Recycle with Northwest Center

Are you channeling your inner Marie Kondo lately? Trying to minimize clutter in your home? Well, Wallingford has a pretty convenient option. Located right in the North Seattle Transfer Center is a Northwest Center donation truck.

The newish transfer center at 1350 N 34th St. is open 7 days a week. At the old transfer center building, I remember the Northwest Center truck being located outside in an adjacent parking lot. Not anymore. The truck is discreetly tucked inside in the same area where you go to recycle. While this is a much better location, many people don’t even know it’s there. I sure didn’t until recently.

Northwest Center’s web page details many personal stories of the work they do with the money they make from your used items. While I really give away my old items to get rid of them rather than out of philanthropic interest, it certainly is good to know I’m helping by giving to NWC then say one of their many competitors whose charity is perhaps more dubious.

My goal for the summer is to try to fill a box a week to get rid of. Sometimes that means giving away clothes we no longer use to Northwest Center, but sometimes I put desirable items on what I call  the “magic curb.” This is really just a corner on my block where things mysteriously appear and disappear. I get grouchy when I see people place items there that are basically trash, and they sit until one of the neighbors throws them away. Our outdoor kids’ jungle gym lasted a mere 30 minutes alternatively.

You want to know a really good way to de-clutter? Don’t buy it in the first place. Join the Buy Nothing Wallingford Facebook page. The community is truly extraordinary. The posts are full of neighbors helping neighbors by sometimes donating an iPhone charger to someone who needs it, lending a one-time-use tool, or even helping carry a dog down some stairs. That really did happen.

And with that I give my leave to get back to de-cluttering.