathi (03:09.162)
right. Yes. They are.

Stefania Mariaa (03:10.583)
Right? Like, doesn’t that feel so much better?

Kathi (03:14.514)
It’s an investment instead of an oops. And that’s what we want. We want you to be putting every dollar, every minute, every ounce of energy into the thing that’s going to give you the best return. And I’ve talked about this in our coaching this morning, and not a lot of people know this, that I went through a couple of bouts of situational depression. And you know,

Stefania Mariaa (03:31.213)
Mm-hmm.

Kathi (03:43.034)
I have no problem with people watching TV. I have no problem with people being on TikTok. But I was doing that to avoid some other things in my life. And if I had understood this financial intimacy, I would have said, you know what? This is, you know, I have no problem with people watching TV, but instead of watching a Friends rerun for the 700 time, maybe I watch a movie that I always say I don’t have time for.

but I think would be really enriching to me or a documentary. And it’s okay to waste some time, some time, but when you’re doing it consistently, when you’re wasting your energy consistently, when you are wasting your money consistently, that’s something to look at. There’s something that’s not aligned in your life and you need to get to the bottom of that.

Stefania Mariaa (04:33.315)
Absolutely. And you know, I’m often like telling people, so I lead people through a process called the bank money audit. And it’s really, it’s quite an extensive process because it readjusts how people look at reviewing their bank statements, reviewing their credit card statements, because it does ask what version of you is showing up to waste your resources.

Kathi (04:40.248)
Right.

Kathi (04:43.502)
Mm-hmm.

Kathi (04:57.142)
Yeah.

Stefania Mariaa (04:57.659)
Is it your younger child who’s looking to be held, like your inner young one? Is it your inner teen who’s rebelling or conforming against the world? Is it your, like whatever part is operating at that place? Because if it is, it means that you’re actually not present. Like you’re not taking care of all of those parts of yourself to ensure that they’re nourished. So now they have to go rogue with your life.

Kathi (05:01.238)
Mm-hmm.

Stefania Mariaa (05:22.707)
spend the entire weekend binging Netflix, even though you really wanted to go to the gym or really wanted to bake or really wanted to spend the morning with friends. It doesn’t really matter. You weren’t an active participant in your life. So these other parts came in to get their needs met in a really rogue way. It’s the best way to explain it.

Kathi (05:22.935)
Ha ha ha!

Kathi (05:42.13)
Yeah, and they’re not going to go away. By ignoring them, you need to address them. And so this is a great way of doing it. Okay, you talk about being wounded by your past financial mistakes. A lot of time clutter is also a result of being wounded. How do you talk people through this so that they can be free from that past that keeps rearing its ugly head?

Stefania Mariaa (06:10.935)
So part of, this is a little bit weird and woo to some, but what I will say is that shame is an addiction.

Kathi (06:20.182)
Yes, yeah, we talk about shame all the time in here. Yes

Stefania Mariaa (06:23.559)
Yeah, so when we have, let’s say, this embarrassing financial decision that we made, we spent too much money on XYZ, or even time wise, I spent too much time on TikTok, or I.

Kathi (06:28.894)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah. You guys, she said Zed because she’s Canadian. So I just to all my Canadian listeners, I just want the shout out. You noticed that other people may not have, but I know you love it when we have our Canadian friends on here. Please go ahead.

Stefania Mariaa (06:36.861)
Ew.

Stefania Mariaa (06:49.428)
I haven’t said a yet, so that’s great. But whenever we spend in excess of our resources, there’s usually this moment of embarrassment, like how could I do that? Oh my gosh, I’m bad. And it’s like this gasping for air. And the problem being is that if that becomes our familiar, if that is the thing that is the most frequent experience.

Kathi (06:51.736)
Hahaha!

Stefania Mariaa (07:15.191)
there’s a neuro groove that gets reinforced there. And even though it’s a negative experience, that neuro groove being reinforced means that we know what to expect from it. So we can feel the shame, we know how to move through the shame, we know how to bask in the shame, but we don’t know how to be unashamed for the past decisions we’ve made. And so if you find yourself in these cycles of like, I’m so humiliated.

Kathi (07:28.48)
Okay.

Kathi (07:36.238)
Mmm.

Okay.

Stefania Mariaa (07:43.415)
that I made that past decision, and I don’t wanna make another mistake like that. The first step is to one, and this is gonna sound a little callous, but like, get over yourself. That shame doesn’t pay. If anything, it actually locks up your energy so that you never move beyond it and that you sit in these looming mental kind of self-harming cycles, instead of being like, oh, I made that mistake. This is why I think it’s a mistake, not what others think is a mistake.

Kathi (07:52.687)
Mmm, right.

Kathi (08:01.632)
Yeah.

Kathi (08:06.976)
Right.

Mm-hmm. This is why I think this is. Yeah. Whatever makes sense. Right. What I think makes sense. Yeah.

Stefania Mariaa (08:13.239)
This is why I think it’s a mistake. And this is what I’ve learned from it. And this is how I’m gonna shift moving forward. I often say to people like, you know, student loan debt is like a huge thing that people feel ashamed by.

Kathi (08:21.781)
Yes.

Stefania Mariaa (08:29.271)
Right?

Kathi (08:29.828)
Guys, there is a huge industry out there to get you to have student loans. They have spent decades perfecting how to entice you into this. This is not something you should be ashamed of.

Stefania Mariaa (08:37.012)
Oh yeah.

Stefania Mariaa (08:45.155)
Absolutely not. And one of the things that I often teach people is like, well, one, you were a teenager when you made that decision. And even though that sucks, teenage you thought that adult you would be able to handle it.

Kathi (08:51.626)
Yes. I think we know that sucks. Mm-hmm.

Kathi (08:59.962)
Right, right, absolutely.

Stefania Mariaa (09:01.923)
Okay, so when you made that decision, you did the best you possibly could given the circumstances you were in. And I understand that as an adult, you have a lot of judgment for the teenage decision, but that’s where you need to get over yourself because they did the best they could.

Kathi (09:07.818)
Right. Yes.

Kathi (09:14.928)
Mm-hmm.

Kathi (09:18.874)
Right, they were trying to take care of you. Yes.

Stefania Mariaa (09:21.675)
Yeah. And this extends beyond, like, you know, some people they’ll feel regret for a marriage that they entered into. Well, past you wasn’t from the same frame of reference. So all that shame and humiliation is really a self judgment rather than self honoring.

Kathi (09:28.278)
Yeah. Well, passed you. Right.

Yes.

Kathi (09:38.06)
Yes.

Stefania, I will tell you, I have come to the conclusion just within the past few months, that 25% of my decisions are mistakes. Now, it’s everything from the kind of canned sardines I bought, to my first marriage, to so many things I’ve done are mistakes. And I think that is entirely human.

So even though 25% of my decisions are mistakes, I’m learning from 100% of them. And I, and you know, like I would say probably in my late teens, early twenties, 75% of my decisions were mistakes. So my average is getting better. It’s just when we live our lives on such a razor thin margin that we can’t make mistakes without absolute disaster that we get into trouble.

Stefania Mariaa (10:16.579)
exactly.

Stefania Mariaa (10:38.071)
Mm-hmm.

Kathi (10:39.338)
And so that’s why we have to understand that there are going to be mistakes.

Stefania Mariaa (10:43.523)
Absolutely, and I love that you bring this into the conversation around like, oh no, if I make a mistake, my life’s going to combust.

Kathi (10:50.653)
Right.

Stefania Mariaa (10:52.175)
So the way that I teach financial intimacy, there is like this deeply spiritual aspect of it. And I think most money teachers, if they have any sense, will also include the spiritual aspect of it. And so there’s this concept of, we’ll always reach points in our life where we’ll have to like totally surrender to reality. I’m of the mind that if money is this like do or die experience,

Kathi (10:58.422)
Mm-hmm.

Kathi (11:03.669)
Yeah.

Stefania Mariaa (11:19.399)
It actually means that there were several instances prior to that moment that got ignored.

Kathi (11:25.782)
Mmm, yeah.

Stefania Mariaa (11:28.299)
It’s like, I need to leave my job and find a better job, but yet you stayed at that job for another eight months. And now you’re in a do or die. It’s, I need to take a look at my spending, but then you avoided your credit card statement for a year, and now you’re in this tremendous debt. It’s the magic people want around their money is actually in the work they’re avoiding.

Kathi (11:34.263)
Right.

Yeah.

Kathi (11:45.579)
Yeah.

Kathi (11:52.054)
Mm-hmm.

Stefania Mariaa (11:53.579)
Right? And so when we’re looking at this, like, I can’t afford to make a mistake. It’s like, actually now is when you need to make the mistake because you didn’t make them when you could afford it.

Kathi (12:00.896)
Yeah.

Right, and guys, it is painful to look at your current situation, but it is absolutely necessary because what it does is it says, oh, this is why I made this decision, this is why I did this. You know what, I’m gonna forgive myself for that, but I’m also not going to repeat that mistake by ignoring it, and that is a beautiful thing. Stefania.

Stefania Mariaa (12:11.427)
Mm-hmm.

Kathi (12:29.822)
The reason I wanted this whole conversation is because you did a TikTok about spending by proxy. And I have never heard this before, but I have done this. I have done this a bunch of times. And I want you to explain what spending by proxy is, what it looks like in our lives, and how we can correct it. Go.

Stefania Mariaa (12:54.147)
Absolutely. So spending by proxy, said simply, is that when you spend like the people you are near to. So what this looks like, it starts again, it’s something that is very rooted in our teenage years because we’re surrounded by other friends. Now if those friends were also in financially turmoil experiences, we will mimic their spending for connection. If we had friends who are more financially better off than we were, we would have been

Kathi (13:09.55)
Mm-hmm.

Kathi (13:16.63)
Right. Yes.

Stefania Mariaa (13:22.859)
we will still mimic their spending for connection. So spending by proxy is actually a way of using money to induce a sense of connection, even though it’s not the connection we really desire, but to mimic it so that we don’t feel so isolated in our personal experience. And so what this can look like is, when I was in startup world,

Kathi (13:26.201)
Uh-huh. Yes.

Kathi (13:38.359)
Mm-hmm.

Kathi (13:44.779)
Yes.

Stefania Mariaa (13:51.059)
So to give you some background, I used to be a financial controller for an international startup. That meant I was going back and forth from San Francisco, from LA. I was rubbing elbows with some really upper echelon startup culture people. And there was this sense of, oh, I can just buy flights. Going back to last week’s episode where I was talking about this over-reliance on abundance. I’ll just buy flights. I’ll always get more money. I’ll always get another paycheck. I’ll just buy flights.

Kathi (13:55.356)
Mm-hmm.

Kathi (14:08.056)
Mm-hmm.

Kathi (14:14.479)
Right. Yeah.

Stefania Mariaa (14:20.427)
What this meant was that I was incurring quite a lot of spending around flying because the people I was surrounded by were able to freely do that. Meanwhile, I was actually not in a position to not question the price of these flights, right? And so kind of unconsciously, blindly would be paying for these things. And then as I started to deepen in my financial intimacy practice, I was like, oh, I was not actually like,

Kathi (14:24.898)
Mm-hmm.

Kathi (14:30.259)
Yeah.

Kathi (14:36.566)
Right! Yes.

Stefania Mariaa (14:50.111)
Some of those flights were not true for me. It actually wasn’t respectful for me to be spending money on those flights. I could have bought something that was a little bit more aligned. But on the flip side, spending by proxy also showed up in my life when I moved back to rural BC during the pandemic. Cause I was like, I have property there. I can live there, renovate the cottage, even though there was no running water. You know, it was a real like real roughen it life.

Kathi (14:53.25)
Meh. Mm-hmm.

Kathi (15:00.672)
Yeah.

Kathi (15:10.09)
Mm-hmm.

Kathi (15:17.562)
Wow. Yeah.

Stefania Mariaa (15:20.483)
But what I started to recognize was, oh, I’m starting to take on my parents’ financial belief systems again. I’m taking on my friends from high school, their financial perspectives, but they don’t live the same life I do. And to give you kind of a simple example of how I started to unwind this was, I was renovating my property, and the one thing I was really clear on that I deeply wanted was a cloth-foot bathtub.

Kathi (15:37.366)
right.

Kathi (15:50.966)
Oh, I understand that deeply, yes.

Stefania Mariaa (15:51.959)
I was like, yep. I was like, that’s all I want. And given that I didn’t have running water, it was like the epitome goal, right? Like, I can’t wait to have bath in my claw foot bathtub. And I remember having a conversation with a friend and their response was, do you know how expensive that is? Which I’m going to tell you, if you have that sentence in your vocabulary, I want you to get rid of it. Because…

Kathi (15:59.079)
Of course!

Yeah.

Kathi (16:18.91)
Yeah, yeah, it’s a judgment that doesn’t need to be there.

Stefania Mariaa (16:22.995)
Exactly. Now, in that moment when it came up, because it actually showed up several times. It came, like the guy at Home Depot said that to me. And like, all of these people were just, oh yeah, all of these people were just projecting onto me this expense. And I was like, wow, I have one of two options here. I can either A, cower and agree, which would then take on their belief system that there is some number that I’m supposed to obey when it comes to renovations on my home.

and what I’m going to be using my resources towards. Or I can actually have some backing for myself.

Kathi (16:51.701)
Yes.

Kathi (16:55.15)
Mm-hmm.

Kathi (17:02.701)
Mm-hmm.

Stefania Mariaa (17:03.167)
It’s not expensive because it’s exactly what I want to spend my money on. Now I’ll be, I’ll give you some full disclosure here. The more you align yourself with reverent spending, right? Where your money is an extension of your self-respect. It will be deeply confronting to those who still use their money in disrespectful ways, because sometimes not spending money is the disrespectful thing.

Kathi (17:25.066)
Right. It’s-

Kathi (17:29.866)
Yes. Ugh, yes! It’s so true.

Stefania Mariaa (17:32.767)
Right. And so in spending by proxy, I could have totally cowered and been like, Oh, I have to save all my money. Even though self-employed, I make good money. I live very like, again, I didn’t have running water. I don’t have any vices. Like I live a very sober, clear life. I was like, wow, here are these people who are spending their money on like dirt bikes, like brand new dirt bikes. And those are a couple of grand that they only use in rural Northern BC, you know, a couple months out of the year.

Kathi (17:39.01)
Yeah.

Kathi (17:49.687)
Yeah.

Kathi (17:55.134)
Yeah. No.

Stefania Mariaa (18:01.799)
on the weekends. So let’s say 12 weekends. They’re spending a couple grand on 12 weekends. And I’m like, oh, but my bathtub that is only $1,600 that I will use every single day is too expensive.

Kathi (18:02.406)
Right. Yeah.

Stefania Mariaa (18:17.203)
I started to realize that this concept of like, that’s expensive was a way of trying to control other people’s experience of resources. So the practice, right? And it was like, the practice was like, wait a minute, I’m sovereign. I’m reverent. How I’m going to use my resources is up to no one else other than me because how I earn my resources is also generated by no one else other than me.

Kathi (18:26.841)
It is so true. Yeah.

Kathi (18:33.708)
Yes.

Right.

Kathi (18:41.343)
Yeah.

Kathi (18:47.662)
Stefania, it’s not about respecting money, it’s about respecting yourself and knowing what’s important to you, what is going to bring you joy, what is going to save you the time that you need or the energy you need. We all have to constantly balance all of these resources and nobody else can make those decisions for us. If you have a spouse or a partner, yes, you get to have those discussions.

Stefania Mariaa (18:54.147)
Exactly.

Kathi (19:17.11)
But you have to know what’s important to you because there are things that are incredibly important to my husband that are not important at all to me. But because I respect him and I care deeply for him, that’s where our money goes. And it’s vice versa. But if we never have the discussion, then we’re always choosing the lesser thing and fighting over the bigger thing.

Stefania Mariaa (19:33.955)
Mm-hmm.

Kathi (19:45.662)
And that’s not how I want to live my life. Okay, we have like exactly one minute. Guys, in the last episode, we talked about the Entertein Money Masterclass. I’m going to put a link for that in here. Guys, just trust me, go do it. It’s a half hour of your time. It’s going to reveal some of the beliefs you have around money, some of the thought patterns, what other people have told you about money.

that you don’t need to believe anymore and how to get over that. And Stefania, I want them to follow you on TikTok because you give little tiny master classes every single time you get on there. People need to, we need to realign our neuro pathways about how we think about money. Stefania, thank you so much for being here today.

Stefania Mariaa (20:28.62)
I really do.

Stefania Mariaa (20:38.391)
Thank you so much for inviting me. I love having these conversations and as long as they land with the people that lands with, that’s all I’m here to do.

Kathi (20:45.518)
Yeah, exactly. And you guys, as you start to unpack your money, see how it’s connected to your clutter, because I guarantee you, I guarantee you, how you’re thinking about your money is how you’re thinking about your stuff. It comes out every single time that way. And guys, just remember, Jesus spoke more about our money and our stuff than anything else in the Bible. It is how we respect ourselves. It’s how we respect God. It’s how we respect each other.

Hey friends, thank you for joining us today. You’ve been listening to ClutterFree Academy. I’m Cathy Lib. And now go create the clutter free life you were always intended to live.

 

More Posts 

#598 7 Ways to Buy Less in 2024

#598 7 Ways to Buy Less in 2024

by | Jan 2, 2024 | Clutter Free Podcast, Finances, Home, Organizing, Overwhelmed, Podcast, tips and ideas | 0 comments

Listen Now

598 – 7 Ways to Buy Less in 2024

Are you ready to start the year with less clutter?

This is the episode for you, my friend.

As you put away the holiday decorations and look around, you may feel like it’s time to start fresh with some decluttering for the new year. Kathi Lipp and her partner in life and decluttering Roger Lipp give us 7 perfectly practical ways to declutter by buying less in 2024. They’ve looked at their personal practices and come up with some fabulous ideas for you to implement to start 2024 a bit more clutter-free. Listen in as they discuss decluttering ideas such as:

  • How to make online shopping inconvenient.
  • How to use it up before you buy more.
  • How to recognize your personal clutter traps.

 Sign up here to be notified when the next episode is released.

The Accidental Homesteader: What I’ve Learned About Chickens, Compost, and Creating Home

Homesteading [hohm-sted-ing]
noun
1. an act or instance of establishing a homestead.
2. the act of loving where you live so much that you actively ignore the fact that your house is trying to kill you on a regular basis.

For Kathi Lipp and her husband, Roger, buying a house in one of the most remote parts of Northern California was never part of the plan; many of life’s biggest, most rewarding adventures rarely are.

Kathi shares the hard-won wisdom she’s gained on her homestead journey to help you accomplish more at home, gain fresh perspective, and give yourself grace in the process. Here’s a handful of the lessons Kathi shares:

  • Prepare before the need arises
  • Everything is always in process, including us
  • Your best household solution is time and patience
  • You don’t have to do everything the hard way
  • Be open to new and better ways of doing things
  • A lot of small changes make a huge difference.
    Highly practical, humorous, and inspirational, The Accidental Homesteader will encourage you to live with more peace, joy, and contentment.

Order your copy of The Accidental Homesteader: What I’ve Learned About Chickens, Compost, and Creating Home here.

Links Mentioned:

Kathi Lipp’s Clutter-free Academy Facebook Group 

 

Favorites:

Learn more about Clutter Free for Life

Advertisements can be real stressors. Do you take time annually to unsubscribe from advertising email lists? What’s your strategy?

Share your answers in the comments.

Let’s stay connected

To share your thoughts:

  • Leave a note in the comment section below.
  • Leave an honest review on iTunes. Your ratings and reviews really help and I read each one.

Subscribe on iTunes or subscribe to our newsletter now.

Meet Our Guest 

 

Roger Lipp

Roger is a productivity and quality engineer for a Fortune 50 company.

Roger helps teams reach their full productivity potential by teaching them the practical and simple steps to reach their goals. Roger and his wife, author Kathi Lipp, teach communicators how to share their message through social media and email marketing.

He and Kathi coauthored Happy Habits for Every Couple with Harvest House Publishers.

Transcript

Kathleen Lipp (00:00.958)
Well, hey friends, welcome to Clutter-Free Academy, where our goal is to help you take small, doable steps to live every day with less clutter and more life. And you know, when you want real life examples, there’s nothing more real life than getting your husband to be on here with you. Cause there’s no, there’s no coating it, there’s no rose colored glass, this is the real thing. And guys, what we are here to talk to you about today is,

we’ve had to do some real soul searching in our house about how to buy less stuff. And so I am here with my favorite partner in crime. It’s Roger Lipp. Hey, Rog.

Roger (00:45.519)
Hey there, and I was just thinking, okay, so you’re talking about clutter and what better way than to bring my husband on? The creator of clutter.

Kathleen Lipp (00:55.194)
Right. No, you know what? No, let’s be clear. I know, I know, and I have said many times that of us, I am the cluttery one. Now, you have your clutter conundrums, your clutter corners, your clutter, you know, catchers. Let’s just say tech. For a long, long time, we had a box called goo.

Roger (01:20.047)
Oh yeah.

Kathleen Lipp (01:24.562)
And that goo was just tech stuff that I don’t think anybody was using. And yeah, so, but here’s what I know. We’re gonna talk about seven ways to buy less in 2024. And these are some things that we have either done or in the process of doing to keep, because clutter, we talk so much about getting rid of clutter.

which is crucial and critical, but if we can keep clutter from coming into our house, and let’s be clear, when we’re talking about clutter, it’s stuff you don’t love, use, or would buy again, but everything is bright and shiny when you first bring it into the house. So.

Roger (02:10.335)
Oh yeah, it all starts with a wonderful possibility.

Kathleen Lipp (02:13.762)
Yes, so I need less bright and shiny in my life. Let’s just be super, super clear. So here are some things that we have employed that are helping us to have less clutter and to think about, and I’m not gonna say do all seven of these things guys, but maybe pick one or two that you can work on that will make a significant difference in your life. So number one is know what you have and where it is.

I will say I know.

Roger (02:44.356)
Oh, oh man.

All right, that where it is, is a tricky part.

Kathleen Lipp (02:51.474)
Yes, yeah, you know, I think it has taken us a good five years to kind of figure out how we’re using our house because we’ve used our house in different ways. If you don’t know our house story, first this was an Airbnb and then we moved into it to primarily do a lot of retreats and then the pandemic happened.

So we’ve used our house in a bunch of different ways. I think we’re finally honing in on how to do things. But also, you know, one of the things that I talk about in ClutterFree so often is you don’t have to store everything at your house. You can store some things at Walmart. You can store some things at Target. You can store things other places, and then when you need them, you go buy them. That’s not really our situation here. If I need a certain kind of flower,

If it’s not here, it’s another week until I can get that flower. So I keep on hand more things than probably the average bear. You probably do too, Roger, when it comes to materials around.

Roger (04:00.955)
Oh, yeah, we think about, you know, what do we need to be prepared for a season? And that has its own set of things, especially winter for us where we’ll have limited access to the outside world.

Kathleen Lipp (04:07.369)
Right.

Kathleen Lipp (04:15.294)
Yeah, so we have for us is know what you have and where it is. And one of the things that we’ve had to do is kind of leave notes to our future self about where things are. I mean, we really thought that maybe we threw away a bunch of cushions last year, we could not find them anywhere. These were cushions for outdoors, we had stored, you know, it’s like, did we store them for the winter? We had some that got ruined.

And so we said, did we throw away everything? Well, it turns out they were stored in an extra vehicle. And it made sense to do that. It was our trailer and it was covered. But we were about to go buy just a whole bunch of stuff because we didn’t know where it was. And so this year we’ll put a note like in April to say, hey, this is where it’s at. I do that with wrapping paper to say, hey,

Don’t buy any wrapping paper, you’ve got plenty. It’s in the attic. You know, notes to our future selves.

Roger (05:17.499)
And you use your calendar, don’t you, for a lot of those kinds of notes.

Kathleen Lipp (05:20.378)
Oh, yes, you know, on a different note, things like cover the patio umbrella, which, okay, so it’s very silly, but when I type that into my calendar and it comes up every year, it’s the potato umbrella and it’s just, it makes me giggle every year, so we just, we call it the potato umbrella. Yeah. Yeah, it’s fun.

Roger (05:29.871)
the

Roger (05:40.583)
It’s a typo that has just stuck.

Kathleen Lipp (05:44.062)
So know what you have and where it is, and if it’s a seasonal thing, go ahead and make a note in your calendar about where you’re gonna be able to find it next year. We have storage that is not attached to our house, and we need to know what’s in that as well. Okay, number two, I think this is where we have made the biggest difference in the amount of, okay, you’re agreeing with me, yeah. Yeah.

Roger (06:04.975)
No.

Roger (06:08.355)
Oh yeah, I see the outline here and yes, 100 times yes.

Kathleen Lipp (06:12.71)
Number two, make Amazon inconvenient. Now, we really changed our Amazon purchasing practices when we did No Buy July. And if you guys have never done No Buy July, and we’re renaming it, we’re calling it Low Buy July because a lot of cloddery people are black and white people and they’re like, okay, I can’t buy anything including food the entire month. It’s like, no, that’s not what we’re trying to say. So we’re doing Low Buy.

So we didn’t buy anything from Amazon in January, I mean, excuse me, July. And we’ve really, I mean, drastically cut down our Amazon purchases. And I think it has made a huge difference in the amount of stuff coming into our house. How do you feel about it, Raj?

Roger (07:05.859)
Absolutely, especially in our situation where getting to a store is fairly inconvenient, Amazon grew in its convenience in our minds. So it was our go-to resource. We need a new hose, just put it in the Amazon cart. So everything was landing there and it was tremendously easy.

Kathleen Lipp (07:11.726)
Mm-hmm.

Kathleen Lipp (07:17.087)
Yeah.

Kathleen Lipp (07:26.423)
Right.

Kathleen Lipp (07:34.19)
Mm-hmm

Roger (07:34.595)
And I think what we found was that it was easy to the ease and convenience made us overspend and overbuy.

Kathleen Lipp (07:43.806)
Right, we were buying things that we didn’t, it wasn’t, you know, everybody buys stuff they don’t need. You don’t need that book, you don’t need that, you know, tablecloth. But it was just easy to spend that and not feel it. So I have taken Amazon off the front of my phone so it doesn’t come up easily.

And here’s the thing, the less you buy from there, the less you’ll buy from there. I know that’s the dumbest thing, you know, that sounds crazy, but if you get out of the habit of just going over there and doing the buy now, and I think about the environmental implications on that, you know, that buy now button, that could mean that, you know, FedEx or the Amazon truck is coming to your house several times.

And if you have a bad spending habit, that could really have an environmental impact. So I try to think about those things and make them inconvenient. And it’s already inconvenient for us anyway, because we can’t have Amazon delivered to our house. We have to go pick it up at my mom’s or at a locker. And so we’ve just fallen out of the Amazon habit. So how can you fall out of the Amazon habit? Can it be that you have to sign into Amazon?

every time you do it. That may be enough of a barrier to not just automatically go and spend there.

Roger (09:19.128)
or have it delivered to a locker instead of your house. And now it’s an extra step to actually get your product.

Kathleen Lipp (09:22.132)
Yes.

Kathleen Lipp (09:27.61)
Yeah, and I want to make sure that local stores stay in business. So when I’m buying a book, I want to go buy it whenever I can at Barnes and Noble. When I am buying, you know, makeup, I’m going to go to local Sephora. And I try to shop in smaller local stores whenever I can, because that’s going to keep them in business and that’s what we want. Okay. Number three.

unsub from advertising. I have been doing this, you know, every time you purchase something online, and you know, I’ve purchased several things online. I love this jewelry brand, it’s called Ink and Alloy. I just absolutely love it. But I have had, I unsub from their advertisements because it is too easy to get so many advertisements.

And then you’re like, well, I’m only buying from one place, but the amount of advertisements, it really, it affects my brain and it interrupts me all day long. I get a notification on my phone that there’s a new thing there. And so I’ve had to take myself off of some of those lists. I don’t want to, especially the coupons.

You know, if they’re sending you a coupon for 25% off, that’s a great coupon, unless you weren’t gonna buy anything anyway. And that need to purchase something can be a real stressor. Does the advertising affect you, Raj?

Roger (11:06.371)
Not as much. Occasionally, through my Facebook feed, I will get suckered into something. They get me dialed in on something that we’ve been talking about in the house, and suddenly it starts showing up in my feed. You’re right. But it doesn’t really hit me in my email as much. What comes to my email is always spam.

Kathleen Lipp (11:11.804)
Mm-hmm.

Kathleen Lipp (11:19.826)
Yes, because they’re always listening. Yeah.

Kathleen Lipp (11:30.07)
to always spam. So, you know, to just say, I’m not gonna click on that Facebook ad, I’m not gonna click on that TikTok ad, I am going to unsub from all advertising that I can. One thing that we do, and this isn’t an unsub, but it’s a different thing, is we pick up our mail and we sort it right there in the post office and recycle.

Roger (11:31.332)
Yeah.

Kathleen Lipp (11:57.354)
all those advertisements. Now I do keep the Sundance catalog because that’s my favorite catalog. It makes me super happy. And I keep the Costco. But otherwise, no, we’re just gonna get rid of it because it’s just enticing us to buy. Okay, now, and if you don’t pick up your mail, in our last house, we had our recycling can right next to the mailbox and it just went straight in there. Okay, number four.

Unsub from autoship. Okay Guys, yeah, you’ll never you will never hit just right the autoship deliveries the

Roger (12:37.087)
It’s like there has to be a way to dial these knobs to get it just right, and there isn’t.

Kathleen Lipp (12:42.782)
They say that there is but there and I skip it the only thing I do have on auto ship is our dog food but I Yeah, I skip it probably every like three or four months Because our dog has a weird eating schedule, but so that I’ve kept up but everything else I’ve taken off. I’ve taken my protein bars off of auto ship because I have like 12 boxes now. I’ve taken my coffee

Roger (12:51.295)
Is that working?

Kathleen Lipp (13:12.466)
Everything is off of auto ship chocolate syrup. Oh my goodness you guys. I don’t know. Yeah, what was happening and Amazon makes it pretty Inconvenient pretty hard to Completely detangle from auto ship and so if you think well, I use this pretty regularly I can do don’t do it Just don’t resist resist. Yeah

Roger (13:13.731)
Chocolate syrup is…

Roger (13:40.517)
Is it as bad as getting rid of a gym membership?

Kathleen Lipp (13:43.762)
It’s not that bad. But you have to know, but I’ve had to Google how to do it before, you know, and that’s just an extra step that I don’t need. I know when I’m running out of something.

Roger (13:45.343)
Okay, you don’t have to call Amazon.

Roger (13:55.023)
Huh. You’d think that they knew that was an extra step and people wouldn’t go through that extra step.

Kathleen Lipp (14:00.69)
Right, right. Yeah, so what they really want you to do, the social engineering behind it, is they don’t want you to cancel it. They want you, if you’re like, I’m gonna cancel it. No, you could just go to every three months instead of every month, or you could go to every six months. And that might work for some people, but you’re probably gonna run out before then and order. It’s just a mess, don’t do it. Unless you know you use the same amount of stuff every single month, it’s not worth it.

Roger (14:02.744)
Alright.

Kathleen Lipp (14:30.822)
Okay, number five, use it up before you buy more. There are certain things that go on sale at certain times of the year, and I try to buy X amount until we know we’re gonna need it again. But most of the time, I’m trying to use up, or at least get to, okay, we just have one serving left, or we just have a little bit left before we buy it. I used to be the,

accidental hoarder. Oh, that’s my next book. Okay, I did accidental homesteader now, accidental hoarder. But I would see something at Costco and think, well, Roger really likes those chips. I’m gonna buy some. Well, it turns out we had three bags at home. So really using it up before we’re buying more, it’s a challenge to myself to say, how far can I get to the bottom of

whatever it is before I buy more. Because a lot of things don’t have as big of a shelf life as you think they do. And you know, talking about the auto ship nightmares, we feed our chickens mealworms, dried mealworms. And somehow we had like six bags. And now you just empty the bag. So now I know to put on the list mealworms.

But we’re not at the bottom. The chickens will not revolt, but we have used it up, and now it’s time to either order more. We have tractor supplies on the way home from town, so that’s probably what we’ll do. Yeah, okay. They are.

Roger (16:15.339)
Yeah, those mealworms are expensive. But yes, I think, you know, cause if you buy significantly before it’s gone, you’re storing it at your house, you’re paying to store it at your house. And that’s, you know, depending on how big it is, that could create a space issue. Yeah.

Kathleen Lipp (16:25.59)
Yeah. Right.

Kathleen Lipp (16:33.514)
Yeah, if you’re a cluttery person, this is not the strategy for you. It’s just not. Unless you know exactly where it’s gonna go. You know, I buy the big packs of stewed tomatoes because we use those all winter long. So I’ll have 12 at a time, but I know exactly where they’re gonna go. I know I’m gonna use them in soups and stews and casseroles and all those kinds of things. It’s all good. Okay, number six, challenge yourself.

You know, where is an area that you are struggling? Again, in Clutter Free Academy, our free Facebook group, we are going to be doing our low by July. And people really challenge themselves. Some of the challenges that Roger and I have done is, we’ve done no by July, or low by July. I one time said, I went for a year without buying pens, which I probably need to do again, because I…

Guys, I have a problem. I love pens. I love certain kind, I’m a pen snob. I love a certain kind of pen. So, but I have plenty of pens. I don’t need more pens. I have done a challenge to clean out our freezer. So Roger would dip his hand in there, grab something out of the freezer, and I would cook it for one of our meals. Trying to think of some other challenges. I’ve done a notebook, you know, notebook buying for a year because I had.

plenty of books here I needed to purchase. You know, Roger, you don’t have as much of a clutter problem as I do, but is there a challenge that you think that would be helpful for you and when you’re acquiring stuff?

Roger (18:15.791)
You know, I could see things like a no Amazon month, just zero, not gonna do it. Yeah, that could be helpful. Just to reframe our thinking in terms of, okay, what other vendors out there that we could use or stores? Yeah.

Kathleen Lipp (18:19.034)
Mm-hmm. Yeah zero. Yeah. Yeah

Yeah, well, and I think it’s…

Kathleen Lipp (18:31.53)
Yeah. Because let’s be honest, Amazon has some less than awesome business practices when it comes to smaller retailers. And I want to aim my money dollar at, you know, buying local, even if it’s from a chain, I still believe, you know, as much as we can buy local.

And then when we can buy from small independent places, I like to buy clothes from independent designers whenever I can. It’s a little harder because I’m plus size. But you know, to get out of the easy trap, and I don’t buy clothes from places like Tmoo. Roger, you probably don’t even know what that is, but like it’s all the rage right now. They have very cheap stuff that you can buy, but it’s also slave labor.

And so I don’t want my dollars supporting that. Almost any clothing we buy, you know, so there are ethical considerations for this as too. So I love the idea of buying, you know, less and less from Amazon and more from independent, which I know can be sometimes be more expensive, but most of us are not lacking in our houses. You know, I’d rather save up for the thing that I really, really want from a business that’s doing business ethically than to…

just have more stuff in my house. That’s really what we’re trying to do is get less stuff in your house. But I still want you to have stuff that you love. And then number seven, know your traps. I think we all have that store that is just easy. They’ve set up the store to really make it easy for you to get lost in and spend more time in and purchase more.

I, some of the ones I’ve heard of Marshall’s, Target, Michael’s, Costco, you know.

Roger (20:30.543)
Are you saying that IKEA has a strategy behind how they lay out their stores?

Kathleen Lipp (20:33.622)
Oh my gosh, right? You can’t get out until you’ve eaten a dozen Swedish meatballs and a cinnamon bun. You’re not allowed to leave. Yeah, so you don’t die. Yes, exactly. So if you’re going to these stores and you’re like, you know what, I just want a new shirt. I want a new shirt. You go get that new shirt. But you don’t need, you know.

Roger (20:42.991)
That’s why the restaurant is there, so in case you starve while you’re trying to find your way out.

Kathleen Lipp (21:01.266)
a face mask, a face roller, a new dog bed, all the things that Marshall’s is famous for. Target, go in with a plan, go in with a list. Michaels, our daughter could be lost in a Michaels for a month. It’s so easy. And when you’re in Michaels, you can discover a new craft that you’ve…

Never heard of, but now you have to buy all the stuff for. Go in with a list. We go to town each week when we’re running errands and we know what we’re buying at Home Depot. We know what we’re buying at Ace Hardware. We know what we’re buying at Walgreens or Costco or whatever it is. Go in with a plan so that you don’t just get sucked into buying all the things because they’re there and they’re pretty.

So Roger, which of these of the seven that we’ve talked about, do you feel like we need to kind of, well, oh, the other with the know your traps. Also, you know what? I mean, go in and be excited to buy what you want to buy. We are going to Disney. We’re going to Disneyland after a speaking trip. And Roger has already said, just so you know,

This is what are you buying when you’re at Disney? What’s gonna be your tchotchke, your goody?

Roger (22:32.387)
I am getting one shot key while we’re there. I’m gonna get a probably $150 button down art shirt from Disney. So, you know, one of their artists that has done it. So a little more intentional kind of design.

Kathleen Lipp (22:43.946)
Like the Hawaiian style shirts, yeah.

Kathleen Lipp (22:51.982)
Yeah, and you, I mean, if there’s anything you collect, that’s probably what it is, is the Disney shirt. And we’re going for your 60th birthday, so you get a Tragickey. I also am, I’m like, I wanna get a couple of Disney shirts. I’ve lost a bunch of weight and my Disney shirts don’t fit anymore. So I know I wanna get two Disney shirts and one zip-up hoodie. Like…

That’s, I know what I want and that’s what I’m getting. And so we’re going in with a plan. Oh, and I’m sorry, your daughter wants us all to get ears.

Roger (23:31.219)
I have never bought ears for myself.

Kathleen Lipp (23:33.79)
Well, here you go. Here you go.

Roger (23:36.291)
have all these I go to this you know we’ve been Disney people for a long time and I’ve never bought yours for myself.

Kathleen Lipp (23:41.81)
Yeah. Well, this is the year because Amanda really wants all of us to get ears. I don’t know if she maybe she said the girls to get ears. OK, we’re going to figure it out, but it’s going to be fun. Yeah.

Roger (23:47.797)
All right.

Roger (23:53.658)
So we have our plan. We’ll see what actually happens, but that is our plan. And, you know, we’re not necessarily super rigid. No, we’re not going to get that other thing, but, you know.

Kathleen Lipp (23:57.43)
Yeah.

Kathleen Lipp (24:03.09)
No. No, because we’ve set money aside to, yes, to go and do the thing. And so we’re going to go do the thing, but we’re going in with a plan. We go, we’re going in knowing what we want and I’m super excited. Okay. So what do you feel like we need to do focus on of these seven things?

Roger (24:07.895)
Right, we have saved. Right.

Roger (24:29.995)
Well, we’ve made the most progress on making Amazon inconvenient. So I think we need to continue pushing the envelope on that. I do also resonate with the Use It Up Before We Buy More and making sure that we’re getting the stuff that is needed when we need it. Yeah.

Kathleen Lipp (24:34.92)
Yeah.

Kathleen Lipp (24:44.437)
Yeah.

Kathleen Lipp (24:49.222)
Right. And I really, my thing is, know what you have and where it is. It’s still a struggle. You know, yeah, so because we have, this is a new kind of life for us, even though we’ve been here for five years and knowing what we need and where it is, we’re still working on that. It’s, you know, we’ve made a ton of progress, but we’re still working on it.

Roger (24:56.235)
Yeah, there is that. Oh my, yes.

Roger (25:13.193)
We have an event coming up this weekend and we need a credit card charger thing and we can’t find it. So we have to go buy another one.

Kathleen Lipp (25:19.374)
Because we can’t find it.

So frustrating. It’s, it just, yeah. Anyway, okay. Seven ways to buy less in 2024. Guys, if one of the things you wanna do is challenge yourself, we have a bunch of challenges in the Clutterfree Academy group, but in July, you know, which seems like a long time off, but it’s really not. We’re gonna be doing our low buy July. So if you go and join,

Kathy Lipp’s Clutterfree Academy on Facebook will have a link in the notes. Guys, do it because it’s gonna be, you are going to change your life. Roger, thanks for hanging out with me. And yeah, and friends, thank you for hanging out with me. You’ve been listening to Clutterfree Academy. I’m Kathy Lipp. And now, go create the clutter free life you were always intended to live.

Roger (26:03.779)
A lot of fun.

 

More Posts 

#597 5 Things I Do the Day After Christmas to Stay Clutter Free

#597 5 Things I Do the Day After Christmas to Stay Clutter Free

by | Dec 26, 2023 | Clutter Free, Clutter Free Podcast, Decorating, How to, Podcast, tips and ideas | 0 comments

Listen Now

597 – 5 Things I Do the Day After Christmas to Stay Clutter Free

You made it through the holiday…but your living room didn’t! Are you wondering how to deal with all that Christmas clutter?

In this episode, Kathi and Roger Lipp share five timely tips for taming the mayhem left behind after all the merriment.

Listen in for their hints and hacks on:

  • Knowing whether to return, recycle, or donate stuff left over from the festivities.
  • Sharing out of your abundance.
  • Saving your after-Christmas sanity!

Sign up here to be notified when the next episode is released.

The Accidental Homesteader: What I’ve Learned About Chickens, Compost, and Creating Home

Homesteading [hohm-sted-ing]
noun
1. an act or instance of establishing a homestead.
2. the act of loving where you live so much that you actively ignore the fact that your house is trying to kill you on a regular basis.

For Kathi Lipp and her husband, Roger, buying a house in one of the most remote parts of Northern California was never part of the plan; many of life’s biggest, most rewarding adventures rarely are.

Kathi shares the hard-won wisdom she’s gained on her homestead journey to help you accomplish more at home, gain fresh perspective, and give yourself grace in the process. Here’s a handful of the lessons Kathi shares:

  • Prepare before the need arises
  • Everything is always in process, including us
  • Your best household solution is time and patience
  • You don’t have to do everything the hard way
  • Be open to new and better ways of doing things
  • A lot of small changes make a huge difference.
    Highly practical, humorous, and inspirational, The Accidental Homesteader will encourage you to live with more peace, joy, and contentment.

Order your copy of The Accidental Homesteader: What I’ve Learned About Chickens, Compost, and Creating Home here.

Favorites:

An Abundant Place: Daily Retreats for the Woman Who Can’t Get Away

 

 

Clutter Free Resources:

Learn more about Clutter Free for Life

Join our Clutter Free Academy Facebook Group

What things do you do the day after Christmas to keep your home clutter free? Share your answer in the comments.

Let’s stay connected

To share your thoughts:

  • Leave a note in the comment section below.
  • Leave an honest review on iTunes. Your ratings and reviews really help and I read each one.

Subscribe on iTunes or subscribe to our newsletter now.

Meet Our Guest 

 

Roger Lipp

Roger is a productivity and quality engineer for a Fortune 50 company.

Roger helps teams reach their full productivity potential by teaching them the practical and simple steps to reach their goals. Roger and his wife, author Kathi Lipp, teach communicators how to share their message through social media and email marketing.

He and Kathi coauthored Happy Habits for Every Couple with Harvest House Publishers.

Transcript

Kathleen Lipp:
Well, hey friends, welcome to Clutter-Free Academy where our goal is to help you take small doable steps to live every day with less clutter and more life. And Roger, happy day after Christmas!

Roger:
Oh hey!

Kathleen Lipp:
Yay! Survived another Christmas, yay!

Roger:
Yes.

Kathleen Lipp:
And guys, as you probably can imagine, we are recording this before the day after Christmas. But we know,

Roger:
We don’t even have snow on the ground right now.

Kathleen Lipp:
I know, we haven’t even had snow yet. And yeah, we’re firm into winter up here, winter time up here. But Christmas brings a lot of chaos and Christmas can bring a lot of clutter. And so this is gonna be a… Very fast episode guys because I know you’ve got other things to do. I know I hope you’re still watching Christmas movies I hope you’re still doing all the Christmas things but I wanted to tell you five things that we and in the Lipp household here at the Red House do in order to stay clutter-free after Christmas and so We’re gonna go through this fast because I want you to enjoy your day after Christmas But number one, deal with the Christmas clutter right away. So anything you are keeping, break down the boxes. Recycle that paper if you can. If you’re a paper reuser or a bag reuser, please be a bag reuser. Fold those up, put them away. If you have family in from out of town, sort through this stuff. Every year somebody leaves a gift behind here and then. You know, it’s four months until we see them again. No, I’m not, I don’t want to store things for people. How else do we deal with the Christmas clutter, Rog?

Roger:
Oh, you know, probably a lot of families do this. We make a game out of throwing away of the wrapping paper.

Kathleen Lipp:
Yes.

Roger:
We have the big garbage bag. Can you make the shot from where you’re sitting with the

Kathleen Lipp:
Yes.

Roger:
crumpled up paper?

Kathleen Lipp:
Yes,

Roger:
So

Kathleen Lipp:
I-

Roger:
that’s just little things like that keep the system flowing and keeping the house picked up.

Kathleen Lipp:
Yeah, and another thing, if you have Christmas ornaments, Christmas decorations things, that year after year do not get pulled out, then it’s time to donate those. It’s time to donate them. And I’m being a bit of a hypocrite here because I have a whole dish set that I love, but there’s no place to display it or store it here at the Red House. We just don’t have the space for it. And… You know, the Red House is not our forever home because someday we will physically not be able to live here because it’s a crazy place to live. But I want to be able to have those dishes. If anybody’s familiar, the Macy’s log cabin design and they make me super happy. I’m not a China person, but this is like stoneware. It’s wonderful. But deal with the, if you have… Ornaments things like that never get put on the tree go donate them You know, that’s some of the things you could deal with right away Put all that stuff aside. Yeah, right

Roger:
If you have lights that don’t work, you might be thinking, oh, it’s a project. I’ll get that fixed someday. Will you?

Kathleen Lipp:
Yeah

Roger:
I know I won’t.

Kathleen Lipp:
Yeah, and Roger’s a lighting guy like he’s a Lighting guy at our church and if he’s not gonna do it You’re probably not gonna do it or the people in your life are probably not gonna do it Is this why we have to buy lights almost every single year?

Roger:
Absolutely 100%.

Kathleen Lipp:
Okay.

Roger:
This is the

Kathleen Lipp:
Oh my

Roger:
only

Kathleen Lipp:
goodness

Roger:
reason.

Kathleen Lipp:
Uh-huh. The only reason not that our house gets more lit up like a Roman candle every single year Okay, so number one deal with the Christmas clutter right away. Okay number two make a meal plan with any leftovers. You have been cooking and cooking and you’ve had people come coming and cooking. So a couple of things, either repurpose those leftovers or eat them right away. Or one of the things that we do at Costco, we buy those to-go containers. They’re from GLAD, they’re plastic to-go containers. So you can pack those up and send them home with your guests. We pack up food and take it to our neighbor who doesn’t cook But he’s always he’s a volunteer firefighter. And so he’s on calls all the time. So we just bring him a meal and It’s good to go. So if you know, make a plan to eat up that food, that’s what I’m saying.

Roger:
Yeah, and I think there’s we’re also attacking this one from the other side this year by having a little bit more strategic plan going in to Christmas.

Kathleen Lipp:
Yes, yes. So we overcooked.

Roger:
I guess this is airing after Christmas, so the cows have left the barn for that one.

Kathleen Lipp:
Yeah, but, but you know, it’s a good thing to think about for next year. You know, every year I put on my calendar, not every year, but most years, do not buy wrapping paper. You have plenty. Um, one of the things that I have already put on my calendar for October next year is you only need the Turkey and three side dishes and two desserts. Um, we lost

Roger:
Yes.

Kathleen Lipp:
our minds this year. I don’t know what happened, but it was crazy. So yeah, you can make less usually. And one of the things that I really discovered is I used to make everybody’s favorites and I’m like, no, I’ll make that for your birthday. Let’s do that for your birthday. We don’t have to do that for every single holiday. So be strategic going in, but also plan to use up those leftovers because I don’t want you to cook just because you need a little variety. People can eat the same thing over and over again. Okay, number three. Schedule a day to do returns do not do returns on today on the 26th. That’s craziness. Don’t do it Don’t do it stay away from the stores. Don’t do it. You are too valuable Your time is too valuable. Your sanity is too valuable, but you know, could you do it? January 2nd could you do it? You know most places have 30 days you do not need to do it the day after I love Amazon returns we are buying less from Amazon but there are specific things that our kids sometimes want that are only on Amazon but I love that you can just go to like a Whole Foods or a UPS store and be able to do that return very easily Make sure that you can you know, if you absolutely can find those receipts Places like Marshall’s they’ll give you a gift card, but you can’t get your money back on your card Target I love their return policy because as long as you have a Target, you know account not their credit card, but like their frequent buyer you get the app as long as you have the app It keeps track of what you’ve purchased and you don’t even need a receipt

Roger:
But

Kathleen Lipp:
Anything on that?

Roger:
we can’t

Kathleen Lipp:
Yeah

Roger:
talk about returns without talking about Costco.

Kathleen Lipp:
What why what

Roger:
Oh,

Kathleen Lipp:
oh you

Roger:
there

Kathleen Lipp:
mean?

Roger:
you can

Kathleen Lipp:
the

Roger:
return it for

Kathleen Lipp:
return

Roger:
like a

Kathleen Lipp:
anything

Roger:
year. Yeah.

Kathleen Lipp:
Yes

Roger:
It’s, it’s

Kathleen Lipp:
Which

Roger:
wild.

Kathleen Lipp:
is lovely. Yeah, we returned a computer recently now there is the infamous somebody returned to christmas tree after christmas If you’re that

Roger:
Okay,

Kathleen Lipp:
person,

Roger:
don’t cheat

Kathleen Lipp:
please

Roger:
the system.

Kathleen Lipp:
don’t be that yeah, please don’t be that person. That’s just gross But yeah, you know, I bought you some uh battery operated socks and because you’re often out there doing snow that kind of thing, but they didn’t work. And so I had them, I just returned them like in July after I had bought them in October and it was no problem. No, you know, by the way, we give enough money to Costco, it shouldn’t be a problem. And Sam’s club is the same way. I’ve never had any problems returning anything to Sam’s club is the but be a returner. Do not keep things in your house, be a returner. So yes, Costco, Costco’s great about that. Okay, number four. So you scheduled a day to do returns, I want you to schedule a day to do a drop-off at the charity shop. You know, if that’s not a regular part of your errands, either make it a regular part and you’re just dropping off like one little bag at a time, or. Schedule a day to do it after Christmas because when you get all this new stuff in There should be stuff going out of your house And especially if you have little kids who are growing out of their stuff They don’t have cousins or little brothers or sisters, you know get that back in there are people who could use that desperately and so um schedule a day to drop off at the charity shop and Then number five stay out of the stores It’s going to be very easy for me Christmas 2023 to stay out of the stores. My mom’s having eye surgery on the 26th. But Roger, if we were not taking care of my mom’s medical needs, I would want to go to someplace like we just went to an apple farm and that was so much fun. You could go to the dog park with your dog. Although, you know, if you’re listening to this in 2023, there’s a bad dog cough going around. So maybe stay out of the parks, but, or go to a movie. I think the day after Christmas is a beautiful day to go to a movie that’s not in a shopping mall. And guys, I wanna give a little warning here. I think that there are going to be some crazy sales in 2023, you know, between Christmas and New Year’s because I think retail was way down this year and so don’t be tempted just because something has a good price on it. I think these stores have a lot of inventory that they’re going to need to get rid of but it doesn’t need to go to your house. Anything you want to add to this list Roger?

Roger:
No, I think going in with a plan and just keeping up with things. You’ve got people at your house probably, and that’s where the clutter is coming from. So

Kathleen Lipp:
Yeah.

Roger:
it is fine to enlist help in dealing with that clutter.

Kathleen Lipp:
Yeah, you

Roger:
I

Kathleen Lipp:
know

Roger:
think

Kathleen Lipp:
what?

Roger:
that might be another thing to think about.

Kathleen Lipp:
I will tell you one of the best things that the people in our family do is they all say, hey, I’ll take a bag of garbage home because they know how hard

Roger:
Yes.

Kathleen Lipp:
it is for us to get rid of garbage up here. Like that is such a gift. So we try to do, you know, we try to keep all the wet garbage, but the dry garbage and the recycling our family takes. And so yeah, ask for that help. I think that that’s really, that’s such a great thing. And you know, send those boxes home with the kids and the grandkids. You don’t need to be the one to take care of all that, unless they’re flying. If they’re flying, then everybody gets a pass.

Okay, guys, we hope that you had the best Christmas. We hope that this is gonna be an amazing new year. Listen next week where we’re gonna talk about ways to keep stuff from coming into your house. Today we’re really talking about getting it out of your house, but we want you to also keep it from coming into your house as well. Well, friends, first of all, Roger, thanks so much for hanging out with me.

Roger:
Thank you.

Kathleen Lipp:
It’s always fun.

Roger:
Yes.

Kathleen Lipp:
Friends, thank you for hanging out with us. You’ve been listening to Clutter-Free Academy. I’m Kathi Lipp. Now, go create the Clutter-Free life you were always intended to live.

More Posts 

#582 Garden Or Grocery Store: Eating Like a Homesteader No Matter Where You Call Home – Part 2

#582 Garden Or Grocery Store: Eating Like a Homesteader No Matter Where You Call Home – Part 2

by | Sep 12, 2023 | Accidental Homesteader, Clutter Free, Clutter Free Home, DIY, Getting Started, Home, How to, Kitchen, Organizing, Podcast, tips and ideas | 0 comments

Listen Now

582: Garden Or Grocery Store: Eating Like a Homesteader No Matter Where You Call Home, Part 2

Have you ever read the ingredients on the bread you buy from the grocery store and thought, “I can’t even pronounce these words! What are they?” Maybe you’d like to take control over what you put into your meals but don’t know where to start?

Start here!

In this episode, Kathi and Roger Lipp discuss what they have learned on their homestead journey about getting closer to the source of their food and what goes into the meals they prepare. As they continue to celebrate the release of Kathi’s new book “The Accidental Homesteader: What I’ve Learned About Chickens, Compost, and Creating Home”, Kathi and Roger share ways we can all eat like a homesteader even if we don’t have a garden.

For example:

  • Making your own bread (Keep scrolling for recipes!)
  • Making your own cake & brownie mixes
  • Making your own cheese (Kathi and Roger are in LOVE with her homemade mozzarella cheese.)
  • Canning and preserving your abundance
  • Batch cooking and creating Kathi’s favorite fast food swap out: individual serving cubes of soup

Haven’t listened to Part 1 of Garden Or Grocery Store: Eating Like a Homesteader No Matter Where You Call Home? Don’t miss those tips! Click here to listen.

As promised, here are Kathi’s favorite soup and sandwich bread recipes.

Sandwich Bread
1 cups warm water
½ Tablespoon active dry yeast
2 T honey
2.5 cups all purpose flour, divided
1 teaspoon salt
2 T melted butter, divided

  1. Mix the water, yeast, and honey together. Add 2 cups flour, salt and 1 T melted butter together and mix.
  2. Put dough on a surface with ¼ cup of flour and knead it for about 5 minutes adding in the other half cup of flour to get a doughy texture.
  3. Take your dough ball and put it in a bowl. Cover it with a dishcloth and stick it in the oven with the light on for an hour (it should approximately double in size.)
  4. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.
  5. Butter loaf pan. Shape the dough into roughly the size of the loaf pan.
  6. Let it double again, covered.
  7. Bake for 30 minutes.
  8. Let cool slightly on a wire rack before slicing.

Soup Bread
Prep time: 12-16 hours (rise time)
Cook time: 45 minutes

Ingredients:
1 1/2 cups water, room temperature to warm
1/2 teaspoon yeast
3 cups flour
1 1/2 teaspoons salt

Instructions:

  1. Mix all ingredients together in an ovenproof bowl. You may use a stand mixer to combine and leave the dough in the bowl.
  2. Cover the bowl with a kitchen towel and place it in the oven with the oven light on. Let it sit undisturbed for 12-16 hours.
  3. Remove the bowl from the oven and preheat the oven to 450°F.
  4. Line a Dutch oven with parchment paper. You may find it helpful to crinkle the parchment in your hands so it stays in place.
  5. Flour a surface and place the dough on that surface. Stretch and fold the dough ball, then place it in the parchment-lined Dutch oven.
  6. Use kitchen shears to make three snips on the top of the bread, allowing the bread to expand.
  7. Cook the bread in the covered Dutch oven for 30 minutes.
  8. After 30 minutes, uncover the Dutch oven and continue cooking for 15 more minutes.

Serve warm, accompanied by salted butter or a mix of oil and balsamic vinegar.

Yields: Dependent on serving size (typically 8-12 servings)

Kathi also mentioned her favorite cheese making kit. It can be found on Amazon. Kathi is not an affiliate of this product.

  • Mozzarella & Ricotta Cheese Making Kit | 5 Piece DIY Kit Includes Cheesecloth, Vegetable Rennet, Citric Acid, Cheese Salt, & Cooking Thermometer

Click here for the Clutter Free Academy newsletter and be notified when future episodes are released.

The Accidental Homesteader: What I’ve Learned About Chickens, Compost, and Creating Home

 

Homesteading [hohm-sted-ing]
noun
1. an act or instance of establishing a homestead.
2. the act of loving where you live so much that you actively ignore the fact that your house is trying to kill you on a regular basis.
For Kathi Lipp and her husband, Roger, buying a house in one of the most remote parts of Northern California was never part of the plan; many of life’s biggest, most rewarding adventures rarely are.

Kathi shares the hard-won wisdom she’s gained on her homestead journey to help you accomplish more at home, gain fresh perspective, and give yourself grace in the process. Here’s a handful of the lessons Kathi shares:

  • Prepare before the need arises
  • Everything is always in process, including us
  • Your best household solution is time and patience
  • You don’t have to do everything the hard way
  • Be open to new and better ways of doing things
  • A lot of small changes make a huge difference.
    Highly practical, humorous, and inspirational, The Accidental Homesteader will encourage you to live with more peace, joy, and contentment.

Order your copy of The Accidental Homesteader: What I’ve Learned About Chickens, Compost, and Creating Home here.

Links Mentioned:

Learn more about Clutter Free for Life

Clutter Free Academy Facebook Group

After listening to this episode, which “Eating Like a Homesteader” tip are to going to implement? 

Tell us in the comments!

Let’s stay connected

To share your thoughts:

  • Leave a note in the comment section below.

Leave an honest review on iTunes. Your ratings and reviews really help, and I read each one.

Subscribe on iTunes or subscribe to our newsletter now.

Meet Our Guest 

Roger Lipp

Roger is a productivity and quality engineer for a Fortune 50 company.

Roger helps teams reach their full productivity potential by teaching them the practical and simple steps to reach their goals. Roger and his wife, author Kathi Lipp, teach communicators how to share their message through social media and email marketing.

He and Kathi coauthored Happy Habits for Every Couple with Harvest House Publishers.

Transcript

More Posts 

#581 Garden Or Grocery Store: Eating Like a Homesteader No Matter Where You Call Home – Part 1

#581 Garden Or Grocery Store: Eating Like a Homesteader No Matter Where You Call Home – Part 1

by | Sep 5, 2023 | Accidental Homesteader, Clutter Free, Clutter Free Home, DIY, Getting Started, Home, How to, Kitchen, Organizing, Podcast, tips and ideas | 0 comments

Listen Now

581: Garden Or Grocery Store: Eating Like a Homesteader No Matter Where You Call Home, Part 1

Is it possible to eat like a homesteader even if you live in an apartment? Yes, it is!

Eating like a homesteader is really about being more purposeful and thoughtful about what you eat and where you source your food. In this episode, Kathi and Roger Lipp discuss what they have learned on their homestead journey about growing their own food in the garden as well as the non-gardening ways they source their food. For example:

  • The satisfaction of growing your own food
    • Start with a salsa garden/container garden.
  • Don’t have a garden? Try:
    • Shopping at a Farmers’ Markets or Roadside Stands
    • Joining a Food Swap or Bartering Group
    • Be a part of a Community Garden
  • And what to do if you have an abundance of produce

For those of you wondering where Kathi and Roger’s chickens fit into the “Eating like a Homesteader” plan, don’t be worried. Kathi’s philosophy is they don’t want to meet their meat.

Looking for the Meal Planning Calendar Kathi mentioned in this episode? It’s right here!

Click here for the Clutter Free Academy newsletter and be notified when future episodes are released.

The Accidental Homesteader: What I’ve Learned About Chickens, Compost, and Creating Home

 

Homesteading [hohm-sted-ing]
noun
1. an act or instance of establishing a homestead.
2. the act of loving where you live so much that you actively ignore the fact that your house is trying to kill you on a regular basis.
For Kathi Lipp and her husband, Roger, buying a house in one of the most remote parts of Northern California was never part of the plan; many of life’s biggest, most rewarding adventures rarely are.

Kathi shares the hard-won wisdom she’s gained on her homestead journey to help you accomplish more at home, gain fresh perspective, and give yourself grace in the process. Here’s a handful of the lessons Kathi shares:

  • Prepare before the need arises
  • Everything is always in process, including us
  • Your best household solution is time and patience
  • You don’t have to do everything the hard way
  • Be open to new and better ways of doing things
  • A lot of small changes make a huge difference.
    Highly practical, humorous, and inspirational, The Accidental Homesteader will encourage you to live with more peace, joy, and contentment.

Order your copy of The Accidental Homesteader: What I’ve Learned About Chickens, Compost, and Creating Home here.

Links Mentioned:

Learn more about Clutter Free for Life

Clutter Free Academy Facebook Group

After listening to this episode, which “Eating Like Homesteader” tip are to going to implement? 

Tell us in the comments!

Let’s stay connected

To share your thoughts:

  • Leave a note in the comment section below.

Leave an honest review on iTunes. Your ratings and reviews really help, and I read each one.

Subscribe on iTunes or subscribe to our newsletter now.

Meet Our Guest 

Roger Lipp

Roger is a productivity and quality engineer for a Fortune 50 company.

Roger helps teams reach their full productivity potential by teaching them the practical and simple steps to reach their goals. Roger and his wife, author Kathi Lipp, teach communicators how to share their message through social media and email marketing.

He and Kathi coauthored Happy Habits for Every Couple with Harvest House Publishers.

Transcript

More Posts