Kathi (00:00.174)

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, I just, yeah, if you heard last week, you know I’m gushing, I’m not gonna gush all this time, but it’s Myquillyn Smith. The book is House Rules. You guys, she is my favorite decorating guru.

And I know you shouldn’t have gurus. You shouldn’t because you gotta create your own style. But she has helped me figure out who I am and how to live in my house. And I want her to do the same for you. Plus, you guys, she gets people who maybe wanna keep too many things in their house. She is not, she’s not judgmental. She understands our people. Myquillyn welcome back to the podcast.

Myquillyn (00:57.51)

I’m so glad to be here. You are my people. I love it.

Kathi (01:01.722)

Yes, yes, we need to we have to have a lot of crossover in our communities. I’m 100% And guys if you haven’t listened to last week go back and listen to that that’ll give you a lot of context for this week But I uh, I may love this book as much as I loved your first book Again, it’s House Rules: How to Decorate for Every Home, Style, and Budget And the reason that I love your book so much is because well

This is called House Rules. You don’t have a lot of rules or you teach us how to break the rules that maybe, I don’t know if other people feel like this, that I’ve had some very judgmental voices, house decorating voices in my head from the past and maybe kind of kept myself a little trapped. Have you ever worked with anybody like that?

Myquillyn (01:55.125)

Yeah, I mean, I have myself, I have experienced that as well, thinking I am going to get shamed or I’m gonna get told off or someone comes in my house and says, we need to get those drapes hemmed and when are we going to do this, that and the other to finish the house? That’s the kind of, yeah, I’ve experienced that myself and had to pull up my big girl pants and say, this is it, this is what I’m choosing to do so that I can

Kathi (01:57.62)

Okay.

Myquillyn (02:24.897)

have the rest of my life be full and look the way I want it to look.

Kathi (02:29.822)

You know, I remember when we sold our last house, it was, I loved it, I loved it so much. But the one thing my husband and I just said, okay, you know what, it’s just not as important to us as it is to other people. And you guys are gonna, everybody’s gonna scream when they hear this. We had popcorn ceilings. And in California, they’re very expensive to get rid of. And it’s like

we had to make choices and people would come in and say, and what are we gonna do about those popcorn ceilings? I’m like, if that’s the first thing you notice in my beautiful home, then, you know, my decorating style is not for you. It just isn’t. And so I think it’s so interesting what some people fixate on when they’re in other people’s homes. And we think, oh, nobody’s gonna notice. And it’s just weird that some people do, isn’t it? That what…

What are we going to do about those drapes on the floor? I mean, we’re going to enjoy them and love them and see that they pool beautifully. Ha ha.

Myquillyn (03:34.362)

Feel free to do something with your own money and your time.

Kathi (03:40.198)

Yes, you have volunteered. Well, okay. So I think that if you love your house enough, it doesn’t matter what other people think. It really, really doesn’t. But you have to love it. You have to say, this is what I’m doing to make my house as loving and lovely as possible. I want to dig into your rules here, because we’ve already done seven and five, you can’t ruin something you already hate and resourcefulness is the ultimate resource. But let’s talk about

Okay, this is for my cluttery girls. Rule 11, luxury isn’t having more, it’s needing less. Talk to, okay, I’m not gonna say a word, just talk to us.

Myquillyn (04:21.693)

Okay, I was reluctant to learn this because all of my life I feel like luxury is having everything at your fingertips, no matter what you could possibly need. That is the very definition of luxury. So we moved into this house and it’s a 1905 Queen Anne Victorian. And I’m pointing out the master bedroom is like the largest master bedroom we’ve ever had. We’ve never had a big bedroom.

And when we moved here, we had a bed and like my nightstands were like this big because our last house, the room was this big. So they’re like, pip squeak. I mean, we had nothing. So our bed was in there. I purchased a little sofa from the previous owner. So I had a little sofa at the end of the bed. I ended up buying a pair of nightstands and I had a couple lamps. I put up drapes. There were shutters on the window.

And one day I walked up to the room, I had painted it a little darker, beautiful muddy blue, one of my personal neutrals. And I walked up to the room and it just felt just right. I couldn’t believe it because there was no gallery wall. There was no like 300 beautiful pillows. There wasn’t three layers of rugs. There wasn’t like layers of throws. It was like so simple. There was no vignette on both of the.

Like I nothing it was so quiet and I felt like rich I felt like I was staying in a high end hotel. It was like the lack of chaos and excess was luxurious. And I have heard that my whole life. But to experience it. I was like, Oh, I get that now I get like the almost the privilege of not having to fill up my space with all of this.

Kathi (05:48.612)

Oh.

Kathi (06:06.135)

Yeah.

Kathi (06:10.752)

Mmm.

Myquillyn (06:11.677)

just in case stuff was extremely peaceful and serene and welcoming and I love beautiful things I still have you know stuff in my home but that is one space in my house that I probably will continue to keep really sparse and it feels great.

Kathi (06:21.421)

Yes.

Kathi (06:32.234)

Okay, well, the conviction is here. I have, our bedroom is big. It’s the biggest bedroom we’ve ever owned. And I love our bed. I’ve got a Suzani print couch that is just, it’s everything I love. And then I have the gray chair. And the gray chair collects all the things and has no business being in there. But I had room.

And my cluttery brain says, but you have room for it. But it brings me no joy. Why do I still have it? Why did I need you to come on a podcast for me to say, okay, it’s time to get rid of it?

Myquillyn (07:11.349)

Because our default is that empty space is like incorrect and needs to be filled. Empty space is waiting to be, it’s unfinished, which is not true. We need margin in our lives, in our decor, in our schedule, in so many things, but like I’ve learned to, sometimes I can’t get it through my brain. Like actually I would enjoy having less in my family room. So I do a little practice, I call it house hushing, where I just tell myself, you know what?

Kathi (07:37.944)

Yes.

Myquillyn (07:39.605)

we’re gonna give it 24 hours. I’m gonna just take all my little cute tchotchkes and smalls and my clocks and my pillows and my plants. And I’m gonna take everything extraneous out, just have the furniture, and I just put it in another room like crazy in the dining room on the table for 24 hours. And it’s like zen and relaxing and without fail every time I choose out of my own free will.

Kathi (07:44.857)

Mm-hmm.

Myquillyn (08:04.981)

to not bring as much in. No one has to, I don’t have to like pick up everything and ask if I love it or if it brings me joy. I don’t have to like clear and make decision fatigue. I just experience the results first of like a quieted simple space. And then I can choose if I want to get rid of something. It’s like, to me, it’s backwards decluttering and it works.

Kathi (08:10.944)

Right?

Kathi (08:25.59)

Yes. It’s the creep. It’s the creep of life. Like, I love this little thing. I’m going to put it here. I love this little thing. I love this little thing, but I don’t love the 72 little things that end up in my kitchen in six months if I don’t do something about it. And I’m not talking about, you know, the bread tie. I’m talking about the little planter or, you know, the little thing that my friend gave me.

Myquillyn (08:41.761)

Yes.

Myquillyn (08:49.975)

Yes.

Kathi (08:53.214)

And it’s okay to enjoy things for a season and then release them. And I’ve also learned it’s okay to just have that thing that my friend gave me out in the fall. It’s not a fall decoration and I love it, but it doesn’t need to be out 365 days a year because I enjoy a quieter space. I really do. I love that. And if you live near me,

Myquillyn (08:57.762)

Yes.

Myquillyn (09:18.133)

Yep.

Kathi (09:22.23)

Check Freecycle for this really beautiful but unnecessary gray chair that needs to that needs to go Okay Again for my clutter free people you are in our brains friend rule a one sane space Talk about that

Myquillyn (09:40.693)

That came about when we were living in a fixer upper and every room was in chaos. We didn’t have a sink in the kitchen. We had like plastic sheets as walls, you know, a weird electrical thing. You could get electrocuted if you weren’t careful. And I just remember thinking, okay we got to have, we have to feel like a little bit normal. We can’t have every room be in chaos. So even with the plastic walls, I just got some paint and I painted over because it was like

Hunter green walls with the wallpaper. I pulled down the border real quick. Didn’t prep it perfectly, just thought, I gotta get something up and we’ll do it better in a few months. Threw a white paint on the wall, put a rug down, got our sectional in there, a couple pillows, a lamp, the television, the dog bed, like we can watch Andy Griffith, we can watch Survivor at night. A place for our family to feel relaxed and like.

sanity in the midst of living in a complete fixer upper. And even if you’re not in a fixer upper, if you’re, the relief of having one space that feels however you need it to feel, maybe it’s more minimal, maybe it’s more cozy at this stage in your life, while you do things in your other rooms is really powerful.

Kathi (10:57.986)

Not 20 minutes before we started these interviews, I was on a call with a nurse talking through her clutter situation. And she’s sneezing through the whole thing and is just sick and run down. And she goes, but I need to declutter, I need to declutter. And like, you cannot make any decisions right now. What I want you to do is just, where do you spend most of your time when you’re

as you’re recovering, she goes, in my living room. I said, I just need you to have a clear spot where your eye line isn’t seeing any clutter. And we can deal with this when you have more energy to make decisions and to do what you need to do, but you have to have a place to rest. And if your eyes are distracted by things, all these hanging chads, all these things that still need to be done.

You can never rest. Your brain is always flipping on, oh, it’s the hunter green paint. Oh, the dog’s bed isn’t in here because I don’t wanna get stuff on. You just have to have one place that you can open your eyes and rest. And this is, I love the name of it, One Sane Space. I’ve never thought of it. I always say you just have to have one place where you can escape, but Sane Space says,

No, I can rest and recover in this area. I love that so, so much. Okay, we’re going deeper into the rules, my friend. Number 98, make your own house rules. So explain this, and I wanna hear a few of yours, and I’ve got a couple of my own as well, because I have done this, but explain this concept.

Myquillyn (12:49.761)

Well, I give a book of 100 house rules and that’s one of them. I think that we should all come up with our own rules to live by. You know, about 10 years ago on Pinterest, it was a big thing. Everyone was making their own wooden sign with like house rules, you know, dogs on the sofa and whatever, no, whatever. It was like all fun things. I love that. Like that’s one of the reasons that I liked this name for the book because I think culturally it conjures up that memory of like the fun.

Kathi (12:53.292)

Right?

Kathi (13:04.212)

Yes.

Myquillyn (13:18.541)

house rules, the relaxed house rules. But one of my personal decorating house rules is that I like my life full of color, but I like my house full of neutrals. I am persnickety and I change my mind. In the spring, if I am furniture shopping, I will buy teal furniture and blue furniture. And in the summer, I want red and pink furniture. And in the fall, I want rusty colors and muddy. And in the winter, I want white. Like I have learned, I can tell when I buy a piece of furniture,

that’s a color based on this, because it was like the season, whatever season was, the color I’m craving. I cannot do that, because I can’t buy a new sofa every four months. So, I learned I am way too like finicky and wanting to change my colors. So I will get all of my base things neutral. And then if I want colored sheets, if I want colored pillows, if I want a colored sweater, I’ll put up books with colors and flowers with colors.

Kathi (13:51.788)

Oh, yeah.

Kathi (13:57.856)

Right.

Kathi (14:10.798)

Hmm

Myquillyn (14:15.585)

but I’m not gonna buy my main pieces in color because I wanna change my mind, I wanna change it up too much. That is not a rule for everyone. Someone else might have the opposite rule and they should. So that’s my example, what is yours?

Kathi (14:24.77)

Right.

Kathi (14:30.946)

So I’ve got a practical one and I have a fun one. So in our house, flooring needs to be functional, not fabulous. And I just needed to do it because, I mean, we live where there is a high chance that chicken poop will get in our house at one point or another. We’re just not precious about stuff. And we need stuff that is functional. And we can put the pretty stuff

at waist level or above. But yeah, the floors just have, and I would never have chosen the floors that we have downstairs, but they’re exactly the right floors. The previous owners knew what they were doing when if we needed to, we could take a hose to them. We don’t do that, but we could if we needed to. And then the other thing is, my style is things we love.

And that’s just, there is nothing in my house that I don’t love. I used to have things in my house that other people loved. Like we had, I bought a pillow one time for Christmas and in red letters it says Joy. And I was so sad to put it away after Christmas. I’m like, is Joy just reserved for December? And so now I have this Joy pillow out all year long.

And it makes me so happy all year long. And it’s like, we only have things in our house that we love. And if there’s something in our house that we don’t love, we have to question, you know, I don’t love our emergency kit. We have it in our house, but it’s not something I’m displaying. And so that’s our style is things we love. And it’s never going to fit into any genre, but I…

I wake up every day and I’m happy. So

Myquillyn (16:31.021)

That is perfect. The whole goal is for you to love your home. You have arrived. Like when we love our home, we use our home. So do not change any of that.

Kathi (16:34.71)

Yeah.

Kathi (16:39.34)

Yes.

Yeah, and I’m reluctant to leave, because the world is not suited for me in any way, shape, or form, but my house is. Okay, this one. You’re a genius, this is all I’m gonna say. Rule number 99, make a we did it list. This is genius, please expand upon what this concept is.

Myquillyn (16:50.605)

and I’ll see you next time.

Myquillyn (17:06.989)

Gosh, I think when it comes to home, we are so focused on all the stuff we have to do and all the undone decisions and all the ceiling fan that needs to be replaced and we haven’t gotten to the back porch yet and the flooring in there. If we can take a moment and take stock of all the things we have done, I do this at least every year and look back like everything in our house, we do it with our goals too, like what we did with our family, but.

Kathi (17:16.91)

Hehehehe

Myquillyn (17:34.561)

You and everything counts. If we made a chicken coop, if we replaced the faucet, if I’m like, and I dusted behind the sofa, write that down, you know, change the light fixture, whatever, it all counts. I think we would be shocked at what we accomplish in a year, in a month in our home. We need to give ourselves credit for all that we’ve done in caring for our home.

Kathi (17:59.246)

And do not discount making a chicken coop because let’s be clear the one we got was advertised as like a Michaels do-it-yourself project and it turned out to be a Home Depot expert pro project It I mean it is it is a fabulous chicken coop, but holy cow. Yes I think it’s we have such I do this with decorating I do this with God, but what have you done lately? What have you done lately like?

Myquillyn (18:12.301)

It’s true.

Kathi (18:28.074)

You know, yes, I have worked so hard on my house. I forget what it was like to move out of the upstairs of our house to put flooring down. You might as well burn the house down and start over again. It is so much work, but it’s done. And it’s done for the next hopefully 20 years. But it’s so easy to focus on, yeah, but the kitchen light fixture. Like I haven’t done the kitchen light fixture.

Myquillyn (18:43.894)

I’m dead.

Kathi (18:56.858)

And I love that you’re taking stock. And this is so true in our cluttery communities. We always talk about, we declutter and then it just gets to look like that again. But here’s the thing, once you get the stuff out of your house, you never ever have to deal with that book or piece of furniture or piece of clothing ever again for the rest of your life. You may have to deal on what you’re bringing into the house but look at what you’ve done.

And we’re so proud when our kids do something, we need to also recognize ourselves for the accomplishments we’re doing. Because let’s be honest, some of these projects are hard and they take big grownup decision making that is sometimes, and you’ve saved money to do things. And if you’ve brought in outside help, that doesn’t always go the way, and you have to negotiate with the people you live with. And so anytime you accomplish something, it is…

It is a win. And guys, if you are ready to, especially if you’ve done some decluttering, I really think one of the best things you can do for yourself, and I know I learned this term from you, after you’ve quieted your house, you can take a look around and say, is there something that I want to do? Because now that my house isn’t screaming clutter at me, it can reveal its personality. It can reveal who it is.

And guys, I’m just gonna really encourage you. Take a look at this book, House Rules, How to Decorate for Every Home, Style, and Budget. Myquillyn this is, I get so inspired when I spend time with you. Thank you so much for your time and your wisdom today.

Myquillyn (20:37.341)

Oh, Kathi, you are so dear. You could, you know all of this. You don’t even need me. Like you are beyond. So I just, so happy to know you and man, you are so wise.

Kathi (20:49.758)

Okay, even if that was true, here’s what you do. You help me be brave. You help me not get, I think so many of us who deal with clutter are such, we’re perfectionists in such hard ways. We don’t do anything until we know we can do it 100%. And you’ve given me permission to say, even if I think I can do it, I should try. I’m probably not gonna burn the house down. I probably am not going to have to repaint the whole room. And…

You know, maybe some $20 decisions are okay to take a flyer on. So I know a lot of what you teach, but you helped me be brave to enact it. And that’s what I want for everybody in my community. So thank you. Thank you, friend.

Myquillyn (21:36.749)

Oh, happy to be here. Thank you.

Kathi (21:39.69)

And friends, thank you for being here. You are the best part of us gathering each week. You’ve been listening to Clutter Free Academy. I’m Kathi Lipp. Now, go create the clutter free life you’ve always wanted to live.