Updated on January 27th, 2025
Spark Joy by Marie Kondo was one of my favorite books I read in February, and now I want to share a more in-depth review as well as an account of my tidying experience.
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Book Review
I watched a few episodes of Tidying Up with Marie Kondo on Netflix, which inspired me to start my own tidying campaign. I knew I would need help going through the tidying process, so I decided to get the e-book of Spark Joy. Spark Joy is an illustrated guide that takes you step-by-step through the KonMari Method. The main objective of the KonMari Method is to keep the items that spark joy for you while discarding the rest.
The first section of the book contains tips from how to choose items that spark joy to how to store them. This section was useful as it addressed frequently asked questions about the tidying process. The next section was all about the five categories of the KonMari Method including how to tidy clothes, books, papers, komono (miscellaneous), and finally sentimental items. As I mentioned, the book went step-by-step on how to tidy the items in each category and how to store them. The illustrations were especially useful for the clothing section as it was easy to follow how to fold all the different types of clothing from shirts to socks. The last section of the book summed up the tidying process and the changes that could happen when you finish your campaign. It was nice reading about how tidying has changed other people’s lives for the better.
In general, the writing was easy to follow, and the illustrations were so cute and helpful. The book took around two weeks for me to finish reading and that is because I started reading the clothing, books, and papers categories before I started my tidying campaign. When I finished tidying those categories, I read the komono and sentimental categories as well as the rest of the book. If you are planning on starting your own tidying campaign, I definitely recommend picking up this book as it will help you along your journey.
Overall, Spark Joy by Marie Kondo is a useful step-by-step that explains how to tidy your home using the KonMari Method.
Available at Bookshop
Rate: 9/10
My Tidying Experience
Now for my tidying experience! After I was inspired to start my tidying campaign, I asked my partner to watch one episode of Tidying Up with Marie Kondo, and he agreed. After the episode, I asked him if he would be willing to tidy with me, and he said he would like to as he had a bunch of clothes he wanted to go through. We planned for the following weekend to start our tidying campaign, and that is when I read the first three categories of the KonMari Method.
When the weekend came, I told my partner to pile ALL of his clothes on the bed and go through them one by one and sort them by keep, sell, donate, and throw away, and I did the same thing with my clothes. When I was done tidying my clothes, I folded them following the directions in the book and stored them in the drawers of the wardrobe. I then worked on tidying my daughter’s clothes. By the time I finished tidying most of her clothes, my partner was done tidying his clothes and we moved on to books.
We followed the same method of piling ALL of our books into separate piles (one pile for my books, another for my partner’s books, and the last pile for my daughter’s). We then went through our separate piles and kept the books that brought us joy and put the rest in a donate pile. I had one shelf of books for me, my partner had a shelf for his, and my daughter had a book stand for hers. I also had a bunch of cookbooks that I decided to place in one of the kitchen cabinets as a recommendation by Marie Kondo.
The last category we tackled that day was papers. Again we put all the papers we found at that time into a pile and went through them. Marie Kondo suggests having the mentality to discard ALL papers because if you do not, you will keep papers that you do not necessarily need. Of course, we kept the necessary papers, but we discarded around 95% of the papers we had. After we finished tidying the papers, we planned for the following weekend to begin komono. Between this time I finished reading the rest of Spark Joy.
The next weekend came and I decided to tackle my makeup and skincare first while my partner tidied his skincare and cologne. My partner also tidied the electronics as he knew what random cords we needed to keep. First I started with my makeup and discarded all my old makeup and makeup that was of poor quality. I followed Marie Kondo’s tip and stored my makeup in compartments separated by the type of makeup (eyeshadow, lipstick, blush, etc) on one of the shelves of the wardrobe. After I finished tidying my makeup, I did the same with my skincare and stored them by face and body skincare products and placed them on a separate shelf in the wardrobe. When I finished tidying my makeup and skincare, I decided to help my daughter tidy her toys.
Even though my daughter is only 3 years old, she was able to help with tidying. First, we put her old baby toys in a bag to give to other kids then we moved on to her stuffed animals. She put the animals she wanted to keep in her toy chest and the rest in the bag. We then put her Barbie dolls together in a box, and her items for her baby dolls in another box. We then moved on to her smaller toys, and I put them on the floor in front of her and gave her a box and told her she can fill up the box but then the rest she will give to the other kids. My daughter went through her toys and picked the ones she wanted to keep. Before we knew it we tidied all of her toys.
The next day I decided to tackle the closest that was filled with random things. I first started with the towels and then the linens and folded them following the directions in Spark Joy. Then I sorted through our holiday decorations and placed them on the top shelf. I ended up finding more of my partner’s books in the closet and he went through the tidying process of these books and I stored them on one of the shelves in the closet. Another category I tackled in the closet was all of my daughter’s old clothes that filled several Ikea bags. I separated the clothes by which can be sold, donated, and thrown away. After I completed the sorting of my daughter’s old clothes, the closet looked so much neater and you could actually walk into it!
Throughout the following week, I decided to tackle the kitchen. Mainly, I am the one who cooks so I decided it was appropriate that I went through the kitchen. I started with the dishes (plates, bowls, cups, mugs, etc.) followed by the Tupperware. I kept all the dishes and discarded the Tupperware that we did not use. Then I tidied the silverware, pots, and pans. Again, I did not discard anything, but I found better storage solutions.
For example, we had sharp knives in one of the cabinets since we could no longer keep them in the silverware drawers because my daughter could reach them, so I bought a knife block for them. I then tackled the tea and food in the pantries. I threw away all expired food and stored the rest in categories like bread, pasta, rice, canned goods, baking goods, and spices. Once I finished storing the food, I was done tidying the kitchen.
As of now, there are only a few komono categories to finish. When I was tidying, I found sentimental items that I decided to keep in a small box in my wardrobe. Even though I am not 100% done with the KonMari Method, I definitely feel a difference in the atmosphere of our apartment. At first, I felt overwhelmed with all the stuff we had, but now I feel happy that I only have items that bring me joy, and every item has a home instead of being shoved into a random drawer or on a shelf in the closet. If you do not want to go through the whole KonMari Method for yourself, there are little steps you can take to declutter your home, and you can read At Live The Easy Life’s post on The Easy Way to Minimise Clutter in Your Home for more information.
I have not seen Mari Kondo, but I have heard a lot about it! You made some serious progress!! I consider myself a pretty minimalistic person, but I have never thought to really organize my spices- I think I’ve got a new project cut out for me 🙂 Thanks for sharing & motivating me!!
Thank you! That’s nice you’re minimalistic, but it’s good to have things organized! I’m glad to hear that I motivated you 😄
This is my first time learning about the KonMari method but I’m excited to learn more and try it out myself. I have a habit of holding onto things I no longer need so this sounds quite useful. 🙂 xoxo
You should try out the KonMari method! You shouldn’t hold onto things unless they’re useful or make you happy 😊
Agreed. 🙂 I think I just might do that hun. x
I am a big fan of Marie Kondo’s tidying up series, I have also sorted out my clothes the way she does and it’s amazing, it’s so much tidier, so much easier to get clothes in and out, I loveee it! I haven’t read the book, but I feel like its something I need to purchase and have a read of!
Chloe xx
That’s great you sorted your clothes like Marie Kondo! I agree it’s much easier to figure out what to wear when I can see everything!
The book is definitely helpful to have!
I’m exhausted just looking at all that you’ve done! lol I’ve seen so many people cleaning & tidying their belongings due to Marie Kondo but haven’t even thought about doing any of it myself, not that I physically can – I’d just be able to supervise. 😀
Sarah 🌺 || Boxnip
It was exhausting, but it was definitely helpful having my boyfriend tidy with me!
You could supervise like you said & have help going through the tidying process! It’s a worthwhile experience 😊
I like the sound of this, but what about all the camping gear I have, snowboard stuff, biking stuff. I definitely have a lot of stuff. But I’m attempting it
You can still tidy all that & there’s even a recreational items section in the book! You can gather all your camping stuff & decide what you need & want to keep then discard/donate the rest & store the items you kept!
Ace thank you xx
I have started this method! I washed all of me and my partner’s clothes and piles our clothes on our bed in separate piles for me and for him. We alternated picking an item we knew sparked joy and an item we knew didn’t (our aim was to get rid of 50% of our stuff). At the end we allowed ourselves to grab anything from the get rid of pile that we really wanted. We now have reduced our clothes by probably 40% 😀
That’s awesome you & your partner started tidying & that’s a great amount you’ve reduced your clothes by! 😄
I didn’t have a lot of clothes to get rid of since I reduced a ton when I moved to Denmark, but my boyfriend definitely had a ton of clothes he got rid of.
I heard about the Marie Kondo system. I haven’t had the pleasure of reading this book or watching the Netflix series as yet but feel that I should check it out.
I have a similar system that I use. It’s called the 5S system which was created in Japan in the 1960s. It is currently used in several businesses such as hospitals and restaurants. I have used it in my household. Here is a link to the blog post that I wrote. You may enjoy it as well.
Thank you so much for this post. I will check out the Kondo system because of this post, I am very impressed and want to learn more. Thank you Raheela
I do recommend checking out Marie Kondo’s book & Netflix series as it is insightful learning about a new tidying method.
I will have read your blog post on 5S since I have not heard of it before!
I really like the KonMari method. I started to incorporate it in my life few months ago. I unfortunately haven’t read her books or watched the show but I’m definitely going to. I really like that you shared your tidying experience as well. x
Antonia || Sweet Passions
That’s great you’ve been incorporating the method into your life! 😊 I definitely recommend Spark Joy b/c the illustrations are really helpful. I haven’t read her first book, but I’ve heard it’s sort of the same minus the illustrations.