Fledglings “March” 31 steps away from CHAOS and mess towards domestic success...

[sanguinechompa]

... well, a shiny sink at least!!

Welcome to the March 2012 Fledgling Flyers thread. Park your mops, buckets and microfibre cloths here!!

A huge "thank you" to Linzer for steering us all through February - not a small achievement Linzer considering your school run/teaching commitments and with your dh travelling so frequently.

If you're house is a mess and you are strugging with C.H.A.O.S. (can't have anyone over syndrome) and S.T.U.F.F. (something that undermines family fun) then this is the thread where we (loosely) follow the step-by-step Flylady housekeeping system (in our own, unique, relaxed style) with lots of chat, whinging (in my case anyway ) and support along the way.

We advise not signing up to receive the Flylady e-mails as you will be inundated! All the information you need will be linked here on a daily basis.

From the first of the month, we will be following Flylady's tips on restoring order to our homes, and as we are all at different stages we will be using one of the following methods:

Here you can, for one month:

• repeat or start baby steps

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

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

More info here and here!

All long-standing members, intermittent returnees, lurkers and newcomers welcome!!

The timer worked - set it for 15 mins, it went off when I was in the middle of something so set it again. By the time it went off a second time I was cursing it as I had to stop what I was doing to get up and turn it off (use one on cooker). Left it off after that and just got on with stuff. Now feeling better as have done 2 hours and feel more in control.

20 mins for lunch then off to school to read.
Feeling very down about DD and school at moment as got a letter yesterday to say her teacher is leaving at end of term - this is the third term in a row that she has had a teacher leave!!! She is in a VERY difficult year group and has to cope with a huge amount of day-to-day disruption (which I think she does admirably although she has never known any different :(), has had 4 headteachers in her time there (she is only Yr4) and I don't feel she has had a settled term since Yr2
I do have faith in the new head and DS (Yr1) has had a brilliant experience of school so far but poor DD, she really deserves better than this :(
No ideas what to do but am trying not moan in a destructive way - am meeting up with a non-hysterical, sensible friend this evening who's DD is in the same class and am avoiding the playground as much as possible. Luckily we have a 'meet the headteacher' coffee morning already planned for Friday though I feel very sorry for the poor head already - a lot of mums are as bad as the kids!

Sorry for the vent but it just hits me in waves at the moment.

Afternoon all! It's a beauuuuuutiful day here and DS2 is asleep so I'm going to enjoy the sunshine in just a mo. The washing is on the line, we've been to toddlers, I've spent too much money in M&S but I've just been paid, and I've bought myself a lovely designer skirt for £3 in a charity shop, so all in all

Bitchy I might have to head over to pedants' corner and check your thread out - I don't understand it either!

WhoKnows - glad everyone OK - our overcrowded bathroom shelf crashed down in the middle of the night a while back - absolutely terrifying!!

Waves to all and skips outside...

Hi all :)
Toffee at your internet issues, DS is only 15 months and I dread to think how I will keep him away from all the internet rot in the future. Have left him on his own in the front room while I put the kettle on and came back to find he's put 'Red Hot Mothers' on the TV How on earth do you hide that kinda stuff?! (hastens to add that its one on those free channels, I do not spend all day watching dodgy stuff )
Am at work today but so far I have:
Made the bed
swished bathroom
Planned dinner
Checked laundry (its still there)
Washed up (5 min room rescue)
Can't remember who described flylady as the fat fairy but that will keep me amussed all day

pendants corner was too scary

List dump as i lack motivation, focus and will to give a shit, whilst being in a vile short tempered hormonal sulk. I fear i might have reverted to teenagerhood

Tues' list:
me and ds up
morning school run
stuff elephant half done
kill another UFO
Kill off chickens 4 1/2 done with except of eye super glue, 9 1/2 to go
15mins on bedroom floor
ironing
Job hunt and application
sort paperwork for meeting wed
Lunchtime school run
feed ds lunch without killing him
Do not shout at ds or rise to his provoking work in progress
evening school run
ds to sort ds' room as he is banned to his room for the evening.
Find the black cotton
eat my own body weight in chocolate
throw a strop on a thread
give anyone advance searching the impression that I have clearly lost my mind today, cos oh yes the posts are all over the place and randomly insane.

School run again in less then an hour.

I've noticed this too, the unsuitable stuff on Freeview. Luckily the DCs don't know we have Freeview as we have got Sky (which is probably worse but there are so many channels that they are unlikely to stumble on porn instead of Disney, also it has got parental controls although I still need to set them up). We only got Freeview for the first time last month when our terrestrial signal went off, I was quite shocked.

Bitchy - you were brave, i've never dared post there for fear of making a grammatical error in my post. Reassuring to see that they swear over there too. All my grammar has been learnt from doing French A level at night school, didn't do any to speak of at school.

Oh dear Feet - your poor DD, I remember you telling us about these teacher problems before. Our current year 6 went through a similar period of turmoil when they were Yr 4 (3 teachers in a year etc), school got them a new teacher for Year 5 who was fantastic with them and they are all really thriving and settled now, hope yours gets turned round similarly.

Click the link whoknows. I didnt

Not a lot of flying going on as I seem to be doing a million and one other things. If I don't get up before the DSs I don't seem to be able to get a head start on the day, and with 2 interrupted nights I barely woke up in time - DSs generally sleep well and I need to wake them up to get them ready in time.

Spontaneous cup of tea/lunch catch up with friend then grocery shopping during the day. Then made 4 1/2 kg of play dough in the evening (selling to fundraise for nursery) - but the recipe came out too oily so donated it to the nursery for general use (manager was delighted not to have to make more up herself!) and will make some more tonight. Note: 1 cup of flour only needs 1 tablespoon of oil!!

Went to Booker this morning to get some containers for the play dough, food colouring and salt - did you know you can get a day pass at Booker Wholesaler for a nursery/school or any charity? Only found that out, will make it much easier when we need to get things in bulk for fundraising events.

Fun in the Foam this afternoon with DS2, and about to go and do school pick up now.

Set the timer going and did 15 minutes in the kitchen to get it under control, but could do with a bit more, will do it while the boys have their dinner, I think.

Managed to do some English work with DS1 this morning (discussing 'Holes' - very enjoyable), then let him type up a story whilst I fell asleep on the sofa with sick DS2 . I have a cold sore coming up as well as a cold and it always makes me feel rough.

Too tired to do anything now, so I'm going to let myself off the hook and have some MN browsing time instead. No chance of decluttering today.

Feet - that's awful about your DD's school . She has done extremely well to cope so far. I hope things start to improve under the new head.

Valium - at 'Red Hot Mothers'.

ChitChat - you are doing loads - and all that without a full night's sleep

WhoKnows - I managed to set up parental controls on Freeview - if i can, anyone can!

Blue - sunshine and shopping - what a lovely combination .

Bitchy - your other thread is a revelation. It's the terms that are confusing, not what the children are asked to do. I love AspirantPirates story .

Ds1 is literally jumping with joy because his best friend is coming over to see him after school. Aww.

Whoops - may day sounds more impressive than it was, lunch and shopping was YESTERDAY!

Hi folks, still reading the thread, but no opportunity to post most of the time. Hope people struggling with colds, other viruses and ills recover quickly. I finally feel my normal self again after a month .

Toffee I just wanted to give you a positive take on the cleaner - after all the point is to make your life easier, and free up some time. I use my cleaner for the home blessing basically (and definitely for cleaning the toilets - I wouldn't expect people staying to help out with that, but the cleaner is paid to clean! ). She does my home blessing every Wednesday, and then there's usually a short list of other jobs that I write out each week. e.g. clean out the microwave, or wash the bins - stuff that you could find on flylady's deep clean list. If we're away, then I ask her to do the windows (inside only) instead of home blessing. When we haven't had visitors then there's no need for her to go in the main bathroom or spare bedroom, so I quite often dump things out of the way there. It does take some time to tidy on Tues evening, but it is such a good feeling when she's been, and the house is clean and tidy (although never clutter free ). It took a few weeks to get to used to the whole concept, but now I love it, and dread having to find a new cleaner when we move. Write out your list of essential jobs so you don't have to tell her every week, and think carefully about which order she should do the rooms, so you can plan which room you will be using when. And enjoy! (And by the way I never ask her to do ironing - there are too many deep cleaning jobs to take up any extra time after the basic home blessing.)

"Lifebegins* - that's good advice. Thank you. I will use her for the 'home blessing'. I suppose I'm not quite sure what I should expect her to do in two hours, but kitchen and bathroom cleaning, floor mops and hoovering throughout the house should certainly be covered.

I had to forget today's list and take myself back to bed this afternoon. Luckily, DH owed me big-time (he's been bedridden for a week with bronchitis), so could hardly say no.

Actually, I see this as progress. The last couple of months I have started well and then given up and snuck back on at the end of the month. So I have done well this month.

I am trying really hard to fly and failing miserably. I have no motivation whatsoever which is a little disconcerting. I am used to being crap at this but am struggling a bit with workload/life/general life business at the moment and flying is way down the list.

However, I do miss chatting so here I am .

Will be back later when I have made dinner etc.

Ellie I often forget this is meant to be a housekeeping thread and just come here for the chat.

Good to see you back. Sorry life has been so difficult recently. My Flying routines have fallen apart recently too (mainly as a result of home ed taking priority).

Thanks toffee, i'm absolutely fine just life is manically busy and I am struggling to find the time to even do basic routines. I am surviving day to day and that's it. Hopefully the Easter holidays will give me the chance to recharge my batteries and get back on top of things.

Glad to hear that, Ellie.

Evening all,

Ta-da!

School run
DCs to school
emails etc
work
buy drainpipe
drop somethingat a friends house
home to prepare for after school activities, ie sort out ballet and cub uniforms, packed sandwich teas for the DCs, etc
school run
rest for half an hour
take DD to ballet
Take DS back to school for parents eve, meet Dh there, feed DS his sandwiches
1st parents eve app
Pick Dd up from ballet
Back to school, feed DD sandwiches in library
2nd appt
Drive home, dump car, shove cub uniform on DS, grab scooters, fetch friend from his house along the road and take all the DCs to Cubs
Speak to another mum about something
Home
Cook and Eat tea
wait for Ds to be dropped back from Cubs
Lounge hotspots
get over excited DCs into bed in spare room
close door on bombsite DCs room
crack open

Forgive my absence the last week or so... My maid mother in law was down so I had a well deserved break... She's happy to tidy up and iron etc... And it's rude to not let a guest do what they want, isn't it?

Ta da:
Back to work (booooo)
Hung washing out
Got washing in
Zumba

To do:
Sink
Washing on ready for morning (loving the drought )
Relax

Big waves to all

Hello everyone. Another one been here in spirit but not tasks.

ah my favourite topic. A cleaner. Love my cleaner. She does do ironing and mops floors. If too much ironing she doesn't do kids rooms. If too much toot on floor of said rooms she doesn't care.

Work life balance sucks here too no home cos refurb means at work 24/7. Impossible to do actual work with kids around. Surely that's why people go to work is to have a break from the kids meetings galore re new head appointment leading up to interviews. Extremely stressed face.
Pil got back today. Dh gone away. IE not enough beds and even less support than normal. On top of all that (tmi) auntie flo oh and ds off with d & v 48hrs!! Mil walked through the door and I had a major meltdown.

Please someone kick me up the arse and tell me to get over myself!!!

So trying to think ahead my bathroom will be gorgeous and as long as I get through without throttling my dh i will be happy.

Hopefully then I can return to flying

Lovely to read about you all (sieve brain)

Eyes closing goodnight all.

I am on a major culling session here. Old internet stuff, old computer files, etc. it is quite liberating. I didn't get around to finish stuffing the elephant or culling all of the chickens but life kinda got mad. And I am feeling mad enough to go do some serious declutering. I might see you all at some point when this random urge has passed

Eh up fledglings. Just dropping in to post links this morning and then will catch up with personals later on.

Sorry, again, didn't get back on here last night. Nothing like a day of procrastinating to tire one out - crashed out early yesterday

[Spots Ellie in crowd and flaps wings] Huge waves to everyone else.

Baby step number twenty-one for today, Wed 21st March is

here continuing/consolidating routines and now apparently one can look at an answer to an 'AskFlylady' question every day Mon-Fri if you can be arsed

This week we are in Zone 4 here the main bedroom.

here's the detailed cleaning list if you are at that stage.

Today's mission is cleaning down tops of doors and window frames and door hinges with a feather duster Flylady says this shouldn't take long but it's a major scaffolding and step-ladder job in my house.

Wednesday is anti-procrastination day ie don't let Uncle Nesbit get his feet under your table - you know what he's like

**

See you later once I've done my evening routine from last night and morning routine for this morning Have a good day everyone!

[trots in 3 hrs later; looks around, naughty corner is empty...]

[chucks a few eggs and some rashers of back bacon on the stove]

[arranges croissants and cramique on large platter, brews coffee and whafts aromas about]

Where is everybody?

. Whats cramique? Lovely breakfast, thank you SC.

Yay! A customer ...!!

Morning Whoknows!!

[it's a fruit bread - usually for tea - but we like it toasted for breakfast too]

Oh, not sure if I'm allowed that, having given up toast for Lent with DS, but it sounds nice! Must go and attend to RL breakfast, see you later.