Flinging our way through the chaos: February’s Fledgling Flyers

[LinzerTorte]

Welcome to the February edition of the Fledgling Flyers' thread.

If you're living in CHAOS (Can't Have Anyone Over Syndrome), this is the thread for you! We follow the tips on the FlyLady website in an attempt to restore order to our homes, but advise against signing up for the e-mails; all the information you need is on this thread.

Each day, I'll be posting the links that will enable you to do any of the following:

• start or repeat babysteps

• repeat babysteps and do 15 minutes a day decluttering in the current zone

or

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

More information about the babysteps is here.

So please join us - there's always plenty of chat, , cake, encouragement and the occasional to help us on our way!

Oh no, your poor DS Bitchy. How did it happen? Hope he's on the mend soon.

thewaffler I don't think I'll be going back to the Shred as I have an idea it was what caused the problems with my knee, or at least set them off again (falling downstairs in the middle of the night was what did for it in the first place, I'm sure). I'm glad I'm not the only one who struggles to drink water, but I'm sure I read somewhere that tea/coffee is just as good and that we also get quite a lot of our fluid intake from food.

swan Hate Aberystwyth? It even has the excitement of an escalator now (big new Next that I was ridiculously excited about last time I went back - not just the escalator of course, but a decent shop!). I'm not sure I'd have wanted to go to university there (small matter of my parents being there aside), but had heard that most students there have a great time as there's no escape from the place so everyone is there at weekends and there's lots going on.

Neenook Good news on the hospital appointment; you must breathe a huge sigh of relief every time.

I am going to risk frostbite after the school run and go out for a run - with at least two pairs of gloves on). It's still getting colder here (-15° atm) but there's still no snow thank goodness and I'm hoping it might be a few degrees warmer by the time I get out.

Oh no bitchy sorry to hear about DS. Hope he heals soon. That must be so hard for a kid.

Tonight I have to bake birthday cakes, ready for sculpting/icing tomorrow. It's nearly 10pm and I'm exhausted. I think the bug that's going round the family might finally have hit me.

He was doing tricks on his scooter. I had just told him off for it too. bloody boys Worst bit is that i have had to cancel his birthday party and he is having to have all of his birthday plans changed. Am just off to the hospital to see how he is doing.

Flying, one of my dc was thought to be asmatic, (constant wheeze) the hospital also told me it was too early to diagnose ( under two) and she did grow out of it! She gets masses of excercise, don't know if that helps. Fingers crossed for you.

Odd thing is i can't remember when she stopped wheezing!!

Off to do morning routine.

bitchy how crap, double devastation of breaking it, and the pain of it in the first place, followed by a cancelled birthday party - rubbish. Hope he's ok

Oh no bitchy - how old is he? My oldest turns 9 and has his party on Saturday. Hope you can rearrange.

Bitchy Oh no, what bad timing (not that any time would be "good", but YKWIM). Hope he's doing OK this morning.

Jnice Hope you do manage to avoid the bug and that you're feeling better after a (hopefully) good night's sleep.

Chickens We were also told that DS was too young to be diagnosed with asthma, but his paediatrician thinks that his wheeziness is mainly caused by allergies.

I'm finally warming up after my run and have discovered that two pairs of gloves are quite effective as long as I keep them on. A friend phoned about two minutes after I'd started out and I stupidly answered the phone, or rather phoned her back - it took me a minute or two to get the phone out of my armband and I had to take my gloves off to do so. I was only on the phone for a couple of minutes but my hands were so painful afterwards, turned bright red and I was starting to lose the feeling in my fingers. It's only just returned to my little fingers now, in fact. That will teach me (particularly as it was my unreliable friend who never answers the phone when I call her).

Morning all! Just a list as there's too much chatter for personals, except to say get well soon to bitchy ds

To do:
Walk dog
Pick up dog poo
Change and wash bedding
Hotspots
Gyminis with DD
Date night tonight- amazing how we have money for this now I'm in charge
Clean out bag
Clean out purse
Empty car
Mission doesn't apply as I do this as part of my home bleugh
Paperwork if DD naps in her bed and not while we are out!

BB later

After two days of procrastination have decided to go back round the babysteps but with a few more routines in place, whilst sorting out the additional mess from being ill and flooding. Damage caused by the night before lasts winds and constant cold was the final straw on both enthusiasm and sense of being in control, so am hoping rebuilding steps will give it back.

Got the kitchen rescued, (how can one hotpot hit so many surfaces?) bathroom habitable, shopping in, washing caught up, replacement emergency meals cooked, which isn?t bad, but everywhere else is a mess and am still all over the place physically, but seeing Dr on Monday.

Toffee it?s definitely clutter here. A lot of it much needed clutter, but we just have too much stuff and not enough space for it, needed or not.

Cq I?m sorry to hear about your friend and hope my suggestion doesn?t make you well up more. I was double orphaned over a couple of years and know that the thing I could have done with, would have been people who?d known them staying in touch, and writing memories about them down while they remembered.

Bitchy poor thing, what a time to learn how often mum?s right.

Linzer I personally don't hate Aberwystwyth (sp?) I think in comparison to Newcastle or London it failed the buzz test! (he then went to Newcastle, anyway I don't personally know this student, just his mum! who was my piano teacher so she was telling me every stage of his troubles. She was a bit miffed because she was looking forward to lovely Welsh visits )

thewaffler I think five months must be a difficult time now for bfders with the new weaning guidelines - hope counsellor reassures you and you can keep going. It does get soo much better and makes life a 1000 times easier after six months.
I agree that parmesan can be taken the wrong way Very brave to do a baked risotto, I certainly have never mastered that, it comes out like savoury rice pudding when I try

Last night we had Macaroni Cheese which I definitely cracked! Even Dh ate it, and he hates auf lauf, although I suppose that's because there was no leftovers in it this time....

Bitchy will look back and see what's happened , better post and run now, as ds2 at home not particularily ill, but tomorrow I can't take a single day off to mind him so I thought I would nip his cough in bud now as I have to wait in all day for Ikea and Kitchen trollies from JL.

Neenok - glad it was good news.
Bitchy - oh no! What bad timing! Hope you can still do something for DS's birthday. :(
swan / Linzer - I've only been to Aber once but can easily imagine it would be a love it or hate it type place. The people I know who went to uni there loved it.

Here's some info on drinking water www.netdoctor.co.uk/womenshealth/features/watermyth.htm just in case it's useful.

Better get on with some work now. Back later!

Oh Bitchy I am so sympathetic. Ds1 broke his arm in summer falling off a haystack when I asked him not to play on it... His arm looked like a piece of bendy playdough On the upside there are so many children who break their arms that it is almost like a rite of passage. Presumably they are pinning it? It will be off in no time, ready for Spring, and now is a very good time to not be outside climbing trees etc. I think it took about 4 days for ds and my nephew (who also broke his arm) to adjust and pain went minute the break was pinned/set. Also they often start with heavy plaster and go on to lighter stuff.

And at least it wasn't on the ice, which you would have felt was more dangerous, and then thought oh, this is too dangerous to do again. Ds1 has had three fractures now, I feel quite emotional about it, but I think you get through it, and it is just part of the course of them playing in the way that children should....

Anyway, back to Flying

todo
Ds and I have just watched a Lego starwars thingy which was hilarious, but the playroom has reached rock bottom again so

remove toy pram
remove large aeroplane to loft
tidy books
tidy music
fold blankets
hoover floor
sort DVDs into alphabetical order we were looking for Star Trek bt could not find it It is there somewhere!!!
put dressing up clothes under dd's bed! I am sick of them in the front room, too many high school musical pompoms and viking axes etc...

then
Kitchen
put saucepans away
move wine rack
move big pile of tiles/baskets to make room for new worktops

swan No, I didn't think you hated Aber personally - but you're right, a certain metropolitan buzz is lacking. You're right about the love/hate thing, Blue - I love it there, but can see it would be quite possible to hate it if I went back to live there permanently. I have a special love/hate relationship with the trains there (actually, I don't think there's any love involved in that particular relationship).

Re falling on ice, I was quite annoyed with myself yesterday for giving into the scary ice skating teacher, who told me that DD2 didn't need a helmet. She came back in after her lesson and said that she'd fallen over and hit her head, and that it was hurting. No obvious harm done and she didn't have concussion - but she could so easily have done (she got concussion a few years ago after falling from a very low stool onto the carpeted floor of her bedroom) and I would have been even more annoyed with myself then.

I like your link, Blue. I'm currently on my second cup of coffee, will probably have a cup of tea late afternoon and then a this evening and I find that covers my daily requirements quite nicely. And the doctor didn't mention anything at my annual MOT in November although I do vaguely remember her telling me I should drink more water the year before.

JustGetting It sounds like you have a lot to cope with at the moment - I hope the doctor can help and that you start to feel better soon. It must be very frustrating if you feel like the place is in a mess but you've done so much already and, as FlyLady says, it didn't take your home 15 minutes to get in a mess and so it will take longer than 15 minutes to sort it out. Just focus on the babysteps and do what you can.

So sorry to hear about your DS, Bitchy. That sounds very upsetting, particularly with his party having to be cancelled now too . Nice, encouraging post from Swan though - and good point about it being better by Spring.

Flyingoutofcontrol - sorry your DS is poorly. If it helps, I have also used spacers and inhalers for both my boys and neither of them could be called asthmatic now (12 and 6), although they do sometimes need them if they have a bad cold. DH and I are both asthmatic so there are always inhalers lying around to share!

DS1 has just woken up and needs attention, so no more time to post. Off to supervise breakfast, then schoolwork, then attempt to get some work done myself. Plus basic Flying routines, which are still ticking over nicely.

BBL.

hope everyone with poorly children and adults feel better soon.

Today is not happening for me. Woke feeling dizzy and ill again,

so have only got dressed,
took DD to school (DS still off)
fed and walked dogs,
had breakfast
and have squirted some bleach down loos.

Have emptied and re stacked dishwasher.

That is all for now, going for a snuggle in bed and may strip DD bed before I lie down.

Everything else can wait until tomorrow. Probably did too much yesterday.

Ta da so far

School run
Loaded car for dump
DH has gone to dump
Two more bags ready for charity
Two bags ready to donate to friend
Made beds

Just about to unload dw and put wm on then give lo's lunch before nursery. Be back soon!

Jax - bed is the right place for you right now. Actually, considering the temperature, maybe we should all go back to bed . Hope you feel better soon.

NickNacks - congratulations on so much decluttering first thing!

DS1 is practising 'sequences' for maths, then reading more about 'forces' for science. Rather him than me! I have just brought in yesterday's washing, which was still hanging on the line - it was frozen .

Back to paid work at home now ( here to spur me into action).

Hello all, can I join this thread? I was on Toffee's January thread, although I haven't been online for over a week as I was busy with work. I'm afraid I've not caught up on this thread either. I've tried to keep up the baby steps as much as possible and now I can't imagine life without a shiny sink .
Things are much quieter from now on work wise so hopefully I'll get back into flying properly.
Big thanks to Toffee for all her help and support last month.
Right, off for a declutter and sort the washing!

Back home with one child for the English lesson! Who is instead playing with the DDs' Polly Pockets... Oh, I'm annoyed. If only I'd known that the other two girls wouldn't be coming either, I would have cancelled the lesson. The girl here is absolutely no trouble - I thought we could play some games, but she said she prefers to play on her own and I don't feel I can force her, especially as she's here on her own. Have texted her mum to let her know what's going on, anyway.

Jax Hope you're feeling better soon and that you can take it easy for the rest of the day.

Day 3 Babysteps going well here - sink is still shiny, glad not adding any more things in today as taking effort just doing that today for some reason..! Was dressed (to slippers) straight away.

Sorry to hear about your boy bitchy, how long is in to stay in hospital for?

Was going to ask if anyone would mind telling me how they store their DC's soft toys/teddies? At the mo, my DCs have theirs in a couple of those soft pop-up kind of cylindrical things from Ikea, but as soon as they're put away I turn my back for a second and they're everywhere - their room never looks tidy as full of the bloody things! So wanted to find something else but not sure what?!

Hope everyone has a good day - has anyone woken to snow? None here (south-east coast) but rumours of some this weekend...

Hello and welcome Haagendazs. Having a shiny sink can be quite addictive, can't it?

poeia We have these baskets from Ikea, which we originally bought to put into a storage unit but now keep a couple in DS's bedroom as he has a ridiculous amount of soft toys. They still end up all over the floor so I'm not sure they're any better than what you already have, although it's fairly quick to throw everything in them. We also have hanging storage in the DC's rooms similar to this, but I find it a lot more fiddly than the baskets - and most of the bigger toys don't fit in.

good morning so far!
done
big bag of rubbsh from playroom
a lot of time encouraging fat lazy cat to chase a mouse out of playroom into garden cat kept running back and standing by its food bowl and looking beseechingly at me as if to say, I don't fancy mouse today.
ds2 sorted dvds into alphabetical order
ikea delivery arrived 27 bits!
lunch ds2
removed all the train books from playroom to the loft to make room
dressing up stuff under dd bed

stilltodo
sink
dw
saucepans away/wash some more

Aww, thanks for all the good wishes re: DH - he's a star
It was a really hard year last year so I'm blaming that for the state my house got into!!

I live near Aber!!! It's getting better - Next is great - DS's love the escalator [country kids emoticon] and it gets better.....because....B&Q, M&S and Tesco are coming soon - SOOOO ridiculously excited!!!!

No snow here but absolutely freezing.