Shambray: Stay Sane Cleaning Series Step 13: Purge Magazines

Magazines...I love them. There is something about holding a magazine in your hands and reading it. However, magazines can build up. If you don't take care of your magazine pile then pretty soon you have a mountain. That mountain that was supposed to bring you joy now creates stress.

So in comes the thirteenth step of my Stay Sane Cleaning Series. That is to purge your magazines. This step is by far my favorite step. I love it because I get time to do something that I love. Yes. I have to put this time down on my cleaning schedule. If I don't then sadly I won't take the time and my magazine pile will quickly get out of control.

This step is really simple and like I said...fun. So here is the breakdown.

Step #1: Wait until you have some quiet. Don't do this with kids screaming and bothering you. Do it when you can relax. Yes. I just said that you can relax while doing a step in my cleaning series.

Step #2: Grab your favorite drink and a couple of magazine in your magazine pile.

Step #3: Set your timer for 10 minutes. I know it isn't that much time, but there are two positives with only 10 minutes. #1 is that you should be able to relax 10 minutes in a week. (You should be doing much more than that, but this will assure that you actually get at least 10 minutes of relaxing in). Second, even with doing this 10 minutes a week you will still be taking control of your magazines.

Step #4: Look through the magazines. I usually tear out pages that interest me. I read articles that I want to and skip the others. I delve into each magazine. Some weeks I get through 3 magazines. Some weeks I don't even get through one. It all depends on how many pages interest me in the selected magazines.

Step #5: Take the torn out pages and write down the information that needs to be written down. If it can be found online then find it and pin it to one of your Pinterest boards. If there is too much information to write down or it can't be found online then I usually take a picture of the page. Then get rid of it. The point is to get rid of the magazines and move on. Make room for new ones and don't let your magazines weigh you down.

After the timer goes off put the remaining magazines that you didn't have time to look through in the magazine pile and know that next week they will be looked at. If you do this pretty soon you will feel more relaxed and get in control of your magazine clutter.

Happy relaxing!