Walking away

I wish my cats offered to walk away yesterday. Instead, stacks of folded laundry and piles papers I've organized toppled like a house of cards. I won't even go into my TBR tower of books and how much fun the cats have with that on a routine basis.

And then they look at me with an "what-I-didn't-do-anything" stare that cats have down pat!

I'd happily offer treats, tuna or salmon, whatever they'd like if they'd just walk away.

So my trying to check things off my list continues. I made one run to the post office yesterday to mail the five packages I'd managed to get together. I have more to do today. I finished one of my RITA books and started another. The new one is by an author I hadn't heard of and I was laughing out loud at various points. I love when that happens. And more cleaning. Yuck!

I'll be back at it today!

Enjoy your Wednesday.

Human Behavior

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My cats, Spirit in particular, had a real problem with my behavior late last night. What kept her sitting on the staircase and meowing for a couple of hours? Or Beauty darting in and out, up and down, trying to figure out what was going on?

I decided to clean the pantry.

This might sound like normal behavior given it's spring and we're hosting my family's Easter celebration, but I'm not a cleaner. No one would ever accuse me of having an ounce of Domestic Goddess running through my veins. But I'd finished a chapter on the proposal and something took hold of me. An alien, a specter of a housekeeper, who knows? But I set to work.

What spurred this into action was a simple Ikea bookcase. I purchased it early in the week for my cookbooks which I kept in the pantry. I wanted them out of there so I could have more room for food. My recent Costco purchases were piling up on the pantry floor!

So I grabbed a screwdriver and set to work on the bookcase. I could only get so far (the screws just wouldn't go in) so hubby took over. I then organized all my cookbooks! Best part, they all fit. I got the small Billy Bookcase in a cherry wood finish.

With the cookbooks in their own place now, I took a good look at the other shelves and realized I had a big problem. My pantry became the catch all for things when I wasn't sure where to put them. Stuff that really didn't belong in a pantry so I had to find places for those things which meant organizing cupboards in addition to the pantry. The cats and dog weren't sure what had gotten into me, but neither did my hubby. He was, in a word, amazed, and soon joined in.

As I mentioned yesterday, I used to be big into couponing. Well, I learned last night without some semblance of organization, food will go bad. I couldn't believe how much was expired, everything from spices to canned food to cold medicine. Thank goodness most of that stuff was practically free!

Little Beauty was right there the entire time, even sharing the step stool with me. At one point, she was half-asleep, but her kitten curiosity kept her front and center where the action was instead of leading her to her cat tree or bed on the hearth.

But today, on this Good Friday, I know my efforts were worth the late night. Things are organized and I still have lots of room! And I can't wait to reward myself with some chocolate on Easter morning.

Baskets

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All I can say about the pic above is it is so true! The kidlets are currently wondering what's going happen come Easter time when we're one basket short. We've been getting the house in order (Finally!) and found one of the Easter backets that had been somewhere it shouldn't. But before we could get it out to the garage, it was commandeered by the cats. They love it. So it's currently up in my room. I told the kids they cats could survive without it on Easter Sunday!

I'm hosting my family this year so the annual spring cleaning has been going on. The downstairs is looking so good if I say so myself. The upstairs not so much. Oh, well... I still have a couple of weeks!

Have you started your spring cleaning yet?

A To Do Weekend

My Advent cleaning and Christmas preparations start today. Later than usual, but that's because of the deadlines I had last month. We try to get things up by the first Sunday in Advent, but that didn't happen this year or last. Pretty much, nothing really got done in November except writing. So today is my catch up on the To Do list day.

I had a couple of days mid-month in between turning in the complete and getting the revisions so I could clean a little then, folding laundry and restocking the pantry and fridge. But that wasn't nearly enough now that I've had another couple of weeks doing nothing. When hubby shops, he only buys what's needed for whatever meal we're going to eat. Not sure if that's a guy thing or his thing, but it's been like that for 15 1/2 years of marriage. I don't think it's going to change.

We did manage to get the chocolate Advent calendars for the kidlets so at least I haven't been a total failure at things around here.

I also cleaned out my closet again. I've found the first time I can't get rid of everything, but I'm not as attached the second time. (A lot like revising, actually.) If something didn't fit, it went into a bag. I need to lose weight (I've lost five pounds already), but most of the smaller stuff was a few years old anyway. No reason to keep it cluttering the space. If I get to my goal weight, I can buy stuff that fits and is more in style.

So that's my plan for today, what's yours?

Too much stuff

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My oldest and I spent Saturday afternoon and yesterday in Seattle working at an Irish dance feis for our new Irish dance school. It was fun, seeing people from our old school and meeting new people from our new school. We roomed with a mom and daughter from the school, attended a nice church in Burien and won a Pretty in Pink basket as part of the feis' fundraising efforts.

When we got home last night, I discovered my hubby had cleaned. I've been slowly trying to declutter, but I only get small snatches of time to do it so really appreciated what he did. Easter isn't that far away, and we have lots of people coming over for egg hunts and dinner. One less thing to check off my To Do list.

I'm afraid to tackle on thing on the list. The playroom. It's not Horders-worthy, but a crew from one of the Clean Sweep, get-rid-of-junk-and-clutter shows would probably find it a challenge. But it must be done. So I'll try to break it down into baby steps. Either that or rent one of those dumpters and just get rid of everything! Though that would cause tears and wailing from the kidlets.

This week will be filled with writing, cleaning/decluttering and craft prep for the April meeting. No more waiting until the last minute! At least that's the plan.

What's your week look like?

Almost!

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Only the great room and kitchen remain on my weekend cleaning quest. (I'm not counting the dining room, which was spotless until I started using the table to sort through my office and craft supplies.) I had big plans to finish up yesterday, but I had to get some pages written and work on some prelim pages (the pages at the front of the book before the title page) for the Vegas continuity. It's really bugging me the downstairs isn't all clean!

But I'm going to try to get at least half of my required pages written first. Such dedication! LOL! I wish. I'm just trying to stay ahead of my schedule.

You might remember me mentioning my good friend Elizabeth Boyle's The Plan before. Well, the truth is, I never could make it to the end of one of my plans. I'd last a couple of weeks, but that was all. I never could figure out why, because the idea behind The Plan is really sound. It makes so much sense to my engineering brain. But something in the execution of it just wasn't working.

So I modified The Plan to work for me.

Actually I simplified it. A lot. And made it completely low tech. Non-tech really. Think goodbye fancy spreadsheet, hello pencil and paper.

My plan is hand written into the little 5 1/2 in x 8 1/2 in spiral notebook I'm never without. It consists of three columns (October, November, December) with the days of the month written on each line. Next to that is my page goal in parenthesis. Before each of the days that correspond to Mondays, I have where I should be with my total word count if I meet my daily goal. Each night before I go to bed, I write down # pages written/# words written (total words in ms.)

I don't know why the Excel spreadsheet didn't work, but I'm not complaining about my hand scrawled version of The Plan at all. It's working. I'm four days ahead of where I should be in spite of my cleaning frenzy the past couple of days! Now all I have to do is keep it up. Fingers crossed!

Attack!

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I'm in full attack mode. I'm attacking the house. I need to find things in order to check them off my To Do list and a full on frontal assault is the only way. I'm cleaning every cabinet, draw and closet.

I started yesterday in my office. Our study that's never really been used as anything other than a large closet since we moved into the house nearly four years ago. Next I moved on to the foyer. Our ski gear from last season was still there along with tons of other things. Then the hallway and closet. I found two packages I thought I'd mailed underneath boxes. That wasn't the scariest thing.

I cleaned the buffet in our dining room and cleared all the craft stuff from the girls group I was trying to organize. Now I'm using my dining room table to sort things from the great room.

I only managed four pages yesterday (seven is my daily goal) and I've yet to write a word today, but I'm on a roll so am going to keep going. I'm ahead a few days with pages so as long as I get a couple pages at some point tonight I'll be fine.

I also watched two soccer games in the pouring rain. It was so wet and the kidlets were drenched. Life in the Pacific NW. The only time they cancel games if it's lightening.

That pretty much sums up my weekend. How is yours going?

Cleaning

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My family is coming over for Easter. We'll be doing an egg hunt and having a ham dinner. Of course company, even family, means cleaning so that's what I've been trying to do. A little at a time, but since I don't like to clean and have been so tired, I've been doing very little.

Time to pick up the pace! I'm sure this lolcat pic will be me come Sunday morning!

As for my rub-addicted kitty...I was so tired Smalls could only wake me up once in the middle of the night. This morning though she head butted me awake so I would rub her. That I can handle.

I'm very excited because my good friend Tiffany (aka Angus' mommy) and her son are coming over this morning. They moved to England last year and are back in town visiting. I cannot wait to see them. I've missed her so much!

Anything going on with you today?

Minefields and clutter

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This reminds me of my house. Between the cats, kids, dog, books and toys, I'm always negotiating a minefield. It's pretty deadly when I try to do it in the dark.

I've been working on decluttering. I managed to get the Great Room, kitchen and dinette area in pretty decent shape. At least surface wise. I never got into the built-in cabinets. But today was a working day so I couldn't declutter or clean. I left that to hubby. He spent the entire day in my oldest's bedroom. It was a mess, so bad, she couldn't do anything with it. But it's almost done and then she'll be in charge of keeping it clean.

A few months ago, I bought the kids a Financial Peace Jr. set from Dave Ramsey. Once all three of the kids' room and the play room are in order, they will be responsible for keeping it clean, plus a bunch of other chores. There's a nifty board for each child so they know what's expected of them. Fingers crossed it works, but it has to be better than what we have in place now...nothing!

I was at Amy's house on Friday morning and saw how organized she was. Only in my dreams! Still at least I'm doing something. Baby steps, I keep telling myself, both with the house and our budget. That's better than nothing!

Have a great Sunday!

Are you messy?

Today is house day. I managed to get the downstairs in shape for our dinner guest on Wednesday night, but that's about it.

Once again, there are so many clean clothes on the floor of my bedroom, I can't see much of the carpet. That means it's time to fold.

I also want to try and get organized. Not totally in one day, but one piece of the mess. I took everything off my built-in shelves in the Great Room in December when I put up Christmas decorations. Even though the Christmas stuff has been packed away, I never put stuff back on the shelves. I want to go through everything and figure out what should go where. I didn't like how cluttered it looked before.

I also want to bring a couple of my folding bookcases not being used and try to put my books in some kind of order. They are all over the place. I don't know what I have anymore!

I thought this quiz looked perfect for what's facing me today:

You Are Very Messy

You are a slob, and you really don't care if other people know it. You don't love messes, but you just can't be bothered to clean on a regular basis. While being messy and disorganized feels easy, it's probably making your life harder. Maybe it's time for you to get a maid.

Are You Messy?

Yep, that fits me to a tee. I'm trying to change. I really am. But it's just so darn hard. Messy could be my middle name.

What about you? Are you messy?