By Dianna Goodwin
I am trying to downsize. In 2025, my New Year’s resolution was to get rid of something every day. The first item I got rid of was a box of extra long matches that had been floating around our house for at least a decade, unused. The last item was a black cardigan covered with lint that was sitting in a bag in a closet. In between, there were 363 other items, ranging from the car we gave to our son to three strings of Mardi Gras beads. I have never been to Mardi Gras, so the beads evoked no pleasant memories of dancing in second lines or eating King Cake. They were just pretty and shiny and taking up space on my bookshelf. But what to do with all this stuff I no longer wanted?
It is a real chore to get rid of unwanted, but functional items, without throwing them away. So I was very impressed when my friend Nicole told me she went on a mission to clean out her mother’s house without renting a dumpster. I decided to interview her to find out what she did with the accumulation of more than thirty years of household and personal items her mother left behind when she died.
First, while Nicole was thinking about whether or not to keep the house as a rental, she started cleaning out drawers, the garage and the closets, taking home family photos and some of her mother’s clothes and personal effects. After about a year, she decided to sell the house, and seriously began to get rid of clutter. She kept the furniture for staging, then, when the house sold, finished clearing everything out to turn it over to the new owner. She held an estate sale, advertising primarily on Facebook. After the sale was over, there was still a lot left. Determined not to throw it all out, she researched where to take things to be resold, donated or recycled in the Malta/Ballston Spa/Saratoga Springs area. The places she found are listed below.
At the end she had three small piles left, one to burn, one to take on a last trip to a donation center, and one to throw out at the transfer station. Hats off to Nicole.
I hope you use this list as a starting point for your own journey toward decluttering, should you need to take such a journey. I am saving this list for my 2026 project of, once again, getting rid of something every day. Maybe by 2030, my house will be free of unnecessary stuff.
Nicole’s list:
Best Buy https://www.bestbuy.com/site/services/recycling/pcmcat149900050025.c?id=pcmcat149900050025 took small electronics including three hairdryers and a curling iron.
Clean green https://www.cleangreenremoval.com/ is a junk removal company that specializes in recycling or donating the items being thrown away. She did not use this service, in the end, because she got rid of everything herself.
Hazardous waste disposal days are held by municipalities. Call your town or city clerk to find out when the next one is scheduled in your area. These are usually restricted to residents of the municipality where the waste is being collected.
Local libraries often take used books, records, videos and cd’s for resale. Mine won’t take text books, old reference books or magazines; those can be recycled, with hard covers removed.
Noah’s attic in Ballston Spa took clothes, linens and odd household items, including Christmas decorations. Other local donation centers
https://www.saratoga.com/home-improvement/tidying-up-donation-spots/ accept clothes, household items, artwork and jewelry. I go to Gateway because they will take most small items.
Paintcare https://www.paintcare.org/drop-off-sites/ located a place for her to donate the unused paint in her mother’s garage.
Planit Salvage https://planitsalvage.com, took her car parts, ice skates, oven rack, metal picket fence, other metal.
Reshop for the Good ;https://www.reshopforthegood.com/ sells second-hand furniture and home goods to support its program to provide home repairs to income-qualified households. They took sets of glasses, some left over furniture, housewares, leather purses, and a jewelry stand. Items must be in very good condition.
The Saratoga County Sheriff has a drop off box for medications and sharps, as do the Saratoga Springs Police Department and Saratoga Hospital.
Staples https://www.staples.com/stores/recycling took luggage, binders, box fans, ironing boards, computer monitors, printer, and her mother’s old fax machine. Nicole took an entire carload of old suitcases to them and they didn’t even blink.
Wellspring https://www.wellspringcares.org/ took cleaning supplies.
