Hi, friends! We are now in week 4 of this life changing #sparkingjoy decluttering series we’ve been working on lately. My bloggy friends and I have come a long way so far!

A Journey to Sparking Joy:

Anderson & Grant
Making it in the Mountains
DIY Passion
Dwelling in Happiness
Zevy Joy
Cupcakes & Crinoline
Lost in the Found
The Happy Housie

This week, we are tidying up the books.

Now, this week so far was the easiest. You see, when my hubby and I got married and I moved into his house, I had a TON of books. We had no place to store them, so I ended up getting rid of them all. Since, I bought Kindle, and the majority of books I read now or through that device.

I maybe have 20 books that I’ve kept and it took me 10 minutes to go through them all. Not bad, right? I don’t keep magazines either, so I had none of those to sort through, either. So really, there’s not much exciting news or pictures on my end to share this week! Instead, I’m going to share some of the tips Marie Kondo suggests in her book, The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up (and you can buy your own copy on Amazon and follow along with us if you’d like! (affiliate link)).

The very first thing Marie Kondo suggest you do is put all of your books in a pile on the floor. ALL of them. For some, that might be a ton. You may have bookshelves full of lovely books, and pulling them out would be a pain. However, just DO IT! In order to effectively purge books, you’ll need to touch every single one and see if it brings you joy.

If you have just way too any books to put in a pile, Marie says to sort them into 4 major categories:

General (books you read for pleasure)

Practical (references, cookbooks, etc.)

Visual (Photograph collections, etc)

Magazines

Once divided, it’ll be much easier to go through and choose which books you’d like to keep. Marie also warns, “Make sure you don’t start reading it. Reading clouds your judgement. Instead of asking yourself what you feel, you’ll start asking whether you need that book or not.” While you may be tempted to pick up and read some of these books you forgot you had, try to avoid it altogether!

I do have to admit though, there are some books I had kept because, “I might want to read them again.” However, in the last 5 years, have I? No! I forgot I had half the books I kept, and I just don’t have the time anymore to read new books let along ones I’ve already read! Marie warns against this too, and says that we very rarely reread books. If you haven’t read it in a few years, just get rid of it! She also says the same about books we’ve only read half of or haven’t read at all. If we’ve kept them to collect dust, chances are we’ll never read them. Besides, if you decide you really want to reread a book or read one you gave away, your local library will probably have a copy that you can give back and not have to store! 🙂

In the end, you’ll be left with books that you absolutely love and will be excited about having. While I’m old fashioned in that I love holding and having a book in my hands to read, I will say the ease of having a Kindle to store all my books on is incredibly handy. Or as I mentioned, the library is a great place to read new books without having to buy them!

If you’re interested in seeing how my bloggy friends did in their book decluttering this week, head over to their pages below! Be sure to stay tuned in for next week, when we sort through all the mounds of papers we all have!

Have a great week!

(I link up at these fun parties!)