April Fledgling Flyers: April Fools we are not, babysteps and decluttering makes our thread hot, step right in and mark your spot.

[NettieSpaghetti]

Welcome, come away in you?ll have had your . This is the April Fledgling Flyers Thread.

Thanks to WhoKnowsWhereTheTimeGoes who was champion at leading us through March.

We are trying to stick to the Flylady © Website and her baby steps and routines to help keep our houses out of C.H.A.O.S and ready for everyday, maybe the odd visitor or two.

Check her website out but don?t sign up for emails as they are likely to inspire but fill your inbox so full we might not see you till August.

The principles are:

Babysteps (one at a time)
Babysteps and 15 minutes daily decluttering
Babysteps and daily missions.

This month I will be posting the links and leading you down the road to building a routine and keeping your house under control.

It is amazing what you can achieve in a simple babystep,15 minutes a day and a little chat.

cant find home blessing guidlines. If anyone else can, could you let us have them please.

Details of the weekly home blessing hour are here.

Happy birthday ellie!

Nettie Sorry you didn't get the school you wanted - hope it all works out.

scatty Glad the party went well and that you have the chance to recover today.

Well, it's not looking good for my iPod - can't find the receipt anywhere, couldn't send it back to Amazon anyway as the 90 day return period is up and I suspect the guarantee is probably only for a year (have had it for 15 months). So I'll have to have a think about the best thing to do (have no idea if/where I could take it to get it repaired).

Have just spent far too long updating my calendar/diaries; back to my morning routine now.

I've also found Flylady's Basic Weekly Plan very useful when setting up my routines.

Meant to say above that I hope you have the chance to recover today, scatty.

Hello everyone, and happy birthday Elliepac!

Linzer, we had an iPod that went wrong and we took it an apple store, where they swapped it for a refurbished one. We didn't have a receipt. Worth a try if there's an apple store anywhere near, but a bit of a long shot otherwise.

Sorry about the school, Nettie. We didn't get DD2 into the secondary school we wanted and we appealed successfully, although it was a very uncomfortable couple of months. If you do decide to go down that route it's definitely worth asking for advice on the Education boards because there are some really knowledgeable people on there who can give you loads of help and support. Having said that, I think it's harder to appeal for infants because there are regulations governing maximum class size. I hope you are near the top of the waiting list.

So my list today is:

Washing - first load in
Wipe kitchen surfaces and do breakfast dishes - done
Sweep kitchen floor - done
Swish and Swipe - done
Make beds - half done (just remembered I'd forgotten one!)
15 minutes in Home Routine app Zone 2 (kitchen)

There'll definitely be some ironing later too

But for now, time to do some work.

homeblessing is in here but you might need to scroll down a bit

Its a shame about the school nettie

Happy Birthday ellie

Sorry memory like a sieve. Ds not well during the night, sent to school but expecting home later. hayfever +asthma = poorly grumpy child.

List for today:

washing
Ironing
folding
My bedding
discover lounge (mainly under washing)
discover kitchen
If i can discover enough of the downstairs will do home blessing too. Upstairs doesnt stand a chance at the mo
Ds to Doctors
Not kill ds before bedtime
EARLY NIGHT

Found you!

[SC contravenes Flylady principles and dumps suitcases on floor without unpacking them straightaway]

Tiring few days but much achieved. Totally manic week ahead - in fact - two totally manic months ahead.

Yay! Joyeux anniversaire Elliepacque!! Hope you have fab day!! What a lovely time of year to celebrate a birthday...oh and at 34 you are a mere youngster btw

Nettie you are linking brilliantly (like the raised eyebrow version!) So sorry to hear about the school choice what a bummer

Linzer thanks for linking plan - desperately need to get back to basics here

Funambulist have iphone

Whoknows respect @ yr strict towel regimen

Swan respect @ yr double church-going

Waves to CBH in naughty corner (will no doubt be joining you there later)

Darts sorry to hear about your arm - hope you can find some suitable treatment for it

Ihate hope you are OK

Toffee hope you have caught up on sleep

A warm welcome to CheerfulYank Sugared Paintinmyhair Janeyjampot Miggly Blueyeshadow Jasmin27

Welcome back Queenofdreams Nicknacks and MakingChanges

myhouse I feel as though I should know who you are . Sorry - not sure if you are namechanger or newcomer - helloooo anyway!!

Huge waves to PA and everyone I have inevitably missed

List so long I haven't got time to post it so had better just get on with it ...

ah, Nettie yep, school gate = tensions Although just meeting the same people day after day tends to break down a lot of barriers. How dare governor hate you - that's not allowed! So many frictions at our school, to do with governors, not so bad at the moment, but it was - and then ripple effect with the parents, taking sides etc. But it has all come out in the wash.

Very bad disorganised morning. All three pairs of ds2's trousers have gone AWOL - finally used the 4th pair covered in lint which had been given up for dead (tissue in the pocket) Where are they? Certainly not in the washing pile, that's why we thought they were in his drawer [sob]
Ds1 was mean to dd, who had a tantrum. Dh overtired from yesterday.

Have headache. Brief reviving cup of tea in garden which is full of tulips, grape hyacinths and white daffs.

done
first wash hung out
second wash in
breakfast cleared
three dcs to school with right equipment
ds2 piano practice
placated dd
forced ds1 to apologise
wrapped present for ds1's friend (Hornby watertower and modelling kit)
chatted amicably to two sets of neighbours thus cancelling effect of screaming earlier

todo
attempt homebless for umpteeth time, but I think I will have to resort to deep cleaning and sorting for the whole day.

Ellie Happy Birthday. I was 34 when I had ds1, you are ahead!

x-post SC welcome back from trip, full of wit
no - not double church going, dh went to Mass with boys, I was Methodist with dd for Brownies parade. Nice to go to different church though. I love the Methodist Church -it is very familiar as I used to go to playgroup there for several years.

Fun congrats on Iphone.

Good morning and happy belated April everybody

Happy birthday ellie I* am 34 too. It is a fab age!

Just a quick post from me for now to get myself motivated for some flying! My kitchen is in definite need of some fairly heavy duty flying! mananaged a bit of a homeblessing light on Saturday morning, but everything is still a bit grubby around the edges. The kitchen in particular, so good to be in there this week.

Had a lovely weekend saw one of my best friends and her little boy on Saturday. He is 9 mo and gorgeous . my little boy is grumping in his bouncy chair so I had better go and

Washing *2
Dishwasher unstack and restack
Clean kitchen sides
Clean bits of cat food off kitchen floor (bleurgh - I don't know what they've been doing!)
Make tea
Fill in WW online
Meal plan for week
Finalise online shop
Put away clean washing
Sort out minimum 1 bag clothes for charity shop

List:

washing 2nd load on
Folding now up to date and awaiting dryer
ironing - pile forming nicely but it is all the right way around fucking vase
My bedding done - was optomistic and put the summer bedding on the bed, winter is currently in washing machine
Make up ds' swimming kit for tuesday done
Sink under bleach done
Sort out training kit bag done
sort out training stuff for tomo am done
Load car with stuff for tip - doing
Tip run - about to do
Pop into town to buy the goggles that were promised but i keep forgetting to do - will follow on from tip
discover lounge (mainly under washing)
discover kitchen
If i can discover enough of the downstairs will do home blessing too. Upstairs doesnt stand a chance at the mo
Ds to Doctors
Not kill ds before bedtime
EARLY NIGHT

Tea break update- 2no hot cross buns eaten, coffee drinking.

Welcome back sc nice to see you indeed, glad trip went well.
Welcome back to pmpy
chb storming through your list.hope ds feels better later and you get a rest too.
linzer thanks for home blessing info. there is no chance of any of that here today, has taken me till now to get dc to tidy up balls from ball pool. That?s a bummer about the ipad, I hooe you can get is sorted somewhere.
swan I don?t know her myself but she has blatently made up lies about our business dealings and is a nasty piece of work. your garden sounds delightful. can I come for coffee there too?
janey thanks very much for your advise, maybe I will do that its just im not sure what grounds we have to appeal given the fact that the school down the road is perfectly good school.
scatty glad dd party was great and hope you get a chance to chill soon.

My list

get dressed.-done-
get dc bathed and dressed-not bathed
crisis clean-nope
home bless/ strip beds-nope
Fly spot mission-nope
Proper mission-done part of kitchen top
take dc out somewhere.-not yet
ds swimming lessons -nope
ring hoped for school re waiting list-have to wait for letter to arrive, its not come today
post belated birthday cards-not yet
to add: make bed, s/s, tidy dc rooms,sweep kitchen floor, iron dc uniform for montessori, sort out swim bag for tonight, make packed liunch for ds for tomorrow.

I have however.

made a huge 1kg batch of braised mince
made potato and leek soup
peeled spuds for cottage pie for dinner tonight.
dw on
td on
wm on
fed cat

right better get on, cat dribbling on keyboard. [yuk emotion]

This is my done list so far today

Coffee and chat with friends
Found the clock on my lovely new i phone (with DS1's assistance)
Texted DH (to check I could)
Got very excited by arrival of my first email but couldn't manage to reply
Played some music on the i pod bit
Played with the home routines app (but just adding things to the list rather than doing any of them)
Played with the calendar bit
Put DH in my contacts list. Now have one (!) contact.
Browsed mumsnet a bit

The house is getting steadily messier around me and school pick up is looming. Must pull myself together.

I hate Home Bless!
made mistake of trying to "do something" to dd bedroom

howeverinspiteofmyselfhavedone
hung up clothes in dd cupboard
dusted surfaces
made enormous pile of dirty laundry from various bedrooms
rationalized shoes, different ballet, PE, football, music bags
music back on piano
pile of rubbish in hall
clothes for recycling
shaken out tablecloth in ktchen
rescued front room

there are too many blooming clothes in this house!!!

will continue and hope I get to the bare floor stage in some rooms.

Linzer very sorry about IPAD.
Nettie well done on all those meals, the week will get smoother because of them. Monday is so difficult to judge, all these intentions and then can't possibly fit them into one day. Hope you get out to enjoy Spring breezes.

nettie you have every right to enjoy your local school. No-one should have the right to make you feel unwanted there.

planofaction as I don't know where to start anymore...

hoover playroom vigorously
hoover my bedroom vigorously
leave all the laundry unless it is uniform or underwear
put large pile of wintery adult clothes in mini-loft, retrieve summer dresses at same time so that I don't make mistake of doing any more clothes shopping, ever.

swan I also feel quite overwhelmed by the amount of clothes we have - not only do the DC have far too much in their size, they also have boxes and boxes of clothes to grow into. I'm becoming a bit more ruthless about the clothes I accept, though; anything I don't particularly like goes into a box to take back to my parents (where we all have a second wardrobe of clothes). So actually not that ruthless - rather than a box in the DC's wardrobes, we have a large box and a teetering pile in the cellar.

funambulist I spent virtually a whole morning playing with the Home Routines app when I first got it. Am wondering whether I should replace my iPod with an iPhone - although I've heard that the phone part of it isn't all that good (would be happy to be proved wrong!). And can I justify the expense?

Nettie Sounds like you've been busy in the kitchen. I'm not feeling very inspired this week wrt cooking so I've decided to use up some of the meals in the freezer.

CHB You've reminded me that I need to get DD1's swimming kit ready for tomorrow too - will add it to my list.

Updated list (have gradually been remembering items on my iPod to-do list):

Morning routine done
15 min decluttering
Mission
Change sheets hanging up to dry
Empty bins done
File receipts sort of
Find receipt for iPod no - have given up
Afternoon routine
Plan English lesson
Wrap present
Find photo of DS for friendship book
e-mail friend re hotels
Book hotel in Manchester
Book parking space at airport
Buy tick vaccine
Send stickers
DD1: homework for dyslexia lesson
Get DD1's swimming kit ready
Evening routine

Good morning! I didn't get as much done as I wanted (I have to leave the house at 7:50 every morning) but I did manage

Swish n swipe
5 minute room rescue in living room
1 load of clothes in the washer

As well as the shower, breakfast, hair/makeup, feed dog thing. DS up and already dressed as he slept in his clothes again :o

Bought lots of shiny new cleaning supplies this yesterday! Yay! Be back later to read the rest of the thread :)

Hi! can i come back?

sorry been awol ds3 has been unwell so been frequently to docs and hospital with asthma.

will come back after school run to do a little catchup.

Still not tackled hoovering, but dd's room looking better - possibility of her actually going in there and finding things she is looking for!

Now to do what I planned.

washing 3rd load on
Folding now up to date and awaiting dryer
ironing - pile forming nicely but it is all the right way around fucking vase
My bedding done - was optomistic and put the summer bedding on the bed, winter is currently in washing machine
Make up ds' swimming kit for tuesday done
Sink bleached and shined best as possible done
Sort out training kit bag done
sort out training stuff for tomo am done
Load car with stuff for tip - cba it was raining
Tip run - as above
Pop into town to buy the goggles that were promised but i keep forgetting to do done
discover lounge washing mostly tamed
discover kitchen
If i can discover enough of the downstairs will do home blessing too. Upstairs doesnt stand a chance at the mo
Buy and fit new headlight bulb done
Sort out plants done
15mins in my room done
Ds to Doctors
Not kill ds before bedtime
EARLY NIGHT

Happy Birthday to Elliepac.

And many to everyone.

Arm is not quite so bad today. I have readjusted my chair at work to raise it up. This means that my arm is not resting so heavily on the desk, Downside is that I'm a short-arse, and need a foot rest just to get my feet on something solid

Otherwise:
morning routine done
kids uniform done
went to work done
(did some work done including prepping my own staff report for boss's return)
home and collect dcs done
supervised lunchbox cleaning done
supervised a clear out of all unusable pens/felt tips/etc done big bag now prepped for disposal, while keeping those that work - all prompted by DD saying she needed new pens for her SATS revision yeah, right!
Decluttered email inboxes done I have two emails, one exclusively for online shopping leaving the other relatively spam free
Washing 1 load done
Cook tea - to do
evening routine - to do
definitely one, at least!

And I've just heard ds, in the background, telling his older sister that she's "the best sister I've ever had". He's 7, she's 11 in June!

And DD has just tripped over something and wrenched her toe. Had a look and have her resting it, nothing else I can do at the moment (apart from the bag of frozen peas....). I keep forgetting how loud she can yell, even though I'm partly deaf

Hi everybody, Ive not had much flying today due to DS hitting his head very hard on the way to school so had to make a trip to A&E to get him checked out. He is fine, just has a big purple lump on his forehead. He has had the day off school, but looks like he will be back tomorrow. :)

Also been tired today due to DH staying up till 4AM watching his soap opera wrestling so have had a lie down for a couple of hours this afternoon. My theory its better for DC3 for me to look after myself

However what I have done:

1. get up, washed and dressed (not difficult as already have this routine) - done
2. start washing machine and get it dried in drier or hung up. done
3. get kids to school - DD got there, but not DS :(
4. a bit of grocery shopping and to Argos to pick up bookcase we have reserved (will be put up on Tuesday) - done
5. sort out corner and move some of DD's toys upstairs or put away for DC3 or thrown out if no good. - have moved this to tomorrow's todo list now due to my morning otherwise been taken up
6. Do my last bit of ironing from my backlog and tomorrow's washing for 1hr - to do once kids are in bed
7. Put clothes in washer ready for Tuesday morning - done
8. shine sink - to do after DH has washed up later

I have also bought a little notebook which I will make my control journal. Also plan to do this tonight after ironing. I plan to have daily list (eg washing, wipe down various sides etc this will grow as my routine grows and my house gets tidier), weekly list (eg bedding, towels, hoovering etc Also to grow the more of a routine I get into and the more the house gets tidy) and a general todo list to get my house out of CHAOS (eg sort out clothes, toys etc)

nettie Shame about the school, hopefully you manage to figure something out

Stillchuckingit I am kind of new, but have been around a while. I have namechanged from fartblossom, but I mostly lurked. I have been in AIBU and have posted a couple of replies to threads and started a couple my own, but the majority of the time I just lurk.

elliepac Happy birthday

Right tomorrow's todo list

1. start washing machine and get it dried/hung up
2. bedding day
3. sort out corner and move DD's toys to either her bedroom/bin/or put away for DC3
4. help DH to build bookcase we bought today
5. Ironing my earlier washing load
6. put clothes in washer ready for Wednesday morning
7. wipe down kitchen and table in room
8. shine sink
9. If control journal not done tonight, to start tomorrow.

Have a good evening/day everyone and I will be back to check up later.

Also can I just say Im finding this thread very valuable in to keeping me motivated and Im feeling a lot less stressed. Thanks all [would like to have a flowers smiley here]

Ellie happy birthday. I hope you've had a great day.
Myhouse you seem to be very well organised even with DS at home and an A & E visit. I hope he's well enough to be back at school tomorrow.
Nettie sorry about the school.
CHB thank you. Seeing not kill DS before bedtime on your to do list made me smile. I have days like that
SDDB lovely to see you again. I'm sorry to hear about the asthma and hospital visits. I hope DS3 is better now?

Flurry of activity this afternoon after getting nothing done this morning due to distracting new i phone.

I love the home routines app. I've started customising it as you suggested Linzer to make it a bit more flyladyesque, as that's what I'm used to. I've had a quick look at the zones thing and quite fancy being in the kitchen this week, close to food, radio and computer so I'm going to stick with that for a while and see how it goes. I've cleaned out a cabinet as suggested and counted that as my 15 minute declutter so two items ticked off at once (is that cheating?)

I like the way that anything you tick off then appears on a separate accomplishments list with a face. I have 21 accomplishments so far today in spite of considerable faffing about on my part and feel absurdly proud.

I feel newly enthusiastic about the whole routines thang. Hope it lasts for a bit.

Darts that's cute that DS said that :)

So this afternoon I've got to:
Finish laundry
Make beds (didn't have time this a.m. but better late than never)
Vacuum upstairs
Clean counters (That's the mission for today, right?)
BATHROOM (it's a disgrace in there)

Oh and 15 minutes in my room. You can barely see the floor in there