Less is more.

While making my bed (at 1 pm) I came up with some motivational thinking, that I wanted to remember…

* Less is more. It’s a famous quote. But in a de-cluttering kind of way it’s brilliant. Less stuff, less house work. Less house work, more time for other things. Not to say I waste my day away on house work. I do what I need to do, but at almost all times I have a messy room. As in NEEDS to be tended to room.

* Take the full bath for instance. It’s been repainted, to be simple. Black. White. Grey. Red is my pop of color. We do NOT need all that crap. I donated a TON of overstock products to Joplin families. And tossed what was crap (seriously when your perfumed lotions separate, it’s WAY over due!)

* If creating is your passion. You want to paint, draw, sketch, scrapbook, sew, paper Mache’… then you NEED to make the house work MUCH easier. Hence ‘Less. Is. More’

* Actually follow through with having the kids pick up after them selves. At the age of 5 and 3 they can both do some sort of picking up. Not always you. NOW to work on Spaghetti cleaning up after himself (I was pretty lenient on him since in the baseball season he works 3 jobs… well for the next 2 weeks he does)

* My newer rule is ‘Does it belong"?” As in I wear my sunglasses on top of my head, if I make it up stairs with them on my head they DO NOT get set down on the desk. The rule applies here because there is NO sunshine in the loft, so there is NO reason for sunglasses. I tell myself this with empty cups in any room but the kitchen, since THAT is the room you get the beverage from.

* In a way I’ve been flying at this for going on 3 years now. De-cluttering is SUCH a process, and when you’re a professional procrastinator like myself, then being a Flybaby is a LONG time commitment. See Flybaby Baby steps.

Now that my brain full of motivating ideas is dumped out to blogger land, I can go back to making my bed, and folding more clothes, or I will find some blog, or website I must check…

Feisty

Update on my flying

Dear Feisty,



WOW!!!!
After I read your testimonial, I stood up and cheered!!
We are so proud of you.
You have conquered your laundry!!!!

What a wonderful moment for you.

You are FLYing and you will continue to bless yourself and your family

and your home.



Thanks for sharing.



{{Hugs}}

FlyLady Katie
 
This is an update to the post I did a few days back on my madd laundry skillz. It was nice of them to respond! Go me!

It's a big deal to me damn it.

Dear Flylady,
I found your site 17 months ago. I was smitten with your idea's, I made a control journal and I read ALL of it, instead of doing things one day at a time, I plowed through thinking I could do it all. I'm sure you can guess what happened.
I crashed, and burned.
It has been an ongoing battle for me keeping up with the house. Well let me tell you a bit about us here at the Mc house. I am a SAHM, and my DH Spaghetti, works 2 jobs, and a 3rd in the summer. We have two children, Bagel who is 3 1/2 and Weaky who is 21 months. We also have two boxers, and two cats. Phew. So with that said, Spaghetti works, and works, and I get ALL the house hold responsibilities.



I am getting better at picking up after myself, and everyone else, I have realized that CHAOS is how we live, and then when guests are coming over, we choose the room they won't see and shove everything in there. And that room then suffers for months before the clutter is removed.



My biggest issue? Laundry. I shudder at the word. I have always done poorly at keeping up with laundry, even when I lived at home and my mom did my laundry!!



I found an older blog post about how I was sitting in a 1x1 square of carpet in my bedroom. The ONLY part of my carpet you could see. The other 8x8 floor space, and 3x10 space was COVERED about 2 feet high with clothes. Some dirty some clean. I later found a blog post on how I had 18 garbage bags, and 5 laundry baskets FULL of clean clothes to be put away. Amazingly we still had clothes on our backs, we just had WAY to much clothes.



Fast forward to summer 2009, I purged like a good flybaby. I was donating BAGS of clothes, my daughters clothes went to a friend who was having a baby girl (I gave her 12 bags!) and my son's 3 bags of clothes went to my cousin for her baby boy.



Each time I donated I felt a weight come off my shoulders, it made me want to purge more! I needed to sort through the clothes, decide what was to keep, what was to hopefully fit into (those are bagged and in the attic. I wrote a date on them, and I have 1 year to fit into them, or they go too!) My husband lost weight so we had to go through his clothes as well.



So if you want to know my old habits of washing, drying and putting away? Well they were slim and none. I washed, then dried. Then it sat for a few days. Then I would have to re wash the stinky clothes in the washer, and yes even some of them got mold on them from this lazy habit! I would carry the clothes up two floors to our bedroom, and dump the clean clothes on the floor, I would do this all day, dumping 4 big baskets onto the floor. Well after caring for two small children all day, the last thing I wanted to do was fold or hang clothes. We ALWAYS lived out of baskets, or the floor pile. I would iron as need be.

(yes we lived like this for 11 years)

Or if we even were close to catching up with laundry, lets say I had a load in the wash, a load in the dryer, and a load to go in. To me that was caught up, I would ignore the evil chore for a week! Well you know where that got me. Back to piles and piles of laundry.



It was frustrating, making us late for work, for family get togethers, not to mention I would get stressed trying to dress myself, and family from a mess of a monster pile! I remember one day, walking into my daughters room who was 2 1/2 at the time, she had dumped over a basket of clean clothes in her room, and strewn them about. I asked her why she did that. She said to be like you mommy.



I was sad that I was that role model. I cried to myself, and vowed that I would have to teach her the right way to be like mommy.



After the great purge was over, and the Holiday's ended. I started on January 2nd 2010, I started doing loads of laundry like crazy, usually 3-4 a day, folding and hanging them as I went, never dumping a clean load onto the floor like before, if I was too tired to fold, it stayed IN the basket.



As of today. January 30th 2010, I have caught up.

I cried. I am SO proud of pushing myself to get this done right. It has been 11 years of laundry piles, and procrastinating, but I did it.



I did it by myself, no need for my husband to try and take the kids away for a day so I can fold, or have my mom take bags home to help out. I needed to do it myself. I thought of you and your quotes and comments often, your Tweets asking me where my laudry is often saved the day.



My Dear Husband and I can now enjoy our retreat of a bedroom like we should, it's pretty and a treat to go to.

Thank you Flylady. Thank you.



Flybaby,

Queen of Feisty



P.S. share this message with anyone who needs it. I hope it inspires. Now I am off to see how many nights in a row I can shine my sink, so far 4 nights in a row is my max, but I am trying, I fly and crash, and fly and crash, but I just keep flying...
 
 
Blogger note: This is an email I sent to the flylady, if you need to get organized in anyway, or start cleaning check her out. She is A.MAZ.ING, and no I did not refer to my husband as Spaghetti and myself as the Queen of Feisty for real... silly readers... and noe that I said on FB a few days ago that I was caught up, I was with the people clothes, I have spent a few days washing rugs, and blankets. I can proudly say that today I have NO laundry.

CHAOS is possibly over?!?

Outside of having jacked up coffee (and not in a good way. I added to much sugar, and its kinda gross. But I will just suck it up, and enjoy the sugar buzz for what it's worth) I am having a fanfreaking wonderful day.


Why? Well because last night I buried myself in Tupperware. LOTS o' Tupperware. Seriously, I had it covering over half my kitchen floor! Either way it's been organized, and is put away nicely (the cabinet was getting to the point where you just openthedoorfast and fling in the Tupperware slam the door hoping it won't all avalanche out.


I realized my Tupperware also multiplies like dirty rabbits, I ended up recycling a HUGE garbage bag of Tupperware. Yes I had that much and I STILL have plenty to use.


Got excited then I organized the pots and pans and my baking dishes, and in the process I realized I had a cabinet full of a bunch of nothing important. After organizing and shuffling around. I was able to make it my small appliance cabinet. SO now my George Forman grill, my omelet maker, my toast, toaster oven, and blender are all tucked away. Right were I can grab them easily, but not all over my counter! Hooray!!


AND great news, I know this is a freaking exciting post there, but it needs to get out of my head. I am 4 days shiny!!


That means that I have washed my dishes and kept my kitchen sink clean for 4 days in a row. Flylady would be SO proud! Each night I go to bed with a clean sink, and make my coffee for the next day. At first it was weird waking up to a clean kitchen, but now it's almost addicting.


Sounds crazy? I know some of you are OCD and LOVE to have a clean and organized home, I just COULD not get my shit together. Well readers, I have gotten my shiznit together, and wala! I have a love for keeping my house clean.


Don't worry it's not only the kitchen. I make my bed every day, and clean up the bathroom, I have been good about NO laundry on the floor, I am trying to keep up with folding. It's clean, just 4 baskets to fold still.


I am in love with this house, and getting it together, seems to be fun if I make it that way. So thanks to all the books, I have read on organizing, and websites I have been following on purging and organizing. It has taken me a year and a month, to really get it all to sink in.


So no, it's not just lazy like I thought. It's a mental process of understanding your home, and your role in it. And having less stuff makes it so much more.


I have noticed that it makes Spaghetti happier, and I am less stressed around the kids, and I have free time to play with the kids. AND I can actually have people over, and it's not CHAOS. (Can't Have Anyone Over Syndrome) I know, I know, again it sounds silly, but this is what SO many people deal with. And now I think I can beat it, and have a nice house.


Well I am off to organize my hall closet, purge some coats (there is a coat drive at Jewel foods) and clean my ceiling fans (I finally stopped them. Eww...) Oh and maybe fold some laundry. Maybe...