Cleaning party to Springsteen!

There were fabulous parts to my day.   Getting to see the excellent quality live-streamed Rock in Rio concert was one of them.  Doing that while sorting out a massive pile of papers at least got me through the cleaning up in one piece.

Here's what I'm up to - its the Cleaning Grand Plan from Organized Home. I am loving trying something new and sticking with a new method of getting things done - breaking out of my previous habit of insanely repeating the same things over and over and hoping for a miraculous change.  

Today I moved along all the clean laundry from the laundry room into bedrooms and the linen closet, freeing up room to move shelving from in the laundry to it's proper destination - the kitchen.  However the spot for the shelving in the kitchen was a little cluttered with what I like to call "boxes of rubbish" but apparently are made up of equal parts bills and children's artworks with a selection of random craft, mementos and photographs!

This is the pile of papers for my father that I need to copy! Oh how I long for a lackey to do THAT for me!

 I did take some lovely photos of elder child's artwork. I like how insanely bright this is! She doesn't want to throw it all away, but my next project is to label it as photographed and if it drifts out of her bedroom then in the bin it goes. I also hope to print out a collage to frame on the wall, but thats a project for another day.

What I learnt today was that it is a very bad thing to let bills get out of control and pile up, because in this household, that means they eventually end up in a random box with other non-bill things and that's never going to end well.  I also learnt that getting control of paperwork is going to always be an ongoing thing for me, its not at all my strong suit. In fact papers would easily be where I lose the war with 'stuff' - I am reconsidering the sanity of having all bills arrive by email. For me personally that would require a separate 'bills' email account so they didn't get lost in my general and junk mail.  That's certainly something to get onto, as then the 'paper' could pile up inside my computer where only I see it!

This afternoon's exercise was a walk up the hill from the children's playground to my Dad's nursing home, about 20 minutes with views like this along the way.

Sunset over the river. Glorious time for walking in a beautiful place.

 I have a thing for clover on the side of the road. Especially around the bottom of very old telegraph poles :)

Tomorrow is a work day, also a day for sorting out quite a bit for my Dad. Hubby should be working on the shelving while I'm gone, so kitchen progress will be made. Tuesday all going well I will move on to the next cleaning adventure on the Grand Plan.

Pulling together and Being Prepared!

One of the most significant concepts for me since I began blogging is that of being prepared.  It was the subject of one of my very early posts as I reflected on my mother in law's incredible pre-preparation for just about anything.

Particularly now, as I am feeling more positive, happy, upbeat and capable than I have in years, I find myself reflecting on this concept of preparation.

Recently (during that quiet time when no blog posts appeared) my husband travelled away for work.  He was driving to a major regional town, about five hours away.   When he'd been gone 4 hours already, and I was mid-breakfast, mid-getting children to school, the whole trip hit a terrible snag in the form of my coming down with a very severe case of gastro. I couldn't move, and he was 4 hours away.  I am so grateful for his boss, who immediately drove him home again to look after the children, as I was so incapable.  I spent the next several days feeling quite off, but the worst passed that first day, and along with the sickness came some pretty significant realisations for me.

The first one was that there was no way that hubby could travel for work again, at least not until our youngest is a little more independent. We simply don't have a 'backup' network to call on, other than each other. This didn't take much contemplation, after the horrible hours waiting for him to arrive home, I'm not doing that again with such small children.

The other realisations however came hot on each others heels and do require a bit more contemplation and change.  After a very upset week, I realised that not only have I established a solid family routine since returning to working, but that this routine was hanging on by a thread. We simply aren't that used to it, haven't settled into it, or gotten comfortable enough with it that it tolerates much battering. The week I was at home sick threw the entire concept of 'calm', 'organised', and 'routine' out the proverbial window, it seemed at the time as though never to be seen again!  (luckily I'm more resilient than that and this week is going OK)

Hand in hand with how precariously our little family is balancing its 'routine' is the entire concept of being prepared! After all, if we are more 'prepared' then by extension our balancing act is more stable, and less likely to topple at the slightest adjustment required.

Which leads me to my focus for the moment. I am still determined to lose weight, keep exercising with the same intensity as in the last month or so, and still quite keen to keep my positive attitude, however I feel a little like the tough work of beginning those changes has been accomplished and I need to consider how being prepared will accentuate the positive attitude and exercise transformations. 

Firstly, simply being more prepared in the meals department will provide me with an even better daily diet to get the best nourishment without any excess sugary carbohydrates!

Being a step ahead of where I am now would mean having an idea of tomorrow's food, and it being in the fridge (its been a lean food prep week this week!); not running out of cat food; having photos uploaded every week; having activities ready for the children when they get home (OK that one is only if I turn into super-Mum!). It would also mean being on top of the mountains of paperwork for myself and my Dad. I feel like I'm drowning under papers at the moment, but will leave that conundrum for another day! I like the sound of being a step ahead, however for now, the tiniest fraction of being prepared that I see now is a bit less dramatic, but might give me a few hints about how to operate in a prepared way.  I've already noticed that the better my communication, the more we are able to negotiate through things as they crop up. Put another way, two grumpy snappy adults don't make great decisions!

Since the returning to all hands on deck working, we've established some routines that sort of work. Hubby does early mornings (when my arthritis still makes me a slow turtle) and drops big children at school before work; I take our little one to her various morning activities; we come home and she naps while I get housework done; the almost 2 hour pickup of big children happens at the end of nap-time; we have a very early tea when we get home; then homework after Daddy gets home and a bit of chaotic energy, then bedtime. This is what is working for us.  

Two times I am focusing on improving is the activities I get done while little miss takes her nap, and what I get done after hubby is home at night.

At the moment, I am happy that at nap time daily I seem to be managing to completely clean the floor off in the entry and kitchen as well as downstairs toys.  This is a bit of an extension of what I've achieved in the past, and this week I'm trying to work out how to extend past that point into uncharted cleaning territory.  I'm still not sure, but some experimenting is on the horizon to find the balance that will fit in my 2 hour time frame. 

In the evenings I am juggling between walking (its not practical at 9pm any longer due to the cold!); school homework; and cleaning!  I am using the early evening time to get into extra projects or washing up, whichever is needing doing more.  This is how I managed to get the floor scrubbed on Monday night, determination!

I need to refresh and revisit the concepts of this post about Working Smart. That's the essence of what is going on here, an attempt to make the obvious easier!

There is something else I'm realising as I go over all this while listening to Bruce Springsteen's Darkness on the Edge of Town album.  It's that I need to find a way to really ENJOY getting more prepared!  I remember when I was in Girl Guides, that my Guide Leader instilled in me, for the shortest moment, a flame of inspiration of REALLY wanting to 'Be Prepared" and obtain my Baden-Powell emblem, the highest achievement for a Girl Guide.  Years later, I feel I'm finally getting the point of all those badges and things. A sense of purpose about how I am going about this domestic life, to relish and delight in what is necessary.

I think I'd much rather relish and delight in more Bruce Springsteen concerts, but in order to do that I need my house to be respectable and presentable for house-sitters, so it's delighting in house cleaning for me in the interim.

Hang in there Bruce, I'm coming to a concert soon!

Motivational Thursday (Bruce!) - the results

I was surprised at how easy it was to get stuck into the Entry just the way my friend suggested!

Here are the results of what I called The Motivational Thursday Project.  For anyone who missed it, this was motivational Thursday.

Part way through. Still quite a bit of chaos.

This was moved from the main wall to make room for the new Expedit shelves.

Wall waiting for shelving.

Front corner less chaotic, and with temporary curtain!

Voila! New shelves filled with all our stuff! (and a bag packed ready for  the trip to Melbourne!)

Today I steam cleaned the rug and tidied the last junk off the pine hutch. It feels great! Inspirational music today was Shackled and Drawn.

Working Smart

Today was bin day. I'm not very organised, hence the interest in how to organise my energy better. One thing I've learnt, at least a little bit, is the value of working smart. Something I'm proud to have accomplished, almost regularly, is the simple art of cleaning out the fridge before bin day. That way at least I don't have ikky stuff in my fridge for more than a week, and what is in the bin thats on the iffy side doesnt sit there for 6 days attracting the fly population of the whole street.

Sometimes I get it done on Tuesday night, sometimes I get it done thoroughly, including wiping down every shelf. Other times I toss the clearly too-old leftovers that stare at me as soon as I open the door, but don't get to the slightly iffy food lurking at the back of the bottom shelf. How smart I work is still variable on a lot of other factors, but if I get SOMETHING out of the fridge on bin day, I give myself a pat on the back for working smart that day! I also try to do a quick '27 fling boogie' (flylady again!) around the house to ditch any more stuff that I don't need as the bin is ready to go out. If its not too full, I make sure to try to fill it up from rubbish I don't need or old broken toys, anything I can get into the bin. For more info on 27 fling boogie visit www.flylady.net There are plenty of other examples of working smart. One I also do regularly is to open all the mail at the recycling bin. Junk mail and envelopes go straight into the bin, never coming into the house, because they don't need to be inside cluttering up the house. Then filing goes away straight away and bills go to be paid. One I don't do (because my kitchen sink is often full) is to fill a sink with hot soapy water before you start to cook, and as you cook, used utensils go straight in the sink and you wash up as you go. A friend of mine downloads her photos at the end of every week. She also sorts them at the same time into the various albums that she then prints when she has enough photos, eg. an album for each of her daughters and one for the family. I find myself not as organised as that, but when I do download photos (I try to do it monthly) I save them into a folder under the year and month, with months labelled 1- Jan 2013; 2- Feb 2013; etc so they stay in order. That way its easy to find by date. What 'working smart' tips do you have?