The other day a new friend, also a very busy working mom, came over for dinner. The first words out of her mouth when she came into the living room were: “Wow, it’s so clean and you don’t have a lot of stuff!” Now, let me be clear — I am not posting this to brag about my house being clean (although I admit being completely obsessed about having an organized house). It’s the second half of what she said that made me realize something.

I’ve always tried to have a very stuff-free living space. I am sure it has to do with the fact that I grew up in a tiny 1-bedroom apartment where having too much stuff wasn’t an option. It also probably has something to do with the fact that when my family immigrated to the US we could only bring 6 suitcases of our “stuff” with us and since then, I try not to get too many things to which I am attached and couldn’t leave behind. (I am sure if I went to a shrink I’d be told that this is some unhealthy leftover issue that I should deal with, but hey, I don’t have time for a shrink so I get to keep my issues.)

So our living room does have probably less than the usual amount of stuff — we have furniture, but it’s pretty spaced out, and the bookshelves have some books on them, a few vases (gifts from family and friends, who would guilt-trip me to death if we didn’t put them out), and some photos — but there isn’t too much other stuff around.

But our basement play room and daughter’s room is a whole other story — they are bursting with stuff. This is one battle which I’ve not been able to win since my daughter was born, the battle against too many toys, books, craft supplies, stuffed animals, and other things that seem to multiply non-stop. Yesterday she was looking for a particular toy and we spent 20 minutes rummaging in her room — 20 minutes which we could have spent in a much more pleasant way. Because there was too much stuff we lost time — and for a busy working mom like me, time is a very precious thing to lose.

So I’ve decided to make this a priority and clean out some of my daughter’s stuff. We used to donate bags of clothes, books, etc to Salvation Army, but I recently read about this new company called Zwaggle that I am considering. At Zwaggle parents donate gently used items to other families and get points for doing that. You can then use those points to get things donated by other families on the site. In the interest of full disclosure I am leaning towards trying Zwaggle because I LOVE trying out new online communities and marketplaces, but it seems like a really nice idea generally.

Are you someone who tries to not have too much stuff or you don’t mind it? Do you have any strategies that you use to reduce the amount of stuff in your house? Please share!