April's Fledgling Fliers: there's no fooling the Fat Fairy this month.

[elliepac]

In a blatant steal from last month's thread:

So here we are, April already.

So for those who don't know the fledglings is a long running thread. Some of us seem clicky but that is because we have been chatting on these threads for nearly half a decade makes everyone feel old we quite like fresh blood though so feel free to jump in and join us.

Three key points to keep in mind:
(1)No perfectionism allowed - this is harder than you would imagine
(2)You are never behind just start where you are and anything you do is progress.
(3) It didn't get into a mess overnight, it won't get tidy over night - accept it will take time to get on top of things and you will be happier.

If you are new then trying to spend 15mins decluttering and the babysteps is the most. Some of us Bitchy can have scary looking lists. One word of advice ignore them. Do what you can, anything is better then nothing, and don't judge yourself against others

Ta da
Cleared out handbag
Cleared out wallet
Took step 1 of dining table hotspot
Sorted/threw receipts
Made shopping list
Culled magazines
Wash hanging up to dry

To do
Popping to shopping centre with DS later and may poke head into bathroom since it's the room for this week.

DH also moved his tools from back shed so a lot more space in there to utilise once I get rid of the junk that was hiding behind tools
Finish dining table
Hoover downstairs and clean coffee table
Tidy junk on top of dresser

Onwards, onwards

My to do list for today:

• Reload dishwasher Done
• 2 x Laundry loads Done
• Put clean washing mountain away in bedroom
• Clean kitchen part done, next job to finish it
• Tidy living room
• Hoover downstairs
• Arrange pick ups of the items I've sold. done
• Do Easter crafts with the girls when DS sleeps done
• Wash out washing machine drawer
• Empty bin and Nappy bin
• Take recycling out done

I've been up since 5am today and haven't stopped. I am just sitting down to my first cup of tea of the day. It feels like it should be nearly bedtime, not nearly time for lunch! Kids are all stressing me out today, which is unlike me. I think I need more sleep. I am getting stressed about the house, and considering forking out for a cleaner but I can't really afford it. But my 3rd trimester tiredness seems to be kicking in and it's not going to get any better.

doc appointment for DD
sort travel insurance
general tidy
pay cc and next bills
get kids to tidy bedrooms

Place marking as I have two weeks off and will actually be doing some housework :-)
I do sign in every month but lapse ...

Lilly I remember that trimester well. It's exhausting. Stick to the essentials. Everything else can be done by someone else wait. How old are your smalls? By that I mean your children. Not your pants!

Elliepac - that is a great method. I will need a coat of sorts for tomorrow so unless I can rustle up something to wear I will have to figure out what to do with a soaked coat.

Have a good holiday SC!

Ta Da's
Managed to freeze one of my CC accounts by accident
Fed minis
One mini napping/ t'other whinging about being bored - going to be a long Easter break at this rate
Put away dry laundry off airer
Hung up more wet laundry to dry
Ironed small amount of ironing whilst minis had their lunch rather than waiting for the inevitable massive overwhelming pile that I hide away and procrastinate about for weeks
Blasted a hotspot - well I say blasted it's been reduced
Put out recycling

To do
Shred paper
Put iron away once it's cooled down
Tidy away minis activity that they turned their nose up at
Remove double buggy from lounge that has been here for days (children are now using it as a climbing frame )
Empty TD
Put dog towels in the TD
Have a coffee and watch the rain through the windows - perhaps it's just me but I find it very soothing and relaxing if you can ignore the screaming children

Waves to Wurst - nice to see you again.

at Ellie.

Have a good trip, SC.

Packing on and off myself for the London Book Fair, but keep getting distracted...

done
counted money in church for a few hours
cleaning lady has tidied everything beautifully and done ironing

my plants have arrived yay! 2 big shrubs and some esoteric perennials, timeto plant them now before I go, and also I am so efficient, for once, drumroll some COMPOST, delivered to my door so I don't have to lug it back from B & Q.

dd is now sitting at kitchen table doing papier mache with her new friend
Maths tutor has cancelled for this afternoon (secretly relieved) as he has flu

And I've bought some new wool. To knit teddies for my nieces in Ireland. Less fattening than buying chocolate to cheer oneself up, but more £

wurst i was wondering how you were doing. And being very jealous of your climate's ability to de stink kit (such that it is not hovering about in the dining room ) you can comiserate on the joys of training camps and jamborees I am crazily thinking about becoming more involved too.

Don't worry about the ruffle scarf. I do think the issue is my ability to knit. I had not thought about crochet it so will attempt that with the other ball and unpick if it works better. My knitting is fairly shocking with plain wool tbh!

Busy day at work. not done any laundry and not likely to do any either. Only just managed to get some lunch so a bit spinny in the head atm. need to get a few bits and bobs done tonight so will focus on the craft stuff as it is easier and less effort and counts on the whole decluttering thing. Slowly slowly, project but project. too many UFOs.

Wurst you are a fucking genius. Sooooooo much easier to crochet then knit. (again i think this is user ability and more natural knitters would get frustrated by crochet approach. Looks like i might kill one of the fecking ruffle scarfs off tonight. Will then unpick the other one and redo as crochet! genuis i tell you bloody genius!

Not sure if it is a scarf or some sort of wild animal trying to escape

Just packing to go away to my Mum's for a week tomorrow. Spent ages in the loft looking for the rucksack, gave up and later discovered it was in our bedroom, buried under a pile of clean washing . It's been there for months and neither DH nor I had even noticed.

It will be good to leave all the evidence of housework undone and failed decluttering behind me for a while.

Hope you all have a happy holiday. May pop in again if I can get to a computer whilst we're away.

Thank you all for the sympathies re the disqualification. Everybody at the club has said they will happen - and I've never counted our chickens until the results came out! I (very very optimistically) had my eye on a Level 1 gala in Cardiff in June which is again a 50m long course pool where there was the chance for her to enter both the 50m and 200m events. She would have automatically qualified for both events but its a bit far to go just for one!

Yesterday she came home with 2 PBs and a time for a new event (100m breast) and the rest of the club swimmers (all newbies too) came home with PBs in most events and a clutch of heat winner medals. Next gala is on Easter Saturday and she is keeping everything crossed as heat winners get an egg!

Today DD spent the day enjoying a science workshop whilst I sat doing nothing after I had bought the weeks groceries.

Bitchy's top tips for ruffle scarfs when crochet - 1 don't lose count of how many you should have in each row. 2. triple crotchet looks nice but means you are more likely to lose count of how many stiches per row. 3. it is all goes a bit belly up add eyes and stick it in the sensory box as a new unique kinda animal

Hello to Wurst and welcome back.

Ta da
Last bits of living room plastered
Wall paper hung
English with ds done. Both survived.
Earth for flooding defence picked up.
Friend well and truly listened to. Both survived.

Late dinner almost done, then well earned sleep.

We had a lovely start to the holidays. We went to soft play then the library (to get audio books for a long car journey to see my uni friends tomorrow) and then had my dad over for dinner. There was very little flying done but I plan on getting lots done before we leave in the morning.

SC and Toffee I hope you both have lovely breaks

Bitchy it's definitely an undersea creature that moves by wafting it's frills.

Aw, lovely to see familiar names!!
Kids are fine, Swan - ds1 is moving schools in September to join the girls (dd2 moved to join dd1 AT&T heck atholic school last year, so he was the only one left. Still not happy with the way they deal with him, so he doesn't have a choice now. So far so good - he knows he's moving, but it am expecting some fall out with the change of routine etc towards the end of the summer... Eek)

I have a short ta da - ironing and actually managing to cook a proper evening meal, but am whizzing off to the grand crochet saga (bitchy, am enormously impressed. I don't knit At All. And haven't crocheted in years. Mine is slowly starting to resemble the creature, but mine is blue - will try and grab a pic later. Fellow leader is apparently going to teach us to use three fecking skeins at the same time to give us red, white and blue frilly beasties...)

Busy day at work. Spent all day wishing it was Friday, not Monday.

I did lol at Lilly's immediate recognition of the problem at hand. Too much to do. not saying No. Story of my life!

Will catch up later and post my list for tomorrow whilst you are all abed x

Good lord. At the catholic school. No idea what autocorrect imagined I was trying to say...

Morning everybody! Off out to spend some time with the DC today. Taking them to a soft play that's inside a shopping centre so will also take them shopping and to lunch.

My biggest challenge is not to buy stuff we don't need. Stay away from poundland!

Short to do list for today so we can just go and have some fun after a boring day at home yesterday doing housework.

to do:

• Get nappy bag etc packed ready to go
• Get DC ready to go
• Reload laundry before we go, preferably hanging outside if there is time.
• Reload dishwasher
• spend evening tidying the bombsite upstairs

Have a lovely day Lily. I'm a sucker for the crafty bits in Poundland.

We are off to catch up with my old uni friends today but before that I need to:
Unload dw and reload
Make beds
Hoover and dust downstairs
Bath and wash hair of dc
Put out rubbish and recycling
Get petrol
Check tyre pressure
Get some bits to take with us for lunch

Have a lovely day everyone

To do:
shower and up
go out for the day
increase wool stock by only the essential bits to complete projects.
finish the sea creature crocheting
find some boggle eyes and add.
see about finishing the blue crochet blanket.
consider the plan for wednesday.

Ta dah
Washing done and on airer in garden
Bathroom bleached
Floordrobe cleared

to do
file paperwork (may put off till tomorrow)

Morning all .

Your fly day looks like this:-

Babystep is the beginning of the Control Journal

Your mission is here

Today is Plan and Play day

Have a good day everyone!

What have we been up to?

bitchy posted pictures of some weird looking knitting stuff and her and wurst discussed crochet techniques. bitchy declared wurst to be, and I quote, 'a fucking genius*. Clearly she is right.

wurst is sending her son to a AT&T heck atholic school whatever the feck one of those is. lily managed to sum up her life in one succinct sentence and she wished it was Friday. This is why we are glad she is back.

mercury had a lovely start to the holiday and is going to see an old friend today....love catching up with old friend..enjoy!

just did decorating, survived homework and survived listening to friend. She also declared bitchy's creation to be an underwater creature.....not sure I have ever seen anything like that in a Sealife Centre. Clearly I have not been looking hard enough .

dizzy has a very clever daughter who swims like a fish and she should be very proud of her.

toffee is going away to her mum's and we all hope she has a lovely time.

swan did some productive stuff. SHe also got excited about knitting. Clearly I am missing something with this whole knitting business. And gardening. And cleaning.

peanutpatty wanted to know about lily's smalls. Weirdo . She enabled me to dish out some wonderful laundry advice which has served me well over the years. I am glad I got the opportunity to share my wisdom.

lily is storming through this flying business and suffering from 3rd trimester tiredness. Remember it well, just make sure you take it easy .

blueandwhitelover popped her head round the corner to say hi and made a great start to today.

elliepac again did nothing. I have started watching the Killing and appear unable to do anything other than watch it. All well and good but am going away at the weekend and have loads to do. I figure that as I am still in post op recovery, it is alright to do stuff..watch an episode...do stuff...watch an episode. Yesterday, I watched an episode....watched an episode....watched an episode....repeat ad infinitum. Today I am going to try and first method. washing on...watching an episode. I am truly shite at flying .

Delightful morning so far, holiday feeling...two boys went off to school. Sun shining, I am slopping around in my dressing gown. Dd is still asleep.

Long list for today though.
todo
euros
haircuts for dd and I
return library books to Central Library
organise catsitter when dh leaves house next week
pack boys' clothes
try and stop dd packing too much
print off tickets
try not to PANIC
oh yes plant rest of plants
cancel fruit box for next week
put away washing?? can I be bothered?
buy more catfood, good quality from vet

rubbish to dump? ditto?
clean out old food from second fridge
check train times or bus times from Dublin
ring sister, possibly have lunch with her in Dublin???

done
paid tutor agency
boys to school with PE kits

Ireland first thing tomorrow morning without DH! With two twelve year olds and nearly 14 year old travelling shouldn't be that difficult should it? They are old enough to be helpful surely? I feel like I now have an engrained fear of travelling which comes from travelling with 3 unruly toddlers, but it is not as bad as I imagine, NOW.