Friday 27 July 2012

Zen and the art of keeping house

I'm a perfectionist, so much of a perfectionist you'd never know when you look at me.
You see unless I'm going to do something perfectly I don't bother doing it at all, really I hate to fail so I just don't try.

Until I met my husband my life was dominated by chaos.  There was no point cleaning because, well things would never stay clean.  No point tidying because things would never be perfectly organised.

Well I was both wrong and an idiot.  The thing about having people that live with you, that you care about (every roommate/ flatmate I've ever had: there is no apology large enough!), is that you cannot let them wallow through all your mess everywhere.
I started with baby steps- when me and my husband first moved into together I started doing the dishes- before the plates got so bad  that the easiest solution to the mess was to throw them out.

Sidebar- one of the ways that I knew, deep in my toes, that me and my husband were it:
The first night he stayed over he hung out in my flat while I was at work all day.  I told him when I left not to go in the kitchen.  That was because it was a health hazard.  Beyond a health hazard.  There were dishes in the cupboard under the sink, thats how bad it was.  When I came home he didn't say anything, but I went to get a drink of water, after bascially locking him in the living room, only to discover he had cleaned everything, every mouldy cup and encrusted plate.  And because he didn't want to embarass me he hadn't mentioned it.  That folks is both chivalrous, gallant and down right kind.
Side side bar- my only advice in finding a life partner- above all things they should be kind.  My husband is the kindest person I ever met.  I will have to blog the story about him nearly getting left behind at seven sisters overland station once.

Anyway to return to the point of this post- when we got married I starting trying to organised enough about laundry that I had clean clothes to wear- (this one is trickier now we have two children, there is so much laundry).

And when we had children I started to get serious about things like routine and cleaning and tidiying, because  well, it didn't really seem fair to bring them up in squalor or leave all the cleaning to my husband.

So I tried things like flylady, but it wasn't really my thing, although I do shine my sink whenever I can these days.  The most useful thing I took away though was the idea that, something was better than nothing.  I little bit of cleaning and straightening is better than sitting on my couch feeling overwhelmed.  It has helped.

Last year I brought a few organising books.  The best of the bunch were A year to an organised life, which I've dipped in and out of but which I have resolved to follow in its entirety next year, I might even blog it!  Its a bit... american for my British sensibilities, but it certainly gets me think about how to organise in the right way.

The other is The Housewife's handbook, which is just excellent.  Full of little tips and answers to all your essential housekeeping and cleaning questions.  I especially liked the routines and habits section at the end- it's given me a real framework to start to manage my own household.

So the big question, am I organised, is my home showroom perfect.  Well no, for one I've got 2 under 2 and for two I've just moved house- those are my excuses and I'm sticking to it!  But I am starting to get there.


(Blogger note: Full disclosure, some of the links above go to my amazon affiliate which, if you purchased the book from the links, would earn me a few pennies.)






Thursday 26 July 2012

The inaugral post...


What to say, I could talk about the fact that I'm a bad mummy, posting while listening to my two ear old loudly complaining and coming up with ever more inventive excuses for getting out of having to go to bed.  (The piece de resistance so far tonight has to be when she explained that there "is no room in the bed mummy." she had arranged her 4 small cuddly toys across the length of her pillow.  "No room for me, I'll have to play in the park instead mummy.")
Or I could mention that I'm a bad mummy, because I'm leaving their dad, my delightful co-parent to manage her and her 6 month old sister in the very slow wind down.
My excuse- it's hot, too hot to expect them to settle and, to be honest, to hot to type.
So I won't post about the predictable yet depressing ways the DWP are still trying to con claimants out of their benefits.  See here for details.
I don't have the energy to rant about the pedestrian, tired and above all stupid habit of law enforcement agencies to campaign against rape by admonishing the victims (stupid because it doesn't work, rapists still rape).  Suffice to say this time its west mercia police, tomorrow your guess is as good as mine.
I shan't gush over the best fic I read all month (if you like avengers fic and believe darcy should be shipped with all the things please go here.)

Instead I'm going to write 500 words of my novel and go to bed.  Or go hang with my husband now he's got the children to sleep.