I cleaned the kitchen and the catbox and took out ALL of the trash! (Go me! 
) I didn’t sweep the whole house, but that’s okay. The kitchen is clean!
I emptied and loaded the dishwasher and started a load of laundry before work this morning! Yay!
Didn’t get much done this weekend, but was feeling yucky so I’ll give myself a pass. Tonight, I will spend 30 minutes folding clothes and we’ll start the bill-bin by opening the mail that’s come the last few days.
Well, the new fridge. It was supposed to fit. The installation guys measured the space and said “it should fit” - but it didn’t. So we removed a little trim. And it still didn’t fit. So they left.
The neighbor came over (bless him) and sanded a half inch off my countertop. Still didn’t fit. So we cut out the sheetrock along the wall. Voila - fridge fits - even with airspace (because there isn’t a wall there anymore). And once its in, you can’t tell I’m missing part of my formica or a huge hunk of wall.
But, this means I have sheetrock dust all over the kitchen.
Perhaps we should have just cleaned the old fridge (which I have to do anyway, its in the basement).
Looks great though and I have a working icemaker again.
Heresy!
Actually, I’m rather proud of myself for using regular dishes at Sunday dinner, instead of the good china that has to be handwashed. Baby steps, you know. I’ve had fortysome years to develop my neurotic habits, it’s going to take a while to break them all.
Shoes are in the closet, and since MonsterKitty took his pill without his usual cloud of panic-shedding, I didn’t have to vacuum. So I put 3 drawers of good, heavy sweaters into box, moved it to storage, and put the clean, lightweight tops I can wear in those drawers. As a result of the clothes fitting into the drawers, the couch is basket free. 17 minutes total! Monday supper is leftovers, so cleaning the kitchen should take about 5 minutes, tops.
Thanks for all the encouragement!
I did all my chores, even the heinous mopping of the dining room floor–I had to go buy a mop first, since mine broke last week.
Now, we shall have a curry feast, and make a giant mess in the kitchen. Yay, I love curry!
When I got married, I had it explained to me that books in the bed was a dealbreaker, and that I would be swiftly divorced. I used to sleep with books in the bed. Mr. Lissar is just fussy.
Tomorrow my Mom is going to take all the bags and bags of stuff to Goodwill. Tomorrow morning, before she arrives, I’m going to see if I can fill one more bag. I must sternly repeat to myself, “There will be no sudden, worldwide shortage of knick-knacks. If you need more candleholders, they are widely available at many fine dollar stores”.
I wish people wouldn’t give us knick-knacks.
OK, this sounds really dumb, I’m sure, but I’ve now kept a shiny, clutter free sink for 1 whole week now! This, of course, means that I’ve done every dish as it was dirtied and/or loaded it into the dishwasher – there have been no dirty dishes lying around all week.
Also, I have swept all the floors (all hardwood in my place; the cat pees on area rugs) every day (actually, I got a Swiffer Sweep + Vac and I love it!) and swiped and swished the bathroom at least once a day for the last four.
The last two nights, I picked up all the baby’s toys and put them back in her room before bedtime!
AND I did four loads of laundry the other day and actually folded and put them away as soon as they were dry! Did four guys wearing black just ride by on black horses? Because this is surely a sign of the Apocalypse. 
I know it’s only a few days, and I am far from reformed forever, but I just had to share my modest successes! Now tomorrow I’m going to focus on more laundry, so that I can get to a point where I only have to do one load a day, everyday.
(And Lissla, I used to sleep with books too. And dirty clothes, and wet towels, and whatever else had taken residence on my bed during the day.)
I did my daily chores, plus gave the main bathroom a good cleaning. Tomorrow I have to clean the other bathroom and wash the bathmats. It really is amazing how, one room at a time, this place is starting to look halfway decent!
That’s them, yes, Sunspace. In the Americas I’ve usually seen all their stuff together, in their own stand saying “rayen” at the top. The webpage used to be better, but you know how it is: someone takes a course on Power Point and their next presentation has a different animation on each slide :smack:
Sunspace, Mama Tiger: you know those breakwaters at the entrance of harbors, like a long path of rock? I used to create a line of piles of books perpendicular to my bed. My mother called it the “rompeolas” (lit wave breaker, the Spanish name for those harbor barriers). I’d pile up the books I’d been reading all through the weekend and put them back on the shelf right before going to bed on Sunday.
Yesterday the bosses weren’t in. Everybody was slugging about, doing lookbusy but not much work. We have flexible hours (40h/week but the bosses don’t much care how they’re distributed so long as you don’t miss any meetings or deadlines), so I left early and stopped on The Swedish Store on my way back home.
I was a Good Girl. I did not hop across the street to Media Market, or go to four different furniture megastores just because they all happen to be together, even though I do know their styles and The Swedish Store ends up being the one with what I want 90% of the time. I behaved.
Two small hampers were obtained and now sit in my bathroom. I also bought a thing for hanging my thick cooking gloves from the kitchen door. Having them there is not particularly elegant, but then, I don’t think a kitchen door that’s almost all clear glass is a very elegant thing. And I acquired enough colored small candles to keep me in colored small candles for months but, this is the incredible part, none of them will leave behind either a glass or a cute metal thingee! A pot with a spout to heat milk could not be found: apparently the Swiss have decided one must not use pots with spouts except for measuring, but my pulse is pretty bad so I like pots with spouts. Total cost less than 30$ and now my clothes are getting presorted and my kitchen is more organized.
Next time I go shopping in France I have to look for pots with spouts.
I am never again making something that might require me to clean the oven with a Q-tip, should something go amiss. I made two shepard’s pies last night, as planned, and as I was putting them in the oven, my wrist kind of flopped, and one fell. Into the nooks and crannies of the oven, and down the side of the wall, and, well, everywhere. Of course the oven was at 350F at the time, so trying to clean it up quick was a nightmare. But we got it. And it turned out that just one pie was enough for the two of us, so that’s good to know.
I’m actually getting discouraged. Part of my plan was to finish up some cross-stitch projects to get them the hell out of my house. I have, at the moment, five unfinished projects. Three are gifts, and one’s a Christmas ornament that can go in the Christmas box when it’s done. I found that I’ve flat out lost the pattern to one piece, nearly lost the pattern to another, lost the hanging part of the ornament (though I can fix that), and nearly broke the coasters as I was making them up for my mom. When I found the one pattern, I just about died. I found a box in the bedroom labeled, “papers”, and upon openning it, found that some months ago the Kangaroo_in_Black had swooped up all the papers in the living room at the time, and dumped them in a box, then stashed the box in the bedroom. I know why he did it, but the fact that he had to drives me mad.
We simply have too much stuff and not enough space. When we had a much bigger house (3 bedrooms, two stories), three or so years ago, the place was pretty darn neat. One room was a bit chaotic, but even then, it was useable. Now we have a tiny one bedroom, and I can’t get rid of stuff fast enough! Particularly as I, like someone upthread, hate to throw away things that still have use to them. I love freecycle for that, but it’s not enough.
Well, today’s the second day of the weekend for us. My goal is to get at least one review read for my thesis, and fold the laundry with my husband. Oh, and to write a quiz for my class tomorrow. Hopefully we’ll get some other stuff done too, but at least that would be nice.
You can get pots with spouts?
WhyNot, I’m impressed. I’ve managed to considerably reduce the number of dish-filled sink mornings, but haven’t eliminated them.
Today is de-cluttering, tidy my damn desk (piled 1 1/2 ft high with fabric, beads, chain, thread) and get all the books on some sort of bookshelf.
I need caffeine.
Oh, a friend of mine got a Roomba. I want to go over and visit it. Maybe bring it treats? Make it cute ears?
Arrrgh! Oh, I know just how you feel. I made a shepherd’s pie last week that bubbled over everywhere and made a huge mess of my oven. How very frustrating! I remembered it last night when putting the mac ‘n’ cheese in the oven and quickly put an old cookie sheet under the casserole, but it was well-behaved (and delicious - Alton Brown’s recipe) mac ‘n’ cheese, so the cookie sheet is unscathed.
I think I’m just going to use that cookie sheet every time I do a casserole now. It’s already old and dark, so I don’t care if it gets heat damaged any more, and it’s far easier to clean a sheet than an oven!
Yep. They’re used in fancy kitchens for making sauces and in real kitchens for heating milk to make hot cocoa. 
Here are some available at Amazon.
Guys, I’ve been backsliding. I got stuck on Mount Laundry, the dining room table is acquiring stuff, the cats knocked my “deal with these papers!” box over, and somehow there’s groceries on the counter. 
Fix them one step at a time. Sounds to me like you’re trying to cover four fronts at once. Just one.
Well, I filled a wastebasket to overflowing with discarded papers on Sunday, and yesterday I <gasp> cleaned out the ‘junk’ drawer in the kitchen. It still has misc. junk it in, but at least it’s only 1/3 full.
Today I tackle the ‘gadget’ drawer of my kitchen. This ought to be good. 
Well, I backslid a tad. Not doing floors until a bobo on my knee heals more. However the daily chores are getting done so good habits are beginning to establish themselves. I’m most pleased with myself over the nightly dish routine because I’ve too long been a knob about getting dishes out of the way. The payoff is that everything’s ready to use when I want to cook in the evening so I’m more inclined to make a better meal.
Whether or not you like Flylady, you gotta love her ‘You are not behind, don’t try to catch up, just jump in where you are’ motto. Every day’s a new day - celebrate your accomplishments thus far and keep on keeping on. As she also says, it took a long time to make the mess so it won’t be cleaned rapidly.
Tonight I’ll do bills & backups from yesterday, get out some cardboard into the cardboard recycle bin, and tidy up the ‘hot spot’ beside me. Then I’ll do some ironing while I watch tellyvision.
I’m still digging my way out from under paying work – that’s the drawback to working at home; when I can earn money vs. doing housework, guess which one suffers? – but by day after tomorrow should have a nice breather. My goals for today are fairly small – daily chores, plus go to the gym, plus clean the floor and tub in the other bathroom.
I’ve also done various other small chores – found a nice tote bag Papa Tiger can use to put his shirts in that need to go to the cleaner instead of dumping them on the floor in the corner; sorting out a whole big pile of boxes to go in recycling; and just some general picking up and putting away.
A suggestion to help keep not only your oven but your under-casserole cookie sheet clean: Put a sheet of aluminum foil on it. You can reuse it if you hate to use it just once, but if you do make a mess all you have to do is crumple it up and toss it out (hopefully in the recycling – we can’t recycle aluminum foil here, unfortunately, but we could the last place we lived, so it’s worth checking). It does reduce oven cleanup to considerably more manageable.
Oh dear, I’m feeling rather pooped and discouraged this morning. I did not do all the dishes last night, clutter seems to have appeared out of the blue, and I’m running our preschool group here this morning. I probably stayed up too late last night, too. I went with a friend to hear Jim Trelease speak about how important it is to read to your children. It was pretty enjoyable, though I didn’t exactly learn a lot; in my case at least, he was preaching to the choir.
My goals for today are to do a sort of light neatening sweep through the house and especially to clean off this computer desk. And mostly to survive the morning.
:eek: OMG, MY HUSBAND WASHED HIS CEREAL BOWL THIS MORNING!!! :eek:
passes out in shock
Maybe this clean kitchen thing is contagious!
I went out and got a pair of cheap lace up Converse knock-offs for wear around the house. Great Og, are they ugly, but I do have to admit I feel more “at work”, which, for a stay at home mom, is a good thing, because I AM at work!
I also got some wet Swiffer mop wipe thingies and they work perfectly well with my new Swiffer Sweep+Vac (although the instructions say not to use the wet ones with the Sweep. Screw that. It’s most likely a marketing thing to get you to buy two Swiffers, and if not, it’s not too expensive to replace if I somehow damage it. I won’t, of course, turn the electrically powered vacuum on with a wet wipe on it! But the motor is way up on the handle, and there’s no cords down there, so there’s really nothing that could contact wetness anyway.)
Zsofia, which one of your things are you going to do? Just pick one,and then go do it, then come back and tell us when you’re done. Don’t make a list. Just pick one.
Yes, actually, the clean kitchen thing is contagious. Just as the dirty one is. I know that’s why I’m good at maintaining, but not at the big push.
Anyway, I did put a cookie sheet under my shepard’s pies. It was the flopping of my wrist that caused the flopping of the cookie sheet, and the furthest pie to go plummeting to the oven door/wall.
I hate cleaning, but I like a clean house. Grar.