If your nest is cluttered and getting you down, join February's Fledgling Flyers and turn it around

[pushmepullyou]

Welcome to the February Fledgling Flyers' thread. A very big thankyou to ToffeeChristmasCake (who will presumably return under her non-Christmas name ) for seeing us through the thick and thin of January decluttering.

All flyers and fledgings old and new are very welcome - we have a fairly relaxed attitude to flying and take some of the babysteps - such as getting dressed to lace-up shoes - with a pinch of salt. We also strongly advise against signing up for the FlyLady emails.

From the first of the month, we will be following Flylady's tips on restoring order to our homes, using one of the following methods:

1. Babysteps
2. Babysteps + 15 mins daily decluttering
3. Babysteps + daily missions

Following the babysteps helps to establish daily routines and build a weekly plan.

If you are overwhelmed by the mess in your home, start with just one thing: shine your sink. It's amazing what you can achieve by just doing a bit at a time!

Pleased be warned that my month's leadership comes with a bit of a caveat as I am due to have DC2 at the beginning of March so there is a chance I may disappear mid month! Thankfully Toffee has very kindly offered to deputise in the event of the unexpected appearance of DS .

Apologies to Toffee (and by extension Ellie) for blatant intro plagarising and thankyou to Nettie for the thread title

See you all in February!

Hope your timer turns up soon, Toffee - I was lost without mine last week. I finally found it yesterday, behind a calendar on top of the piano.

Good luck with your crisis cleaning Nick and swan.

Prompted by my mini nervous breakdown over the state of the house last night, DH has just taken all the DC out to the Roman baths so I'm about to start my crisis clean now. Didn't get as much done this morning as I'd hoped, partly because a friend who owns the hotel down the road phoned and asked if I could go over to proofread an e-mail he'd written in English to prospective guests. Helped him to correct the worst mistakes, but it turned out that over half of the (very long) e-mail still needs translating. I've agreed to do it, but Flying is taking priority for now!

Timer question: what do you do when you set it and within seconds of it starting, you get 'M-u-u-u-m' to deal with? Don't know if it's just my two but even if they've been happily doing something else, they have antennae for when I start to focus on something!

Toffee - definately not superwoman. The children weren't ill, the school was closed for the day. That helps as the weather was lovely so they spent alot of time outside.

Working from home definately makes things more difficult. I don't have "work time" and "home time"; I work when I can and when there is work to be done.

Today I'm going to

Mop the kitchen floor (didn't have time yesterday)
put away pile of clean clothes
2 minute hot spot
vacuum living room

I also need to go into town to buy a birthday present for a party tonight. I'll leave the LO with DH whilst he watches the rugby.

systems My timer has a start/stop function, so I can pause it if I get interrupted (which happens frequently if the DC are around). I had to rely on my oven timer when I mislaid my "Flying" timer last week and got very frustrated about the fact that it didn't allow for interruptions.

Washing hung up and first 15 minutes of crisis clean done; into the kitchen now...

frenchfancy Yes, not being able to switch off from work is one of the (few) disadvantages of working from home; everything else tends to fall by the wayside as soon as work arrives.

Systems - I turn it off and pick up where I left off after dealing with them. But that does, of course, mean everything takes an hour, instead of 15 mins.

French - I work at home too. I find it really difficult to switch off from everything that needs doing in the house when I'm working, but I have to sometimes.

Nicknacks - I know! I also found a book on decluttering in a pile of clutter recently!

Linzer - wish I could just borrow your timer. Still haven't found mine. Happy Flying.

Must take children out for a walk. Luckily it's a lovely sunny day for a change.

Back from busy morning.
all the way home dd was suggesting activities for the afternoon - sprinkler in garden [nooooooo!)as it was so nice and sunny and they could dance around in their swimsuits
trip to swimming pool (possibly)
ds1 wants to visit his friend
ds2 is hoping his friend will come round

Can't quite see this crisis clean happening for long timer or no timer.

Lunch made, but for some reason no-one wants to eat any - dd is now busily washing a pair of wellington boots in the new bathroom.

Three 15 minute room rescues done, so I've now decided to work for 15 minutes (rather than leaving it all until this evening and tomorrow evening).

Found so far:

DD1's crochet hook (too late, as we've just bought her a new one for the new semester, which starts on Monday)
DD2's skiing gloves (too late, as the skiing course finished yesterday)
DD1's birthday voucher from Ikea (probably too late as it expires at the end of the month and having been twice this week, we're unlikely to go again soon)

Toffee Do you have a timer on your mobile? (My UK mobile has a timer but I keep it at my parents', which obviously wasn't much use last week.)

swan DS refused point blank to eat the lunch I'd made today; I'd completely forgotten about his aversion to macaroni cheese.

Timer now set for 15 minutes of work...

Genius. Can you believe I have a PhD and yet pausing the timer never occurred to me??? I was just always thinking, failed again, can never get 15 minutes in a row ..... This is why I need this thread, utter lack of any practical sense!! I have been feeling rubbish all day with a nasty cold but this has actually cheered me up and motivated me, would you believe. Off to find one of my many timers ...

Well, clearly even after nearly 18 months I am shite at this flying lark. One late night at work transcended into a week when I couldn't be arsed to do a thing! Thankfully, DH could be arsed so has kept things ticking over but am now back with a vengeance (mainly because it is half term this week and I have no valid excuse because I am not at work for 9 days ...perk of being a teacher!)

I also have DD's birthday on Wednesday so have lots of people coming round so need the house to be presentable. We finally got her a present of wooden train set with a table. CM suggested it as apparently she plays with hers for hours. She also has a big Peppa Pig cuddly, some books and a dress. I still have to buy lots of stuff for her party as she is adamant that she wants a Peppa Pig party (it is only family and friends) and nothing less will do as she has been talking about it ever since DS's birthday in August .

So the big plan is to get the house tidy over the weekend and then do the rooms people will be in properly at the beginning of the week. I also have an insane amount of washing to do and the big goal is to not have a single jot of washing by the end of the week. Oh and am also going to have a go at ebaying some of the DC's old clothes and stuff.

Have not managed to catch up with the thread yet but will attempt to do so later! Big waves to everyone .

Dd is sorting out my handbag for me, and has found £15 in loose change! Clever girl
pjs under pillows
laundry in the right rooms
sink shone
rubbish collected up from worktops
dw finished

hi ladies
Have had a migraine lurking for three days, staved off by lots of water and lots of strong painkillers ... it is reappearing at present.
Otherwise, feeling good LOL, happy and just need more sleep!
Had a girls' night out last night at a friend's house - fab night and migraine went away for a whole 6 hours so I indulged in three big glasses of champagne! Shattered today as I didn't get in til one!
DC cheery today. Have made salt dough hearts with them for Valentines for grandma and nanna!
(hope dh is planning on a card for me from them or else! LOL) Off to MIL for tea, saves me thinking about it.
Rejoined the gym yesterday, £££ but at least i can take the children swimming again, may even get back to yoga once a week, perhaps ... used to go 3 times per week before I got pregnant with DS2 - who was 10 weeks old yesterday! Already!
see you all tomorrow

Just back from long walk. DS1 very grumpy about it, but it definitely cheered him up. And I found my timer! So now I'm going to do some 15-min room rescues (am sitting at the dining-room table, which is piled with clutter).

I'm at the swimming pool!
think I can put them all to bed today thoroughly sparkly! even if nothing else is
great present ellie ds2 adores his and only just growing out of it at 9

Systems hope you kept your head down and didn't get defeated - I just abandon ship when defeated

Wendy I need to start using this gym a better more intensively. There is salsa,something else unpronouceable dancewise, tennis, and of course gym but we only use the swimming pool bit and the cafe. Dh doesn't set foot here. Dough Hearts sound beautiful, I'd forgotten about Valentine's I always do...

bit not better [freudian slip!)

Resolution failed: no 15-min room rescues achieved. The hairdresser over the road phoned to say she had a slot available to cut DS1's hair, so I have spent the last hour over there. Cooking dinner now. And DH has handed me a glass of .

I don't think much Flying will be happening now...

DH stayed out with the DC all afternoon, so the house is looking significantly tidier now (although I didn't manage to get quite as much decluttering done as I'd hoped).

Have just finished the translation for the hotel (not paid, but I might get a taxi ride to the airport out of it). Can hear the DC downstairs - theoretically in bed, but it sounds like they're running around; they're certainly very lively - so must go and investigate before going to investigate the situation.

Am now on second glass of . Definitely no Flying until tomorrow now.

Evening

Just dropping by to say "hello" to all

Still all a bit feak and weeble here with this virus

and dd is now showing symptoms

I haven't achieved much as still feeling wierldly floaty. Dh carrying on manfully (whereas I am being a wimp) and did a mercy dash to supermarket while dd and I made a "market" out of lego, wooden blogs and playmobil on the dining room table.

Waves to all.

Well done with your crisis cleaning Linzer

wendy thanks for reminder - have done nothing re: Valentine's day - your salt dough hearts sound good!

Glad you have bit of a "break" Ellie (well, a few days in which to Fly and prepare for a party anyway!!) Train set sounds fab

Well done Swan and Toffee for exercising!

Waves to NickNacks FrenchFancy systems pushme and everyone else!! Heading to bed now for an early night.

Hi all

Tomorrow's babystep is to pick a mission and do it

No missions tomorrow - apart from the baby step of course, and Sunday is renew your spirit day so don't forget to do something special for yourself.

Hope noone minds, but I'm going to skip the full roundup this evening as I'm feeling a bit under the weather as I've been having eith bad Braxton Hicks or mild contractions since early this morning.

I expect it is nothing and I will still be here on the 8th feeling cross, don't particularly feel that anything is imminenet tbh, but is enough to make me tired and grumpy and want to go to bed

Nice to see ellie back - it is so hard to do anything in the week when you're working, I really sympathise.

Glad to see SC is feeling better and hope your DD feels better soon too.

Hello to toffee, linzer, systems, wendy, swan and nicknack, as well as everyone else I have probably missed.

Keep your fingers crossed for me that I get some sleep

Morning all,

The DC are still getting up far too early - DS was insistent that he wanted to get up at 6 this morning and that DH had to get up with him. The girls got up not long afterwards and I've taken over, while DH has gone back to bed. They'll often sleep in until 8 at weekends, so I don't know what's happened this week.

I'm hoping to actually get some decluttering done today. A colleague of DH's is coming to visit this afternoon and I've said I'll make some brownies this morning, but it shouldn't take too long.

PMPY Hope you got some sleep and are feeling better this morning.

SC Sorry to hear that your DD is probably coming down with the virus too; I hope you're all on the mend soon.

Toffee Glad the timer turned up, even if you didn't have time for any room rescues in the end.

swan I'd been hoping that the swimming yesterday would tire the DC out, but no - they were late going to sleep and up even earlier than usual this morning.

wendy Hope you manage to stave off the migraine and well done on rejoining the gym; I don't think I even had the energy to think about exercise when the DC were 10 weeks old.

Push hope you got some sleep with the dreaded BHxs. Thank you for doing all the rounding up with so much else on your plate.

SC how are you this morning? The market - inventive & lovely. My favourite cousins used to recieve different model market stalls each birthday -baker, florist, confectioner, I can remember completely coveting them aged 9. (although they weren't playmobil but plaster I think)

Not a good start to morning, although all is calm now...with ds2 screaming his head off that dd had interrupted his football match on telly by daring to put on CBBC. Two late risers and one lark. And an owl, me. Again, I am not good at early mornings and dh is! Come back, all is forgiven.

Done
load of washing
breakfast

todo
get dressed, find specs
wash hall floor
hoover our bedroom
take shepherd's pie out of freezer [yay - organised!)
not so organised need to buy some potatoes for the toppping
take dcs scootering in park
ds2 to friend's house afternoon
HOMEWORK (interview someone - who though? ds friends' mum? Grandma on phone? Random churchgoer?)
Altar serving x 2 at 6pm so church later, need to plan early supper. Fishcakes?
Need to make those [sigh]

and something else a bit more inspirational! Valentine's Day something or other?? My kids have to be bludgeoned into doing any craft so have to be very pro-active about this...

15 minutes to put washing away now.

pushme hope the contractions have eased! I had those for 4 weeks prior to having DS2 - I was a week overdue. Up all night with them stupid things. I was shattered by the time he arrived! (and still am 10 weeks later LOL)
swan when is dh back?! You have coped very well!
linzer good luck with decluttering!

We may be going to buy a new car today it's just deciding how much to spend!