October's Fledgling Fliers: Seasons of Mists and Mellow Flyfulness

[elliepac]

This is where from the 1st of the month, we attempt to declutter and follow the 30-step wisdom of Flylady (minus cutesy language and a surfeit of e-mails) with lots of chat and support and mutual motivation along the way. (More info available here )

Humungous thanks to our previous thread leader Blue for navigating us all through the August school holidays...and for doing it so consistently and well!!

As usual we will be following a three-pronged approach - and don't worry - we are all at different stages. Some of us (SC stares at feet) -are even embarrassingly stuck at decluttering stage after two years

• repeat or start baby steps (again!)

• repeat baby steps + do 15 mins a day decluttering in the current zone

or

• reinforce babysteps and do daily missions if you have finished decluttering.

Can spot errors made by others though - promise! Hope you manage to get a good day's work done Linzer without too many interruptions.

Thanks for links Ellie! Have a good wk!

Morning all,

That advert caught my attention too Swan, I was just thinking who on earth makes their own filo pastry (turns out Linzer's MIL does) and they haven't rolled it very thin when it turned out to be M&S. Silly!

Been AWOL over the weekend, been at ILs, so just lurking. Blue - your pizza and olives story made me nod my head as DD had just had a major strop because Grandma didn't have any olives to put on the pizza at her house. Like your blog by the way.

Linzer - I have just finished that last book, it was very good, a bit of a slow start but I thoroughly enjoyed it. Did you say you hadn't finished it? I can let you have it back next week if you want.

Home blessing today. Quite out of the blue on Saturday morning while I took the DCs swimming DH tidied floors and hoovered the whole house. So I am going to skip that part, and mop kitchen and bathroom floors which I didn't do last week because of the bad back.

Today's list is long.

Beware of window cleaner when getting dressed - done
Take keyboard plus DCs plus homeworks etc to school - done
Meet SENCO regarding DS and his IEP - done
Morning routine - am allowed to neglect most of it on a Monday because it is getting cleaned later anyway - done
WAshing - just about to do
Unpack Ocado stuff
Mop kitchen and bathroom floors
Dust
Empty waste bins
Go for a run - beautiful day here
Wash towels
Change DCs sheets
Go for coffee with friend
Pick DD up from school
Go back an hour later for DS after basketball
Tea
Beavers
Sainsburys with DD for Hallowe'en stuff

Back later

panic panic panic

seee you all later!

Twas a quiet weekend on here, I spent most of it clearing up nettie and darkness's mess [hgrin].

But what were the rest of us up to?

sc was patting donkeys, cracking with sparrows, loving apple strudel and entertaining. Sounds entertaining in itself [hgrin]

blue was super busy and had a grumping ds. Hope he managed to settle for you [hsmile].

sr was also patting donkeys and loving strudel. She mused over Downton (I just can't get into it...I think there may be something wrong with me) and Troy (I too quite enjoyed it!) and mainly did laundry.

rowingboat was feeling all controlled with her journal and was on a donkey. Sensing a theme here!

pa popped in to make her excuses before heading off on a mammoth journey with work. I shall let her off because I am generous like that [hgrin].

linzer has been working and strudel loving. Sounds like a mighty fine combination to me.

toffee's life sucks a little bit at the moment. They are all ill again and to top it all off she has toothache. We hope she feels better soon [hsmile]

nicknacks had has a poorly DD and spent yesterday talking to herself. Hope she is feeling better now

I am not talking to nettie and darkness because they trashed my lovely clean thread with their halloween frippery, and they couldn't even be arsed to give me 15 minutes a la fat fairy to clean up.[hwink][hgrin]. They are banished to the naughty corner for the rest of the day.

ellie has done naff all [hgrin]. I like to lead by example [hgrin].

Back later after work!

Cleaning lady has just rung. She is not coming today after all. What a relief! No really...now I can just tootle off to work without worrying too much about the revolting piles of weekend detritus everywhere.
I've just been rushing around like a mad ferret trying to make the house ordinarily disheveled for her, and hiding things in cupboards.
Phew.
time for a cuppa after all...

ellie Downton truly is rubbish. But I love it.
Try Gosford Park imo much more gritty.

Whoknows kind dh!
My dh worked wonders with the homework, but he continues to annoy me beyond measure with his absolute refusal to engage in the problem of THE HOUSE and GROUNDS, and how to make them function. I'm sure that Lady Grantham did not have this problem.

P.s. I have bought cobwebs [hgrin]
Dd mum's bought too many cobwebs [hconfused]

Morning everyone. Thanks for all the good wishes for my sickly household. I think I need to get more fruit and veg into everyone somehow. I tried very hard to get DS1 to go to school this morning, dosing him with Calpol and giving him a throat spray, but he put himself back to bed. I feel so guilty that he's off school again. He can't sleep, so DH has set him up with the BBC radio version of 'Lord of the Rings'. That'll keep him occupied for a few hours.

Rowing - I did try a temporary tooth filler, which had worked brilliantly when DS2's filling fell out a few weeks ago. It didn't seem to work so well for me (a bigger cavity, I suppose ), but I'm managing with that and a numbing tooth gel. I do recommend keeping some in the bathroom cabinet for emergencies.

Nicknacks - hope you and DD are on the mend.

Swan - don't panic!

WhoKnows - glad to see your DH has started off this morning's home blessing.

SC - hope all that mess doesn't take too long to sort out. Sounds like you had a good weekend though.

Linzer - glad you had your birthday lunch in the end .

Ellie - thanks for round-up and mission links.

See you next week, PA and Darkness.

Can those of you with editing work please send some surplus work my way ? I need to start earning money again - eek!

Tried to arrange get togethers with a couple of friends this morning, but they are both busy, so that means I have to do my weekly home cleaning now . I need a list:

Phone calls - dentist, etc.
Morning routine: still to do - unload d/w, reload d/w, put washing away
Home cleaning - downstairs: me; upstairs: DH
Mission - maybe....
Help DH pack up stuff ready to decorate dining room (oh lord!)
Chase work contacts
Read to DS1 ('The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time' - love this book)
Lunch
CAMHS appointment at 2pm for DS1 (CBT therapy)
School run - DS2
Ring friend re target-setting evening at school tomorrow
Package Gap returns to post tomorrow
Dinner (DH)
Before-bed routine

That'll do. Hope you all have a great day.

Thanks for round-up Ellie.

WhoKnows / SC - it's only plain green olives the boys like though. No black ones here!

SC and Linzer - hope the work goes well. Still none here. :(

Swan - hope the panic settles quickly. Have a nice !

Get well soon to the Toffee and NickNacks households.

Lists: ta da!
Washing done
Everyone where they should be, not very late...
Clean laundry away
Downstairs s&s and shiny basin
Post office & bought milk

To do:
Bathroom mission
Boys' bedroom mission
Finish morning routine
What's for dinner?
Chase up plasterer
Pay playgroup & music bills
Cook big batch of beans for freezer

Hmm, the Fat Fairy's site seems more disorganised than usual this morning. Broken links and the sneak peek not updated. Tsk.

Blue DD has a preference for green too, although she will try any. If you get a bowl of olives in a restaurant she will eat the lot if you don't watch her. Her favourites are those herby ones in a little yellow pouch you get from supermarkets. My mum gave her the chilli variety by mistake once!

Swan - he isn't too bad with the hoover, but as for the house and grounds - I am with you there, our house is in need of quite a bit of maintenance, he just isn't bothered. Unless it actually starts leaking or gets to some other crisis he just won't do anything. I am left to do it all and I hate dealing with builders etc too, they come round and scare me by tutting at stuff and making it all sounds a lot worse than it probably is.

Toffee - ouch, sorry about the tooth, hope you can get a dentist appt soon, hope DS1 is better soon too.

WhoKnows No need to send the book back as I have my own copy - am still only a couple of chapters into it, but have enjoyed what I've read so far. I really must give the other book another try, but the chances of me getting it finished before we come to London are looking increasingly unlikely. I may well bring it with me if I fail to get into it a second time, though.

Blue Sorry to hear about your lack of work; if it's any consolation, being snowed under is no longer a normal state of affairs for me. This may well be it until Christmas now! And the subject matter isn't particularly exciting either (other than to people like DH).

Just back from speech therapy with DS, who refused to go back to Kindergarten afterwards and had to be prised off me. The speech therapist said he'll probably only need one more session for "sh", then we can take a break before he goes back to work on "s" (he has a slight lisp). Must admit I'll be glad when it's all out of the way; I'm sure it's worth doing in the long term, but it really does eat into the morning. DD2 had the same pronunciation problems but went for speech therapy in her first year at school, which was far easier - no time lost and no bureacratic hassle with referrals etc.

Toffee Hope you can get the tooth sorted out as quickly as possible. Would be glad to send some work your way if you know anything about biogas production in German. Actually, I wish I could subcontract the document formatting (it's been converted to Word from a PDF file and I'm having a bit of a nightmare with the headers that aren't actually headers) but I'm still hoping that the agency can get their hands on the original Word document.

Feel your pain there Linzer - I am rewriting a lot of old procedures at work, they were written in Word about 10 years ago and I am getting all sorts of compatibility problems with the new version of Word, very frustrating.

Hmm, not sure I can bluff my way in biogas production in German, Linzer, but thanks anyway. Have emailed my usual work contact and she is away till Thursday, so no news from there yet.

Am having a temporary filling done at 12.15, but it's by a dentist I don't like to see anymore after she did something weird to my jaw once. Am hoping I don't come out in a worse state than I went in....

Kitchen nearly done. Just got to mop the floor. DH has forgotten all about the home cleaning and has decided to repaper the dining-room ceiling .

Afternoon all.

Sorry I have been away for so long but I felt truly rubbish last week. In fast not 100% better yet but enough to keep going. Have also been doing planning for tomorrows interview when feeling a little better over weekend so no time to get online really.

Today have been and done weekly shopping, have made a yeast free loaf which is currently cooling for lunch and am just cooking a shepherds pie for DH and DD for tea as swimming night. Had to turn own supply work this morning as have only just got voice back and need it for tomorrow so a bit today at another week with no work probably.

Am just trying to finish off lesson things for tomorrow. Other than that

• Recycling
• Sort out fridge
• empty all bins in house that are over flowing.
• hoover downstairs
• 2 x washing
• paperwork for LEA supply agency. They sent it a week ago
• dd to swimming

That will do for now

Welcome back, MC. Sorry you've been feeling rough. Good luck at the interview tomorrow.

My tooth is sorted! Apparently, this temporary filling will last 18 months . I will, however, have it done properly next week.

Off to appointment with DS1 now. I wish his OCD was as easy to sort out as my tooth.

Toffee I just sent a e-mail to ds's school about his lack of confidence with drawing/presentation of his work and how it is affecting his ability to do his homework. Don't know why but just writing it has made me close to tears...
Hope they send a gung-ho breezy answer to kick me into shape - it is so difficult worrying about our children isn't it...
And when I pick up ds2 I'm going to be in tears again over him and his project. He wants to make a puppet show video of his school trip, but neither of us know who to actually turn this into reality and he was screaming his head off this morning over it when I suggested a nice poster
Dd has done hers on Powerpoint! Wow, including sound effects and wobbly writing.

I've done morning at school, for some reason that has filled me gloom too..all those books that no-one ever reads...just stuff on whiteboards all day....Still balm to the soul to tidy all those shelves in nice Dewey decimal order...

MC well done on baking, and getting ahead so nicely with pie. Good luck with interview, hope adrenalin beats the illness.

Sorry Toffee I thnk it is brilliant that you are going to OCD appt, these things really help. I love Lord of Rings (original text) too! I remember getting to the end and devouring the Appendix because I loved it so much...

Bit of a tough one today (back to reality after frivolous w/e)

Morning routine including dw x 3, wm, s& s, boudoir tidy done
Put away 3 paniers of ironing NOPE
Restore playroom bomb-site to some semblance of order done
Clear dining room table and wash up stuff that won't go in dw done but now needs doing again
Work work done but took far longer than anticipated and still more to do
French study 10 mins
Exercise NOPE
Sewing NOPE
Hwk supervision done was tortuous
E-mails to sort out social stuff NOPE
Phone call to dh's venerable aunt (80th b'day) called twice but she was out celebrating!
Hoover and dust ground floor and generally put to rights done
Laundry done
Arrange meeting with dd's teacher sent e-mail

Also:
chased away corpulent squirrel who is digging up bulbs as fast as I can plant them
did recycling
cleaned out gps

Will be glad of some peace and quiet home alone tomorrow.

Off to clear up kitchen, mend dd's school pinafore and attempt to beat dh at university challenge.

Waves wearily to all ...

homework started with screaming match, but has fallen into place with minimum of fuss, and now I know all about Rembrandt .
SC you probably know far more!

done
ballet run
food shopping
complete neglect of ds2 who is wandering around like a lost soul occasionally demanding to go on computer (but not getting anywhere
dd is doing an Autumn picture for Brownies under dh's supervision ....two hander

Evening all!

SC How much crockery and cutlery do you have if you had to do DW x3?? And at that pesky squirrel! Happy birthday to DH's Aunt. 80 is a fine age to reach.

Toffee Hope DS's appt went well and your tooth is more comfortable now.

Swan Hope you and DS are feeling more positive now. You're right, worry and guilt is what parenting is all about.

MC Sorry to hear you've been feeling poorly too. Shame about having to turn down work, always the way, isn't it?

Today I've been a busy bee. No music group as we didn't get there quick enough and it was full when we did. So instead we came home and continued the good work mindees mum had started over the weekend and I now have one potty trained mindee! So proud of him!

Todays list.

Empty DW done
Mondays wash done
Wash, dress, breakfast everyone done
School run done
Clean out rubbish from car
Music group full
Put washed hats, scarfs and gloves away in hall drawers done
15 mins declutter
The mission done
Bleach through WM
Finish cards with DS's done
Box to charity shop

List was half done but thats ok.

Tomorrow DH and I are off to collect DS's bikes which have been ordered and are ready for collection. Christmas shopping is well under way now. We have all the DC's main presents ordered and also DS1's birthday present ordered (December birthday) so am feeling very pleased with ourselves.

In the afternoon I have a parents meeting with DS2's teacher. DS1's is on Wed). I'm hoping she'll say lots of lovely things of course!

Hope you have all had lovely and productive Mondays. My dinner is ready so I'm going to eat, shower and BED!

Evening all.

NickNacks - No! Don't mention Christmas shopping!!

Hi all,

work was cool! Went to TK Maxx on the way home and bought a pair of sunglasses for £3, and some pixi eyeshadow, which actually looks like a lovely shade for a blusher. It is raining torrentially here, well it was, all day.

Toffee I'm glad you have managed to bodge something together until you can get your tooth seen to. I would probably need about 5 packs of that stuff if any of my fillings fell out. Are you feeling better other than the tooth?

Swan and SC and Linzer (and whoever else was talking about strudel) can I join in this conversation?? I have made strudel - once. It was deeeelicious, but making the strudel pastry from scratch took a long time and required the entire work surface. I did think, well they probably have a factory to make their strudel pastry at Marks so it might be worth just paying them to make it. Haven't tried it with bought filo though, so will certainly bear that in mind, when I start making cakes again - too fat for cake eating.

Nick nacks what! Christmas presents! How organised, mind you, I don't think I could hide a bike in my tiny house for very long - unless it was a playmobil bike. I'm still contemplating ds's birthday present for two weeks time.

So just not doing anything, but have been very good at the exercise bike. On the plus side, I know I will have it all back under control tomorrow with my trusty morning routine - thank you fly lady!

Have a good night all!

Blue well I was soundly beaten (as usual) by dh at UC. Well done for getting through such a mammoth list today.

And you too Nicknacks my word you have both been busy! Well done for finishing such a long list although you are making me anxious with all this talk of Christmas presents. I am failing miserably to prepare in advance as usual and I was determined to have it under control this year.

We were entertaining 12 at lunch yesterday, but by the time we had finished, I was serving pudding on mis-matched saucers, coffee in novelty mugs and the dc had to use plastic teaspoons (teaspoons are like socks I find, they just somehow go missing ..) We used to have a matching dinner service aeons ago but I have long ago given up replacing bits as I have nowhere to store them. I am longing for that day in the future which will never arrive when the entire house is totally renovated and restored and I can buy a sideboard, and frivolous things such as er, curtains and matching wine glasses. Does anyone else dream of grape scissors or is that just me?? ?[desperate saddo emoticon]

Swan don't know that much about Rembrandt I'm afraid - (visited his house in Amsterdam once) - love his bathing woman - oh and my gynaecologist named her daughter after the love of his life. Hope your evening was not as stressful as your afternoon . I've turned in to a complete worry wart since having dd if it's any consolation. Anxiety and dc just seem to go together somehow. Hwr, always consoled by the fact that the worst bits can co-exist with best bits sometimes!!

Re: kitchen/dining room tables further down thread. Listened to a 'thought for the day' on Radio 4 once by Rabbi Lionel Blue who spoke about using the wood from his grandmother's kitchen table to make her coffin as per ancient Jewish tradition, the symbolism being that it represented the life and soul and heart of the home. Thought that was rather touching.

Whoknows/Linzer sympathies over Word doc compatibility probs ...they often have me seething...

Waves to Ellie Rowingboat Feetheart MC Madwoman Pushme Droitwich Bilblio and the many others I have forgotten

Best get to bed

Toffee forgot to say hope tooth repair not to painful tonight
and MC hope you are feeling better

Wasnt me made all that mess Ellie it was coostoonettle [hgrin] [hwink]

'twas fun though [hwink]

Sorry AWOL, computer in for repair.

swan hope you email to school works for ds.
toffee hope mouth bit better
mc good luck with interview

Done loads of family stuff. Bike rides, Halloween costume making and cookie making. Dh stripped dc beds and remade them and tidied bedrooms :-0

All looking not too bad at all. Some more work to do in the kitchen. Got a business seminar on twitter and Facebook tomorrow hoping to glean enough info to convince dh we need to use these mediums more.

Then off to friends shop where they are holding a cancer research Frocktober event in support of my challenge. They run a wool shop and are going to be there all day in long dresses and glammed up. Can't wait. So chuffed they are doing it too.

Just had final total for cancer research relay for life this year. Total amount raised is £45987.90 [hgrin] so proud to have been part of it.

Mil had her second lot of chemo and feeling worse than last time so a bit down about it.

Ooo I am going on some. I'm hoping my computer is back by the end of the week so I can catch up properly. I am reading but have sieve for brains so can't comment much.

[hgrin] [hgrin] [hgrin] [hgrin] [hgrin] [hgrin] [hgrin]