Fledglings dreaming of a FLY Christmas - December's fledgling flyers thread

[BlueEyeshadow]

Welcome flyers one and all, old and new, to the December thread! As the advent calendars go up, let's beat the CHAOS (Can't Have Anyone Over Syndrome) and FLY through Christmas into the New Year (or have a go at it, anyway...)!

We take a three-pronged approach (and a large pinch of salt) to the FLYlady system:

-babysteps
-babysteps and 15 mins' decluttering
-babysteps and missions

The website is here: FlyLady - if you haven't had a look at it for a while it's worth a gander as the design and layout have changed for the better recently.

Whatever you do, though, don't sign up for the emails or your inbox will be bursting within seconds. Or so I'm led to believe... I will post the links to the babystep and mission for each day (the first ones to follow this evening) and there'll be plenty of chat, , and along the way.

A big thank you to Darkness for leading us through November with so much fun!

mc good luck for interview for Friday in case I forget tomorrow!

Hard to slow down - sooo much to do!
Iswym about getting up - good plan. I feel like makingchannges does I think! So all I have to do tomorrow is keep the sink clean - and get up and dressed? This I can manage
Also, though, I need a good mushroom recipe - we were having veggie sausages and roast potatoes and apples tomorrow, but need to use the damn musrooms. Determined to get our food budget down. Any suggestions beyond mushrooms on toast, which is all I can think of?

overflowing elf stuff?? Cool!

Hello. I've been lurking, and did a shiney sink at the beginning of November, but thought i'd try to do better in Dec.
Have been hogging the hoarding thread for months! In process of moving all hoarded stuff to storage and then hope to have a tidy clear house and keep up with it.
While also taking time to sort hoard bit by bit.

Thanks Blue for leading!

ofm luckily DD hasn't grown enough hair yet to have caught them and after itching all day I've had a thorough look through and I'm safe too! They've just stuck to infested mindee, poor kid!

well done weevils on de cluttering! That must have been a big step! Hooray for clear surfaces now though

Thank you to Darkness for leading the thread last month
Thank you to Blue for taking the reins this month

Welcome to all the new folks too, good to see you all on here. Just ask if there's anything you don't understand.

I've just been making a little list of 24 Christmassy things to do which I'm going to cut up and pop in all the drawers of the advent calendar (next to the chocolate coins!), the DCs are besides themselves with excitement about it. I have just completed tomorrow's task, which is to put Christmas music on the Ipods. I'm getting in the spirit, look, Christmas namechange and it's still only November.

Then it's off to bed, hectic day in store tomorrow, I've got work in the morning and then will be helping with the school Christmas fair from 1 till about 5 (gulp).

Oh god it's December tomorrow - where is the Advent stuff!!!

Evening all. Hi to Donkey, Weevils and Bird - hmm, a bit of a theme there!

I did manage a reasonable amount of work in the end today and have made a momentous discovery ... Under the hotspots in the dining room, there was a piano!!

ABird - I've got a ton of mushrooms to use up too. I just generally add them to everything, although DH was out tonight so I made myself mushroom fried rice.

WhoKnows - great idea! We're still just on jelly babies in the Advent train at the moment, but I'd like to try more imaginative things once the boys are a little older. DH is currently fixing the train because when we got it out, several handles fell off... :(

Aaaanyway, here come the links, as I realise I didn't even know which zone we were in... :

This launch pad is new - keeps everything tidy.
The flight plan is quite a handy summary of everything too. Tomorrow is Errand Day.

Babystep: shiny sink!
Mission - 2 zones this week: living room and hall/porch/dining room

Big waves to everyone - will start round ups tomorrow. :)

Am i ever going to get this early night thing? Or shall i just admit defeat and accept I will never get it and be happy with bed before midnight? Damm and bollocks cos I really had intended to go to bed early. can't even say i have done much whilst i have not gone to bed.

New month, new start with the babystep, new day.

Ds to school on time
rug put back
return furniture to lounge
laundry
bath emptied and ds' kit put into to de-stink
pack ds' stuff for going away
put ds' clothes away
clear bathroom floor
find utility room floor
find study desk
find lounge window sill
turf stuff out for charity shop run.

Which reminds me linzer have reasonable size soft toy bee and lady bird here. Any good to you? I know you said you have a bug for lessons as a tool.

and the last thing on my list for tomo is: bed before 11pm

Morning my lovelies.

I am starting the month as i mean to go on which is keeping up with the thread and possibly doing some flying, only possibly mind.

I have a very busy day at work and dd is at a party tonight so list is shor and to the point:-

Shine sink

That's it. Aiming high and all that .

Have a nice day!

Hello All!
I'm new to fly lady but need some order in my home. So have had a quick read and am going to start with the shiny sink. Have just got a dishwasher so for the first time ever I can actually see the draining board! So that one should be easy to achieve.

After that, who knows!

Morning all,

Must get back on track today; I have lots of good intentions for the new month. I think I'm going to start with shining my sink as that always motivates me, and then get on with my morning routine plus try to fit in some tidying/decluttering/today's mission. I have a whole four hours before the English lessons at school so no excuses.

Welcome Isla - jump on board and ask if you have any questions!

Darkness That's very kind of you, but I do have a bee now (after much searching). He (Billy) has gone awol but the DC have said he's in the playroom, so I suppose I'll have to venture in there at some point...

WhoKnows Great idea re the Advent calendar - did you think up all the things on your list yourself? Love the Christmas name btw; I really must try and come up with one but am feeling very uninspired atm.

DH brought me back a big Niederegger marzipan Advent calendar from Berlin yesterday and four small ones arrived yesterday (from SIL and DD2's godmother) so we now have a grand total of... 15 Advent calendars. Three main ones (Playmobil/Lego), three with chocolate (as DD2 spotted a Peppa Pig one in London that she had to have) and the rest are "just" picture ones. It's ridiculous, isn't it? I had a bit of a meltdown last night when DH got back about all the stuff we have and the amount of time I have to spend tidying, but I just don't think he gets it and I feel like a stuck record.

Ta da! Now for that sink...

Morning everyone. Just about to take DS2 to school, then have to take DS1 to A&E with a suspected broken toe, following a particularly rough playfight with a friend yesterday . Hoping to fit some flying in too.

Will try to pop back later.

Blue - glad you found the piano . We found one too! The answer to not losing it again, I've discovered, is not to allow even one single thing on top, otherwise it multiplies.

Welcome, Isla, Weevils and Bird. I have been flying for over a year and it really has made a difference. Decluttering and maintaining simple routines is the answer.

Welcome back, Silvery.

Waves to all the oldies!

Linzer - I thought up some of them but was inspired by a thread in the Christmas section. 15 - wow! We have three, one refillable one, one beautiful German picture one and one that DD made at school last year and we have kept.

Toffee - oh no, poor DS1, bet that's painful

Isla - welcome, enjoy the new DW!

Ellie - helloooo!

Deck - me neither, very rarely get light off before midnight. Last night was then woken at 1.30 by a light fitting falling onto the floor and smashing (I had changed the bulb a few hours earlier, must have not put it back on properly). DH got up and cleared it up as he was still awake at the time (he's even worse than me for late nights). Then DS arrived in my bed at 3.30 after a nightmare (probably about windows being smashed) and stayed the rest of the night in eager anticipation of the advent calendar.

Morning all! Just a quick one as on my phone but welcome isla!

To do:
Call families on waiting list about new space coming up after christmas
buy advent calendar and fill it! ( DD is not 1 yet so she hasn't realized my forgetful ways!)
Sweep and mop kitchen done
Wash up/ dry
Shine sink
Playgroup *2
Hoover later
Walk dog
Mission doesn't apply, I'm a bit obsessive about shoes and coats!

That'll do!

BBL!

oh posted on the old thread
We have just four Advent Calendars one lego, two Fair trade religious
choc and one old fashioned glittery Germanic!

off to work now

SC how did the baking go? Hope they filled the festive larders for you

hello newbies

well, I like to to have stuff on my piano, it muffles the sound
Yesterday in between procrastinating and screaming, ds1 was picking out Haydn tune on the piano...(he doesn't play piano) I was so and [proud]

The problem with putting stuff on our piano is that it all tends to fall down the back. Well, it's one way of decluttering I suppose.

Signing in - hello to all oldies and newbies :)

I'm hoping for a decluttering December as the main emphasis - I will have been here for 2 years come January and still live with too much clutter, not all of it mine (DH's childhood home and various ishoos around that that I have bored thrilled you with before, usually when I am on verge of clutter-induced meltdown )
For December I will get rid of something everyday and see where I get to. Whoknows is my role model :)

Today's list:

• WORK
• Make smiley face biscuits for DD's teacher who goes back to her HLTA role after teaching DD's class for most of this term so far - new teacher starts on Monday, No 4 so far this term
• Dinner prep
• Clear shoe cupboards and 'get rid of something'
• Photocopy newsletters for School Assoc
• DS swimming

Will try and catch up later though did notice Linzer's 15 advent calendars!!!!
We have 3 - a filled one each for DC that DH and I spend all year finding small enough bits for (and then do panic shop the day before!) and a surprise Playmobil one for them to share - got it as a freebie in Toys'R'Us a while ago (if you spent £45 on Playmobil - not hard!) They were DELIGHTED, opened first door together, got a postbox so DS then re-wrote his Christmas list tiny enough to fit in :o

I know, I know feetheart. I really like the kind that you can fill yourselves, but I think the DC have got too used to the Playmobil/Lego ones now. I'm sure they'd be happy to have one in addition, but... just no. We bought ours at ToysRUs too but at normal price IIRC (certainly not reduced by more than a euro or two). Austria is a bit rubbish for bargains - and for shopping in general, really.

Have had quite a good morning of FLYing. Off to the school now to teach English.

Aww pants. MNet just ate my lovely post with detailed personals and everything.

So this will be a quickie post as I don't have time now to redo it!

To Do:

1. Kitchen tidy & DW empty
2. Tidy, dust & hoover living room
3. Go food shopping once DS wakes
4. Buy pretty ringbinder and polypockets for control journal
5. Set up control journal (spiral notepad, while pretty, isn't working for me!)

Right, getting off arse a move on now.

Absolutely knackered, considered going back to bed to sleep but my brain is racing. So decided the only sensible thing as i planned not to do anything of the list til lunch was to sod off out. Heading of to do some therapuetic training. Evening is going to be hellish and i think this is the best way to get through it.

List update is rather bleak.

Ds to school on time success!
rug put back
return furniture to lounge
laundry
bath emptied and ds' kit put into to de-stink
pack ds' stuff for going away
put ds' clothes away
clear bathroom floor
find utility room floor
find study desk
find lounge window sill
turf stuff out for charity shop run.