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!

Morning everyone,

Thanks for the round up PMPY hope baby stays put until you are ready!

Wendy good for you not getting stressed about the car. Enjoy you new car!

Makingchanges tofee gave a great explaination about e-cloths. The glass and polishing cloth is fab as it cleans glass, windows, steel etc to a great shine and doesn't leave streaks and the general purpose cloths are great for normal cleaning.

Missjulie wow 90 letters!

sorry there are not mere personal messages will try to do better in future

Unfortunately my list yesterday was not half as impressive as everyone thought as I only got half of it done oh well roll on today

Today
Make the decorations for DS1s cake and but them in the fridge to set
DW
Find DS2 a fancy dress costume for his school party tomorrow
Washing
hoover the living room
mop the kitchen
lunch
dinner
declutter hall
dust and hoover the playroom
clean the fridge

oh and a PTA meeting this evening!

LOL Linzer yes that sounds familiar, we still have boxes labelled things like "dp's random papers from front room, 1997" hanging around ... this is why I run the administrative things in the house, I might be crap but relatively speaking I'm the more organised one!

Toffee when you have twins and one is really badly behaved and the other is good (at school, I may add, at home they swopped roles) the teachers do begin to realise it is not just a case of "bad" parenting, but that the children do have different responses to school environment.
Unfortunately they all now seem to be naughty, late and disorganised with very bad handwriting and shirts hanging out, so a pattern is emerging
Re: ds2 being in a bad mood after trip, it is eggshell territory after school here, most days
You are brilliant to help on school trip; it is exhausting though! I remember going to Kew Gardens with the school, and just wishing I could take my little group off and let them run freeeeee, and not fill in any worksheets

Last night I went to bed at 9.45 in a huff and read my book. Just fed up with trying to get recalcitrant children to bed post projects,Beavers, Brownies, and Football match. Dh took over. I had a lovely refreshing sleep. I must do this early bed thing more often

ERRAND DAY
go to library find book on Costume for European Day on Friday (they have to go in National costumes or something "creative"
return library books
buy dd new shoes
buy ds1 new shoes
buy Brownie Leggings
iron dress for dd

INDOORS
tidy bedrooms, finally get dusty landing books out of bedrooms into corridor
hoover dcs bedrooms
put away clothes in drawers rationally
put away spare material in dd's cupboard

EXTRA
piano practice
piano lesson (me)
sewing curtain in between

What's for dinner - risotto with chorizo, leek and mushroom, and cheese, salad
kids - plain rice and cheese, ham, salad

Wendy well done on calm re-charging!
OPT your posts are cheering
Push have a good day
Systems you can do it, my filing was rather like yours, I worked out the best thing was to start a new file from NOW, at least I knew where last week's paperwork was even if 4 years ago was a mystery. This morning I actually found 3 passport sized photos for the dcs for their European Club at short notice, in a section marked "assorted school photos" I was so CHUFFED..as I knew they were in my files somewhere....and I have 4 concertina files..for last year alone.

Cobweb poor you, and poor ears and throat. I hope you are resting today and not doing more than basics.
Could you try telly to eek out the intervals perhaps. Ds2 went through the stage of thinking he needed to go all the time because he got confused about the sensation.

morning.

there is no life here and i am a figment of your imagination I wasnt on the internet until 2am and i actually put all the paperwork away last night So i am not crawling back into bed and pulling the covers over my head and ignoring the world. Honest gov.

Tut tut CHB and on very day of baby-step no.17 as well!!

Morning everyone! Checking in late - hope you are all ok.

I had to eat my words yesterday as not only did dh stay at home from work and actually admit he felt ill, he went to bed and is still there this morning. And I (who was feeling much better) suddenly was struck down with nausea and dizzyness yesterday evening and felt rotten again although I feel much, much better today after a good night's sleep. We are all off to the doctor this afternoon and hopefully dd will be back to school tomorrow. It really has been the most frustrating week (what with one thing and another)! Determined to catch up today/tomorrow.

Wow Pushme 37 weeks and counting!!! Congrats on reaching full term. That went fast didn't it??!! It's really getting very exciting now!!! [sc starts knitting booties]
Great round-up last night too... glad junior has settled down for the moment anyway.

Elliepac well done on a great party - sounds like you all had a really fab day! Good luck with the clear up/Flying today!!

A very warm welcome to LemonDifficult

Toffee hope ds2 isn't going down with something

Ihate sorry you are all still suffering - hope you are able to rest a little

Hope you are feeling better today too MakingChanges

Well done with your mammoth letter writing session MissJ

Good luck with your huuugggeee list Swan

Namechange thanks for your lovely post yesterday
and glad you are staying with us 120

Big waves to Linzer, Wendy Systems and everyone else ...

[makes note to check out book-marking, post colour changing malarkey]

Not writing a list today - take too long. Just cracking on!! It's bright and sunny which highlights the dust and clutter ... very motivating!!

Struggling with motivation today and only have until 1pm as have Maths workshop at school then.

List includes

• Finish Morning routine
• Empty bins in kitchen - done
• Make 36+ buns for DD to take into school tomorrow (me and my big mouth!) - done
• Make Spaghetti bolognese for dinner and freezer - done and bubbling (MUST remember to turn it off before going to school)
• 15mins in living room - finish off yesterday's decluttering that is still on floor
• Pack up and post stuff for ebay and my Mum
• Go into loft to try and find yellow dress for DD to wear as 'something yellow' for Non-uniform Day tomorrow - apparently yellow leggings and yellow tutu is not enough

That will do until after school then need to

• Get DD to write invitation to friend
• DS to swimming lesson
• Ice 36+ buns (in yellow!)
• Collapse in heap

Sorry for lack of personal messages, please accept frantic waving instead :)

Lemondifficult was looking for your post but it was so far back, I couldn't spot it, sorry...
in the meantime (further procrastination)Feet I watched a cookery programme for the first time in ages on Tues, - Jamie's 30 min suppers. Dh was enthralled and kept saying "why can't we cook that" whilst I kept muttering "just look how many pans he's using - who's going to wash them up...ds2 isn't going to eat that is he - mutter mutter mutter
But it is MESMERIZING especially Jamie's voice - never dared watched Masterchef, that would be the end of my cooking forever out of sheer jealous spite

These special dress days are v. tiring. Feet I wouldn't have a yellow dress or even a yellow tutu. Onion skins? make a nice saffron colour when you boil them with white cloth.

I think dd is going to go as Holland in a dress covered in tulips, but I need to borrow some clogs. Then I need to think of what ds2 is going to wear (not allowed football clothes as "country", and ds1) sigh.

Well, i have been kinda productive. I am sorting though my cv. it requires a miracle atm, and retyping as the only electronic copy is on the computer that suffered the black screen of death and now has no bios :( Thnakfully i keep a paper copy. - yes i know more clutter, but i find it useful in interviews - gives me something to read whilst i am waiting to walk in, plus reminds me of my job specific customerisations.

to do list
burn pgce stuff - far too long in coming and will be thereapeutic plus shift 3 boxes of paper that i would otherwise have to shred.
Finish cv revamp
washing up/DW

short and sweet today.

can't get the twiddly bit of Vivaldi's Spring
back to try it again....spurred on by CHB

Swan - yellow not too bad as its DD's favourite colour (and DS has a Mr Happy t-shirt :))
Would be and if they had to go as a country. Good luck

swan I also tried and failed to find Lemondifficult's post - gave up after three or four pages and decided I must have overlooked it. But welcome anyway.

DH has just sent me an e-mail - with a smiley, which he never normally uses - to tell me he'll be having a "home office day" tomorrow (Denglish for "working from home", I think). Replied with a smiley, but inside I was thinking noooo... I'm only just getting back on track this week! Maybe I could send him out to do the weekly food shop, after which I shall insist that he spends the rest of the morning locked away working. If anything else, I shall have to curtail my MNing.

Quick update:

Morning routine done
Mission - bathroom done
Mission - office done
15 mins decluttering in office done
Clean fridge
Menu planning done
Write shopping list part done
Purge magazines done
Empty bins done
Pay hotel deposit postponed till tomorrow
Pay church tax postponed till tomorrow
Ironing about to do
Hang up washing
Afternoon routine
Send photos to GPs
DD1: thank you letters x2
DD2: letters x2
DD1: homework for dyslexia lesson
Sort out magazines for friend done
Visit English friend
Evening routine

Linzer
depends what he likes to do on his home office days

can you see I'm finding it very difficult to do my piano practice - I need a Tiger Mother to stand over me..

If nothing else, I meant to say.
Flaw in the plan: DH may not want to be seen out shopping if he's supposed to be working from home. Solution: I shall send him at 7 am, before he would normally be at work.

If you find any piano practice motivation swan, please send some over here - I'm hoping to get the DDs to do theirs before we go out (but suspect they will have had enough by the time they've finished their homework).

DH likes to do a modicum of work on his home office days, but not generally enough to keep him occupied all morning unfortunately. (As it's a Friday, he theoretically only needs to work in the morning.)

I'm giving up and trying the curtain instead .
Perhaps Lemondifficult is a reference to Feet's post about yellow?

Meant to say earlier

Feetheart, Swan and Ogre Oh no!!!I can't believe I missed the first episode of Masterchef last night!!!
(We all had an early night because of this lingering lurgy). But yippeee!! I see there's another episode tonight ! Hope they don't drag out the "drama" too much like the Australian version (far too many people weeping and wanting to open gastro-pubs in barns and not enough cooking!!) And yes, I did nick that line from Groanead article ...

Linzer same problem with hair cutting and dyeing here!! In fact the standard of hairdressing is so bad that a L'Oreal packet is a far better bet than risking your Barnet Fair in a salon. That is why we all walk around with solid colour helmet head hair!!

Right, packing everyone off to doctors's now ...

I can't find LemonDifficults post now either ...

cue Scully and Mulder music ...

or ...perhaps I have finally lost my sanity

How very, very strange

I definitely saw the name in bold and a post about joining

But it's not there now ...

Perhaps we have a ghost on the thread ...

MUST leave for doctor now ..will ask about anti-hallucinogens while I am there ...

right, I have ironed a curtain seam...
now have the strength to continue with twiddles..

SC it was a trick! To test us!

To see whether we had read the thread properly!

I have lost the will to live. Seriously this is a nightmare right now. cba.

I don't know about DD behaving like a spoilt princess but I am a grumpy woman today. All I want to do is have a little nap instead I am going to do a Peppa Pig puzzle for the gazillionth time.

Have done the tidying but have got real cba where the washing is concerned. Managed to stick some in the washing machine but can' be bothered to do anything with it .