Declutter Valentine's Day Stuff {15 Minute Mission}

Today's mission is to declutter Valentine's Day stuff. This is the perfect time to do this, since it has been around a week since this holiday.


One habit I want everyone to get into is to clean up completely after each holiday event, meaning to put away decorations, deal with clutter you've received, etc. so that the next year you're starting with a clean slate and in the mean time not dealing with what used to be festive decorations, but are now just reminders that you haven't cleaned up yet!

That's why as part of the Declutter 365 missions after each major holiday I've tried to add a day into the missions on the calendar to take a few minutes and clean up.

For Valentine's Day the types of things you need to at least consider decluttering include excess candy, old and now wilted flowers, all those little cards your child received at their school party, and unwanted decorations.

Have I left anything out?

Anything That Is Valentine Related You Aren't Decluttering Needs To Be Put Away Today

Even if you don't want to completely get rid of some of these things, such as certain decorations you love and use year after year, for example, it is time to put them away now and not have them laying out anymore.

You can get ideas for how to organize and store holiday decorations here, in this article.

As for more meaningful cards, such as the Valentine's card given to you by your spouse, people have different philosophies about keeping these or not. You need to decide for yourself whether you want to keep them.

But if you do decide you want to keep some sentimental cards like this (which is perfectly fine!) make sure that today, as part of the mission, you decide how you will organize and store these sentimental things. Otherwise, just laying the card down on the kitchen counter for the next 3 months, for example, is not a good solution, and you've effectively made clutter.

If it is important enough to you to keep then treat it that way and make sure you put it somewhere safe and where you can find it again!


Top photo courtesy of JustyCinMD and top photo in collage is from a reader, Katrina, and bottom photo from Kathleen

Photos From Readers Who've Done This Mission

Getting Rid Of Kids' Valentine's Cards

Above is a photo from a reader, Adrianne, who said after she saw this mission was coming up, "So glad I saw this! This is all trash (my kids are out of the house right now 😉). I saved the peanut safe candy and put the stickers in my sticker bag."

Adrianne chose to get rid of some of her kids' Valentine's day stuff from their school party while they were gone, and that can work well, but I'd also love to hear how you choose to do it.

Eventually the vast majority of these cards from classmates are clutter, but perhaps they're clutter that is currently meaningful to your kids (whereas 10 years from now they might be happy to save 1 out of the 30 of them).

So my question for you -- is there anything fun you can do with these cards now with your kids to reuse or repurpose them, or a good way to organize and store them for later decluttering when they don't feel quite so sentimental to your kiddo? Or, do you just get rid of them like Adrianne, because it's not worth the hassle?

Decluttering Flowers

You should also eventually declutter flowers you receive from Valentine's Day.

You can keep these flowers until they wilt too much, and then throw them away or add them to a compost pile if appropriate. (Also make sure to declutter excess vases if necessary.)

The photo above is from a reader, Jenny, who said, "I throw a Valentine's Day party for my single, widowed and divorced women friends. Gave away all the flowers to my neighbors. Took candy to the office. Rest of the Valentine's Day decorations are back in the pink box."

Don't Forget To Declutter Valentine's Day Candy

I wanted to mention that if you and your family haven't eaten that Valentine's Day candy it's most likely time to declutter it.

And no, that doesn't mean you need to eat it! :)

You can get more ideas of what to do with your leftover candy in my declutter Halloween candy mission!

Other Seasonal Decoration Decluttering Missions

As I mentioned earlier, there are additional seasonal decoration decluttering missions here on the site that you can work through, to make the process of decluttering and organizing your holiday decorations easier and less overwhelming.

Here are additional Declutter 365 missions we do about this topic:

• Declutter spring decorations


• Declutter summer decorations


• Declutter Halloween decorations and Halloween candy


• Declutter fall decorations


• Declutter Christmas decorations

Want To Do More Decluttering Missions? Get Started With Declutter 365 Today!

Once you declutter one type of item in your home I bet you'll want to declutter some more. After all, decluttering gives you a great reward for even a small investment of time and energy.

The Declutter 365 system is designed to help you declutter, over the course of a year, your entire house, with just 15 minutes of decluttering each day!

Hundreds of thousands of people use this proven system to get rid of their clutter, and bring peace and calm back to their homes.

Declutter 365 works to guide you to clear the clutter without overwhelm, focusing on just one small area at a time, and without making a huge mess in the process, so you see consistent forward progress without all that "messy middle" that makes it even harder to function in your home than before you started.

In addition to building a daily decluttering habit, the Declutter 365 program, along with the accompanying 52 Week Organized Home Challenge, teaches you the skills, habits, routines, and mindsets necessary to maintain the clutter free and organized state of your home from now on, so it'll never be as messy and cluttered as it is right now, ever again.

If you haven't already, make sure to get your copy of this year's Declutter 365 annual calendar here (it's FREE!), find today's date, and do 15 minutes of decluttering on the day's mission. Then, repeat again tomorrow, and again and again. Over the course of the next year, if you do this 15 minutes per day, you'll declutter your whole house!

Get This Holiday Decluttering Checklist + 32 Other Decluttering Checklists For Your Home

Right now you're decluttering holiday items and decorations, and there's a lot of these types of items around your home.

Get your 1 page holiday decluttering checklist, plus 32 other decluttering checklists, to help you declutter your entire home here.

I've done the hard work of breaking down these tasks into smaller more manageable steps for you, so you don't get overwhelmed or worry you're forgetting a task, and you can go at the pace you want, whether that's fast or slow.

In addition, you can tackle these decluttering tasks in whatever order you want when you use these checklists!

In addition, when it's time to declutter stuff from Valentine's Day, it means spring is almost here! You can get more ideas for what to declutter in the spring here.




Top photo courtesy of smbuckley23

Related Pages You May Enjoy

Getting Clutter Free 15 Minutes At A Time Hall Of Fame

Getting Rid Of Holiday Clutter Hall Of Fame

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