It's the clutter shouting "Mayday" as the Fledglings spring into action

[GoingGoingGoth]

Copying last month's thread.

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.

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, we won't be judging you.

Evening all,

Tired tonight, I woke up at 4am feeling bloated (ate masses of cheese and nibbles with wine last night) fell back asleep for an hour at about 5.30.

Anyway, had a nice day, coffee with friends this morning, then shopping, then home, school run etc.

DS was moaning about being bored yesterday, so I bought a cricket set and a new football in town, he has run me ragged all evening with them.

Not much Flying today, just a bit of tidying.

Toffee / PMPY - i'm the heaviest I've ever been in my life at the moment . Have eaten about 6 million calories in the last 24 hours.

Carpe - MIL did the same thing post breast cancer with the deodorant, it was a bit grim, however she clearly had a change of heart because the problem has sorted itself out now.

Links for Saturday 10th May

Babystep 10 is about the power of 15 minutes. This is probably the most important step for me. You can do anything for 15 minutes (no sniggering at the back there). It's all about working solid for the time set and then stopping, no extensions. An then having a break for the next 15.

Saturday is Family fun Day

It's the weekend so NO MISSIONS! Go enjoy yourselves

I've only just got in, and put DD to bed so I'll do the summary in the morning

done (since last inspection)
friend for coffee
took out rubbish
picked up sons(ds1 has at last brought his violin home to do some practice!)
fell asleep in my bed
cooked supper (beef stirfry and watercress and fruit of forest compote with icecream
put ds2 to eat in separate room as he was shouting at everyone, and said he hated ds1's fat fingers
dealt with ds2 who was in a state over Googlebox (he wanted to watch it and we said no, as last week was vair unsuitable and he behave badly all through it) Dh chatted to him and put him to bed and we both defused situation, rather well I thought! We are getting good at this...(although in fact the trick would have been to avoid Googlebox in the first place
cleared kitchen, washed up dishesl wiped table, put away food leftovers
had short drink with dh

Whoknows ds2 is obsessed with cricket, unfortunately it is very dangerous for neighbours if you play it in our 60 ft garden - I'm hoping school cricket lessons will be enough to stop him complaining about it..he thinks badminton a very poor substitute.

I agree, our garden is about that long and it's narrow, shuttlecocks go over the fence too. We're lucky, there is a massive green nearby (several acres) which is perfect for ball games. I feel a bit self conscious though, people I know drive and walk past it all the time (main road runs round two sides of it) a 47 year old overweight woman of large norkage playing football without a sports bra is a bit of a grim spectacle I suspect. However DS loves it and I guess it won't be long till he won't be seen dead playing footy with his mum.

Am still lurking here but slowly being driven out of house by paper avalanche. I'm even worse at dealing with paper than decluttering! Study now has only narrow path through to desk. I have tried timer, deal with 5 items..... but fail with all of them as every piece of paper needs another 2 or 3 before it can be dealt with. Aaaaargh.

Thank you however to all of you and particularly for thread leaders. And congratulations to Mercury on the job.

Not waving but drowning
Hx

Oh dare Honu, I hate paperwork too. I have an ikea drawer unit thing that I fill up with everything then tidy it a couple of times a year when it fills up. No organising when stuff arrives it just goes in the school drawer, the banking drawer, the 'other' drawer or the 'need to do something about this' drawer. It's a bit tidier than having everything out althoughb probably not much more organised!

Did you make it toffee? I probably had a couple of calories too many, but just about ok. Always wake up far too early the day after a diet day though!

And I still haven't cleaned out my handbag!

Right my three this morning are as follows:

Finances
Clean out handbag
Do something nice with DD

Yes, pushme, I did make it! Amazingly, DS1 put himself to bed early last night, so that freed me up for an early night myself. Absolutely starving this morning though and am now chomping my way through pancakes and maple syrup as it's not a fast day .

Well done on getting through the diet day yourself too. I probably had just over my calorie allowance as well (500), but it's still an improvement.

Still reminiscing over my slim days. I never thought I'd have to diet . People used to tell me off for being too thin.

Honu - sympathies on drowning in the paper clutter (I like the Stevie Smith quote). It's the same here, except all our paper clutter is kept in boxes and carrier bags, stuffed away in cupboards and under beds. Like you, I feel overwhelmed by it.

WhoKnows - glad you had a nice day yesterday. What a lovely mum you are to buy your son all that sporting equipment and play with him - at least it will burn off the 6 million calories . I would feel the same as you about having to run around in full view of passersby, by the way.

Swan - congratulations on averting the crisis with DS2. Maybe you and DH are working better together at managing DS2 because he is working at home now. My DH has definitely learnt better ways of dealing with DS1 now that he's at home more and experiences the daily ups and downs. We work really well together, mostly.

Goth - thanks for the links and the much-needed reminder about the power of 15 minutes . That will be very useful to me today.

Feeling very happy that I have a whole day at home to get on with lots of jobs.

To do:

Spend time on myself - long bath, hairwash, deal with hands and feet
Catch up on washing and ironing
Home ed preparation for next week
OU work
General house rescue (DM arriving on Monday - argh!)
Walk with boys (if it ever stops raining)
Blog
Lunch and dinner

Ta da so far

Reading in bed with DS2 first thing
Pancakes with maple syrup and glasses of orange juice for breakfast
Persuaded DS1 to take his meds with no trouble
Washing on
D/W on
Sent important message about Minecraft to DS2's friend by text

Hope everyone has a good day.

SUMMARY for Friday (normalish service will resume soon)

WhoKnows clarified she's been alcohol free since January, not a year.......4 months! Because she gone off the taste of wine

There seems to be an ill DC club in the thread, passes round meds, sympathy and patience. DD is also a member so missed school and sports day today. Carpe was hindered by whining DS, but Alice got on with a supermarket order.

it was Bitchy's birthday

Swan got loads done, but is getting ready for being husband-free for a couple of weeks. Planning is key. (And stocking up on chocolate and any film you want to watch without the sound of sighing) Hope today goes well

Toffee has started the 5:2, it does work if you stick to it (I didn't)) I may try to join you and pushme and start next week (anyone spot the procrastination?)

WhoKnows had the after effects if cheese & nibbles (but they taste so good) but has worked it off playing cricket

Honu dug a hole out of her paper mountain to say hello. I try to tackle it very Wednesday (my anti-procrastination effort) it's not always successful but it has stopped falling off the desk now.

Well today is going to less complicated than we planned! we were meant to be going to help out at the market garden, but as DD has a virus it's not going to happen. The doctor says she's not contagious (as long as she has good hygiene) but just needs to take it easy to help recovery.

She missed school and sports day as that's when she was at the doctors, and was devastated about it. However her best friend is home schooled and they were planned to take DD to soft play with her as her birthday treat, so she got the afternoon with her as well.

We're taking DD to the library so she gets a little exercise today, but I ink I'll have to face the rain on my own later for a walk.

Today i am sending ds into the villiage on his own, there are 2 points of road that make me nervous. But he is more than capable, it is the drivers who would take an adult out who are the issue. So I am feeling rather nervous Goes to do something whilst he is out. shouldn't take him too long.

Sorry to hearth that there are so many poorly dcs hope they make speedy recoveries.

5:2 i have heard some interesting things about this. Some good, some not so good when people have stopped. I look forward to hearing how people find it. My issue is two fold - forgetting to eat, and then eating stuff I shouldn't (ie nutritionally devoid). I am thinking about joining a gym, but if I recalled correctly I needed a letter from my doctor before they would consider my application And that was before all the recent issues

Right, leftover pizza for breakfast consumed, 1 coffee down. I think time for more coffee and to get moving... tons to do.

Phew, home in one piece with what he went for and straight away. Now to focus on decluttering...

Isn't it comforting that you wander back somewhere after a couple of years away and there are familiar folk still there waiting for you
DH has been at home pretending to do the house stuff but he's back to work on Monday. I looked at the state of the house and decided I needed to come back.
I will start properly on Monday but will post a weekend list:
shine sink
DS homework
empty bins
15 mins living room
15 mins dining room
washing (1 load left to do)
ironing
finish f & d festival baskets

That will do - don't want to crash & burn!

ellie, ellie look look. DWMummy is Back

I is the one who had a genius in their name and is rather fond of name changing will NEVER live that down

Hello!

Thanks for continuing links Goth and hope your dd recovers soon.

Sorry to hear lots of littlies (and not-so-littllies ill). Wishing them all a speedy recovery!

Great to 'see you' Honu and good luck battling the paperwork!

Toffee and others - don't want to sound negative/discouraging re: 5:2 and genuinely wish you well with it, but it was that that precipitated dh's collapse from gallstone size of large bullet so obviously I have very negative feels towards it. He'd been doing the diet for a couple of months ... and ever since it happened to him ... I know of 6 other people in rl (there are also lots of people on threads on here) to whom the same thing happened. Consultant said it was the feast-famine-feast-famine aspect of the diet that puts gallbladder in to over-drive. So just be aware of danger and pay heed to any twinges under right rib! Good luck!

Oh no Bitchy I am SO sorry!! I missed your birthday!!!! I can't believe it!! I have it posted on a 'notelet' thing on the screen too! I really am a twonk - I am so sorry!! (Unusually for me, didn't get to look at computer for past two days.) But wishing you many, many belated happy returns and lots of virtual I hope you can have a lovely weekend of celebration!

Swan I could have written your post about tsunami of enforced socialising atm - just girding my loins before gussying myself up and trying to look smart and be polite to people (miserable old bat that I have become) - and don't have the energy. Every weekend in May is choc-a-bloc.

This morning is literally the only free time we have all weekend but have been washng uniforms/doing hwk supervision etc . This afternoon-early eve have school communion ceremony (dd singing solo up very vertiginous church 'platform' in transcept (can't remember proper name) and I am v. nervous on her behalf and trying not to show it), this evening with friend's scout's bicycle display thing, tomorrow with brunch with friends, theatre performance and choir practice in the evening. All pleasant things but I have no energy (and need to be expending energy on other urgent things) , and dh not happy and is grim with stress owing to work pressure.

Last night went to vernissage where dd is probably going to be at secondary school + presentation of various academic streams/options and I felt really panicky in the crowd of people and had to leave and breathe in fresh air at one point. It was also exhausting speaking to all the different teachers and trying to speak with correct grammar/ask reasonably intelligent questions. Felt totally wrung out when I got home.

Don't know what is wrong with me! School is fab but perhaps it vision of another 8 years here of rigorous French-style education for dd with burgeoning homework and exam pressures ...and misunderstanding cultural nuances etc etc.

Would love to read rest of thread but have only had time to skim read so apologies for continuous whinging and if I have missed people out/if I've missed anything vital in addition to Bitchy's birthday

Good luck to your ds Bitchy on his first lone sojourn! I sympathise with the nail-biting - dd just starting to venture out on her own a bit too - very nerve-wracking!

Huge waves to Whoknows Pushme Carpe Alice Ellie Feetheart Engels Blue and everyone else!!

Had better go ...

Btw ... may only be on here only intermittently over next few weeks as loads going on: costumes for school fete, confirmation choir, dd's party, my b'day, getting house ready for visitors, visitors themselves etc etc - behind with them all - aargh! Things calm down a bit in June thanksfully!

Have a good w/e everyone!

I'm still lurking and trying to do the baby steps plus the s&s dw and washing machine daily but dd3 has recently had health issues which have significantly increased this week resulting in 2 trips to a&e and 2 follow up visits to gp. Just hoping next week goes smoother at least dd4 is settling well into her new nursery

[Double take] Is that DroitwichMummy I see???!!

Yay!!!

Mummy is back !!!

I've worked you out Bitchy! I thought you would be here somewhere

so sorry to hear about your dd3's health issues Jacks365 that sounds very stressful for you all x

SC! Hello!!! Have you missed me?

And all is right with the world because dwmis back. I think that might have made my day .

Sorry for lack of posting. Going back to work has really taken it out of me and have been too tired to do anything but work and that includes flying.

Of course sc is pleased to see you. She needs her mummy. As do I.

Elliepac too!
Must get off here and go on my WI walk but I will be back later with an update

Hi dwm lovely to have you back

about you dh sc. hadn't realised it was 5:2 related. I did it all last year and it worked really well for me and quite suits my way of eating (except on Fridays!)

I have managed my first 3 (bak