October-fest: a fledgling (at best) might spruce up its nest (then take a rest?).

[strictlycaballine]

Welcome to the October 2012 Fledgling Flyers thread. Park your mops, buckets, microfibre cloths, golden dusters and spiders-web-removing-implements here!

A huge "thank you" to Whoknows and Pushme for leading us throughout September!! (Hope you are recovering well Whoknows - take it steady!)

If your 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, support and along the way.

This little-and-often system is designed so that you can follow a series of steps and routines each day (which gradually become second nature) in weekly designated zones of the house; defining and minimising housework - which in theory should leave you with more time to do other more interesting things instead! At the same time it is intended to reduce that panicky "rabbit in headlights" feeling when you are overwhelmed and everything needs doing all at once. No problem if you miss a day or two; just jump right back in and it will all come around next month again anyway!

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 steps and routines using a three-pronged approach (dependent on the stage everyone is at):

• start or repeat 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.

[And if you are really enthusiastic and have finished decluttering - you can go on to detailed deep cleaning in each zone.]

More info here on getting started, and the flylady system here and here Don't be put off by the barf-tastic language of the site - the underlying system is sound.

All welcome!!

Get to bed Mrs SC!!!

Early morning here. DS and DD have just gone to school. Just having a little MN time before study time.

Big waves to everyone and apologies for lack of personals and lack of me being around this month. Still recovering from Dengue. One day I think I am getting better, then the next I feel rubbish again. Fed up now and this heat is doing my head in!!!!

Relieved to see you posting PA - have been worried about you and suspected dengue might be the cause. Take it steady x

[Really going to bed now]

Morning all! Apologies for going awol again. Struggling this week to be honest. Work is a bit crap, I feel a bit crap and the children are being little craps. Oh and my flying is crap. Am going to get back on the flying wagon tonight. Promise. For now i am going to drink coffee and perch my ass in the naughty corner ( my considerably smaller yet still humongous ass, body clutter is the only thing I seem to be doing well at, nearly 3 stone now!)

sc to hear the plaster fell off, I have some walls that are like that... Thankfully we have horrid embossed wallpaper that previous owners put up and that holds the plaster in place... We are gradually getting around the rooms.

Dry here today so hopefully the moat which has formed on top of the concrete of the foundations will dry out a bit

At work today so my list is short:
Buy cards for Dmil birthday (today )
Send flowers
S&s
Sink
Change our bedding.

I did some anti procrastination yesterday, must chase it up today.

Morning!

Morning routine going well here! Off out to work shortly. Going to keep concentrating on morning routine this week, and catching up on laundry!

PS Lauren sorry to hear your horse is lame again .
Mine is going quite well at the moment. He is running in another point-to-point race on Sunday after a win two weeks ago, which was most exciting!

I'm sorry , but I've now seen the bit about advertising in the rules. Thank you for having pointed it out to me. With a fledging company I will have to find other venues to promote myself Thanks again Clare

Clare -there is a section where you can pay £50 to advertise, look under the Classified section of Talk.

Morning all just a list dump for now but will be back later for a catch up! Date night went well though he stayed over for the first time, which made getting out the house this morning before mindees arrived and DD woke up a bit of a challenge

To do:
School run- 1 down 1 to go
DD and mindee to playgroup
Ring baby gymnastics for times and days
My laundry away (3 days in a row this has been on my list )
Today's mission- or a variation of it, I use a knife and a cloth under draining board
Routines
Friend round for takeaway tonight

BBL!

PA - sorry you've been ill - not what you need when you are still settling into a new country . I hope you feel fully recovered soon.

Ellie - oh dear, sorry life is so stressful at the moment. Good idea to escape to the naughty corner .

SC - grr at the plaster. Hope you managed to get some more sleep last night.

Castle - yummy pain au chocolat, thank you.

Clare - I will check out your website. Good luck with your new business.

WhoKnows - how are you feeling today? Are you still fragile after the op? Hope you are remembering to take it easy.

Shifty - hope you have a good day at work and return home to dry, unmoated foundations.

Planning to bake a cake with DS1 this morning: an Incredible Edible Cell cake . We are decorating it with sweets that represent the different parts of the inside of an animal cell. DS1 is only interested in eating the sweets afterwards, but some of the facts might stick in his brain too .

Friend coming round for tea later, if she can squeeze in past the boxes and junk from yesterday's clearout . Hopefully, DH will do a dump-run when he gets home this afternoon.

Been a bit remiss in posting lately and keeping up to date on the thread

DS has (for some unfathomable reason) decided to start waking in the night, every two hours. I'm therefore running a bit on empty and flyingvis taking a back seat to eating chocolate and drinking coffee just getting through the day while coping with an influx of extra work from my actual job. At least the weather is nice so I'm getting washing frozen dry outside!

So, forgive me for being AWOL. I will try to catch up later. However, I do have a lovely either Word or PDF version of the Christmas thread (with no dates, just weeks) so can email people this if they need/want it for their control journals. Just drop me a PM and I'll email it off to you.

Ohhh carpe can I have a Christmas plan too please

No worries sending the plan.

Just PM me an email address and preferred format!

Good afternoon (well it is here!) Helloooooo!! Lovely, sunny, autumnal day. Hope you are all OK, particularly those of you feeling under pressure from work, under pressure from builders, sleep deprived, or below par health-wise.

[swoops on Castlelough's discrete parcel of pain au chocolat and devours rapidly [licking of lips emoticon]

Sister has been installed in hospital and will be operated on later this afternoon so I've been thrown out until this evening. Not remotely worried because hospital/staff all totally brilliant and fairly minor procedure.

Ellie sorry about current crap-fest (although I must confess, wording did make me cackle a bit - sorry) That's amazingly well done on the body clutter front - 3 stone - you kept that very quiet - that's BRILLIANT going - partic. as you haven't had an easy time of late. CONGRATULATIONS!!!

Hope the cement managed to be imprinted with a few dog/rabbit /bird footprints before it finally set Shifty Tis good you have fine weather at last to banish the mud.

Castlelough congrats on your horse's recent win and good luck on Sunday!

Lauren how is yours today? Must be so frustrating for you ... (and how was date night?)

Issima I was about to write "have fun with the nesting" but then read you were off to the tip, car wash and having to sort out your dh's boxes!! Oh well, hope it's not all too onerous at least and foxy joiner at least alleviates some of the boredom of it!! Amazing the number of people one meets who "used to live in Bxls for a year or so"!!

Clare yes, as others have pointed out, small classifieds section here Good luck with your business, I'm sure you'll find there is huge demand!

Lauren ooohhhhh lovely that date night went well !!

Good to see you Whoknows hope you are beginning to feel a bit more human now (but still taking it easy)

Toffee v. impressed by your original/stimulating lesson plan!! Bet it will taste good too!

Carpe sorry you are suffering from lack of sleep (sods law that it always coincides with increased work load or other rl challenges) Take it steady and hope you can catch up on some shut eye soon.

To do:
finish morning routine inc dw, wm, s&s (was out early to hosp)
school run (half day today)
NB renew carte d'identité this wk
pack up on-line shopping returns
on-line ordering of presents for godchildren
paper decluttering will get dd shredding
BOUDOIR & HOME OFFICE decluttering
e-mails (rabbit equip + 2 thank yous)
research easels
medical appts
hwk supervision
ballet run/quick shop
afternoon/evening routine
baby-sitter (dh business dinner)
hospital visit

Have a good afternoon everyone. Waves to Trazzle Bitchy Swan Justgettingonwithit Madwoman Honu Pushme Nicknacks Maggie Lplate Feetheart Mercury Gossip Dizzy Mymums MrsOnatopp Ricecrispy and eveyrone else I've forgotten!

Dammit, tried to get on to say good morning, oh well. Good Afternoon everyone!!

Just back from my workout this morning, and ready to tackle the mamoth task that is tidying this house.

I feel a crisis clean coming on......

BBL to let you know how I've done!

Good afternoon everyone, just finished a driving lesson, due for my test next month and I'm still making shocking mistakes, today I tried to pull out on to a main road in second whilst going at 5mph and stalled it in the middle of said main road, grrr. It would have been a fail if cars were coming as its a fast one.

My flying took a back seat yesterday as I felt crap, and the house is looking crap today so I'm going to be hitting it with a vengeance this afternoon, haven't done any more xmas shopping but I did have eggs benedict for breakfast mmmmmm.

I have my usual morning and afternoon routine to do so I will check back with you all later, must fly!!

Hmm, not sure if it will taste good, SC - it's a bit burnt. Never mind, I have trimmed the burnt bits off and DS1 is decorating it with butter icing and sweets .

reading everything that everyone's been doing has made me feel a bit sea-sick

However, I am now going to pull myself together and DO upstairs.
Tried to have a nap after another Open Morning, but failed.
Only two weeks to go before Dh gives up his job and then the will hit the as far as tidying up...goes as he is working from home from THEN ON...

Toffee I think "doing" things is the only way to remember anything....there again I have forgotten most things I ever remembered so I may be particularily challenged on that one.

Feeling particularily exhausted by homework travails, family therapy, and decisions about secondaries. Tomorrow ds2 is visiting the Secondary of choice to on a special taster day just for him! He's in with the Year 7's, although he is only Year 6. It sounds good, but equals another day where I feel just exhausted by to-ing and fro-ing. Thoughts of half term plans, Dd wants a "fifties" outfit for a party, Church references are all making me feel sick. Having written that, I feel a bit calmer, and know it is all small fry. So, onwards and upwards.
A beautiful day, and I've already had a lovely walk this morning

Trazzle and Whoknows hope you are managing.

S/c my method of highlighting with acrylics (no idea if this is ?proper?!) is easiest with a chisel shaped brush and the right transparency of paint. Mix tiny bit of paint and water to a thin consistency. There are lots of methods I suspect, but I?d start by learning how to make subtle highlights and work backwards as an easier learning curve.
Decide on your highlight mix. I don?t like using base plus white, preferring say a base green and lighter one. (same with shadows but reversed)
Paint a bit on some newsprint, let it dry, if the prints still black, it?s the right consistency, if it?s gone grey, the paint?s s generally too thick.

Damp your brush and press dry (or be bad and suck it like what I usually do!) Use the brush?s chisel edge and short strokes, and don?t use too much paint on any spot. (It blurs during drying otherwise)

If there?s light there?s also shadow, and I like using contrast as part of highlighting. If you overdo it or get the contrast wrong you can glaze over it usind a very thin base colour wash to tone down and soften up. (Also makes flesh more ?real?)

re banana boxes; do you remember before my home became a collapsible ?dwelling unit,? I was helping clean up a hoarded house? They are for her, she will only use banana boxes for storing paper for some reason, and a lack of them is the latest reason not to do things!

Claire if you ever meet a proper hoarder and need someone who can clean in/up regardless of how bad the state of it, I?m available!

Toffee eating your way through learning is always a really good way to get things to stick if

I have spent today volunteering in my DCs school, which was great fun but means I have only done very minimal flying. However, because I have been pretty on top of things the house isn't too bad so Im pretty happy.

I passed my driving test in July Gossip . It wasn't as bad as I expected it to be although I did loads of things that my instructor would have shouted at me for,such as almost pulling out infront of a car on a busy roundabout Im sure you will be fine!

Anyway, I guess I should go and get on with things instead of sitting on here procrastinating

Toffee am not averse to a few burnt bits

Eggs benedict sound rather good too Gossip (don't be discouraged re: driving lessons btw - I only passed my test third time - couldn't still can't reverse around a corner!) It will come in time and honestly, if I could get a license, anyone can. I'm still a pretty crap driver but a lot safer than most of the drivers here - not hard - calm, kind, polite, pragmatic Belgians turn in to mad men behind the wheel.

Hope crisis clean going well Lplate

Swan you sound buried under a mound of stresses. Sorry life proving a bit tough atm. I imagine big decisions such as school placements are the sort of thing that can drain the energy out of one until all is decided - and everything else has to take a bit of a back-seat in the meantime. (One of my sisters going through this with my nephew but university not school) With regard to your dh working from home - if all else fails - isn't there a newly erected garden shed???

Wow Justgettingonwithit all the acrylic advice much need and hugely appreciated - thank you. I think that is exactly what my tutor was trying to convey yesterday (about using contrast to create depth rather than adding white) but I didn't quite understand it until you explained it. Great tip about news print and paint thickness btw. Good to know about being able to make corrections too! (Still struggling with paint thickness/transparency etc) Double wow over helping hoarder with everything else you have got going on. Hope the banana boxes do the trick!

Think DS is coming down with another bug or monumental teething grump as he refused lunch (bar an apple) slept for 2 hours, then screamed when I suggested the park, and just wanted to cuddle me on the sofa. He now refused dinner but is eating an ice lolly.

Hasn't made flying easy that's for certain.

And tomorrow we have a GP appointment, then toddlers so who knows when I will get anything done

And tonight looks like it could be interesting too.