Time for a bonfire of the clutter? Perhaps not but Fledglings are flying high with the fireworks through November...

[BlueEyeshadow]

Huge thanks to SC (and Bitchy!) for leading the thread throughout October (and to SC for such a copy and paste-able OP)

If you are struggling 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 wine and cake along the way.

Flylady link here.

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 zones of the house which are designated weekly; defining and minimising housework, which in theory should leave you with loads more time to do something more interesting 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!

It's up to you, but 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):

1. start or repeat baby steps

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

1. 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 Flying lessons . Here's the launch pad for more experienced fledglings.

Don't be put off by the barf-tastic language of the site - the underlying system is sound!

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 daily and doing the babysteps is a good way to start. Some of us (mentioning no names!) can have scary looking lists but don't let that worry you! Do what you can, anything is better then nothing, and don't judge yourself against others.

If all else fails, a + the power of three technique + a bit of support on here can work wonders!

Oh and don’t let it put you off if we appear a bit cliquey – some of us have been on here for years – but all lurkers, intermittent returnees, oldies and newcomers very, very welcome!

**
Quickly dropping the links for tomorrow in case I don't get time later.

Babystep is starting by shining your sink.

No mission because it's the weekend. Saturday is family fun day
**

Signing in for November.

ellie sorry to hear about your friend

Thank you for October sc and bitchy and blue for shiny new thread.

Have home visit from maternity care services tomorrow (will have post birth doula as standard over here, mostly paid for by insurance co.) So will have to do a quick whirl around to make sure everything is in order.

I am shattered and dh is watching cooking programmes so may head to bed and read. It's been a looooong day!

Sorry to hear about your friend ellie

Another one here who doesn't dress to shoes but I do get up and set for the day straight away- even if it's 'house clothes'.

I might be needing some help from some of you experienced mums with children who have sen. DS2 is being referred to the ed psych for assessment. Not really sure what path this is leading us down and I'm a bit worried.

Thanks for your kind words everyone. Funeral was a lovely service (as lovely as these things can be) though obviously v sad. She was a single mum and she had her son quite young and he had just left to go to uni. Breaks my heart just thinking about it. There were a lot of people from our year group there and it was so nice to catch up with people but so sad that it was in such horrible circumstances.

Needless to say no flying today but loads to do tomorrow so I shall bid you goodnight as I am knackered.

sc you could never upset me my lovely.

I left my ta da list on the other thread. It seemed kindest Tomorrow ds and I are off into town for a festival type thing. Should be fun but a looooooong day. But it does get me a get out of jail free card on the flying thing. Plus I can't shine my sink properly as it has developed a leak and you can't leave water in it. Thank goodness for the dishwasher!

No doubt I will pop on at some point tomo.

My nephew has just gone off to uni..he would miss his mother like hell if she died I am so sorry about your friend Ellie. I bet her son would love to hear any memories you have of her over the next few years.

Well, Halloween has gone alright. I have walked 10,000 miles around the neighbourhood in search of friendly orange lights from excavated vegetables. All very family orientated round here and hardly any packs of feral teenagers (I say hardly, someone did kick my "gatekeeper" pumpkin to bits when we went out on our rounds.

Ds2 managed quite well as a vampire this time, although he just went round the block before declaring his white "claws" were too sweaty. Ds1 is hopelessly untheatrical (for someone who wants to be a performer) - insisting that he could just wear an elf's hat and that would be enough - no attempt at face paint, facial hair, talons nothing..Dd had a friend over - now all asleep.

Have unloaded dw, reloaded, cooked basic supper for 4 teens, made ds2's bed, put ds2 to bed, hung out washing, cleared up sweetpapers, said hello to returning husband (he came back at 9pm) and opened the door to about 25 trick or treating families and given them sweets!

Oh yes [proud] ds2 and I did some lovely Halloween decorations to the garden with streamers, spiders and sparkly pearls! ds2 also told me (but refused to do the actual cutting or innards) just how he wanted his pumpkin carved, with two large teeth and a big smile..and a very large round nose.

[Drags stumps in what looks like Halloween-esque style but is in fact just due to fact that I am porky and unfit and have been on my feet (literally) all day]

[Averts eyes from Bitchy's long list on other thread]

Ellie glad the funeral was a comfort but how terribly sad about your friend's son [sad. My nephew also just started at uni last year and he is still so young ... .

Evening all! Amazed to hear form you all how active trick or treating is in UK now. Have just hosted lovely Russian friend and daughter (who have house in US) and tried to explain to them (as I do every year!!) that there is no point trick or treating here because very few people understand what it is all about (apart from certain members of expat community) so they had to settle for extorting sweets from various members of long-suffering office staff.

Made afore-mentioned witchy fingers, watched dd and ballet friend choreograph and perform witchy dance performance, was covered in face paint by dc (as was dh ), cooked supper of roast chicken and trimmings and drank rather a lot of and listened to friend talk about fascinating childhood growing up with parents and brother in a one-room dormitory in Siberia with only cold running water, no shower etc .. and this was in the 1980s !!

Sorry, posted that too early by mistake!

Arf at your ds2's pumpkin carving directions Swan!

Have a great day out tomorrow Bitchy

Thanks for links Blue

So sorry your friends let you down today Engels, hope home visit goes well tomorrow

Don't know how you cope with the dizzyness Fuzzpig which must be so debilitating

Big waves to Nicknacks and everyone else!

Shattered now, g'night all!

Good morning everyone - please can I join you?

I've been lurking with interest :) but have decided to be brave and jump straight in.

My DCs have grown and flown, DP and I both work full time and both feel TATM in the evenings and weekends. I need a system to stop my house from silting up. I did sign up (very briefly - I couldn't cope with the avalanche of emails!) to FlyLady, so this thread seems just perfect.

I do sort a lot of stuff as I go - such as recycling papers, advertising etc. immediately. I've just been through my shoes, clothes, scarves, handbags and makeup. I now need to tackle the books. This is quite daunting, I will start with mine first I think.

I have made the decision not to ebay or bootsale anything purely for my sanity. I just need stuff out of the house and down to the recycling / charity shop asap. The realisation is that decluttering is on going and it needs to be done little and often otherwise you are right back where you started.

What's TATM?

I agree about not bothering with eBay. We aren't doing that anymore either. Too many horror stories about dodgy buyers. I could use the money, but I figure I need the space equally desperately!

Our bedroom is more spacious now - during this week we emptied a chest of drawers and a file cabinet, and DH put them outside last night so we can take them to the tip (in dad's car) today!

The paperwork is all in a big really useful box - TBH most of it could probably be shredded or chucked but we decided that going through it in detail would take too long and distract from the more urgent job of chucking big clutter.

The underwear/jammies etc are all nicely organised in the tall Trofast unit which had previously been used for toys - but we've decided no more children's stuff in our room is the aim!

Now that there's space we can move the little bookcase up here - currently it's perpendicular to the wall in the narrow gap between the stairs and the TV unit ie not accessible! You'd have to wheel it out to get to the books which doesn't happen so it's just a clutter magnet! I have lost count of the amount of times there's been an avalanche of random crap falling behind the telly . I need to work out what books will live in our room - again, I'd rather not have children's stuff in our room I think, but there's a load of children's reference books and I'm not sure where they'll fit (bedtime story type books are already in DCs' room).

Better stop waffling for now as battery about to give up - BBL!

ellie so sad. Sorry for your loss.

8am and I've already been moving furniture around. Then again, 5am is standard wake up in this house, so I've been up for 3 hours now.

Now the rush to Christmas begins. I've decided to do the following:

• two days per week to DIY, getting the absolute things done I want to finish before Christmas
• two days per week towards "dressing the house", meaning decluttering, tidying, and getting things ready to decorate. It will also be for "Christmas prep" like putting together mince pies to freeze and any things that I can do ahead of time.
• one day per week for appointments, errands, and so on.

Then of course, the weekend, which will be for spending time with the dcs, baking with them, and doing fun stuff. It will also be a mix of DIY and cleaning and prep work as I can fit it in to the weekend. I'm going to return to devoting some time in the evenings to do crafting, as I've sorted a space in my room to work on it - well away from the television so I don't do the zombie in front of the television thing.

So... in keeping with that.. today will be wallpapering, shredding paper, making cake with the dcs, and general tidying.

I love November. Christmas season has officially started here.

I've given up on ebay as well. More hassle than it's worth tbh. I've got 3 large bags of items to take to the charity shop this coming week. HUGE relief getting that stuff out of the house - a lot of it is toys and clothing the dcs have outgrown - I've kept it hidden in my room, but if the dcs spot the toys, they'll want them back in their room, even though they've been hidden in my room over 2 months and they haven't even noticed them gone.

Welcome Chottie. You are probably right about ebay. Better just to get all the clutter out of the house. Does TATM mean 'tired at the moment'? It has a very different meaning on the Urban Dictionary, but I'm assuming you don't mean that .

Ellie - I'm glad the funeral went ok and that you were able to meet up with old friends. So terribly sad, though. Her poor son .

Good to hear that we all got through Halloween. I seem to have run out of any enthusiasm for any of these festivities. I used to love them when our children were younger. However, I managed to go through the motions for DS2's sake: carved pumpkins, hung up decorations, helped him make a spooky witch, had his friends round, made cupcakes with them, opened the door to countless small children...

It's funny seeing the trick or treaters evolve over the evening: first, the cute tiny boys and girls dressed as witches or pumpkins, with proud parents standing behind them, prompting them to thank me for the sweets; then the primary-aged children, in groups with their school friends, still with parents, still polite; then a few older children without parents, mostly polite; then the ragamuffins at the end who stole all the sweets I'd left out on my doorstep (because I was tired of opening the door over and over again) and ran away, laughing and shouting, "LEGGIT!"

At least no one stole my pumpkin this year.

DS2 refused to participate in handing out the sweets and went up to his room to read, leaving me to do all the hard work .

Managed to get a relatively early night, so feel a bit better today. We are walking into town this morning, visiting MIL, then DS2 is going to a birthday tea with friends this afternoon. I have a long 'to do' list to tackle when he's out, although I'm tempted to just lie on the sofa and read.

Some twatty lorry driver decided 35-45mph was a perfectly good speed to fly through a housing estate this morning, doing so 4 times between 7 and 9am, shaking the houses like there was a thunderous earthquake every time. Needles to say it also woke up two tired and now grumpy people. Ds is sooo tired he feels sick. Have a good Saturday morning. Weekend? what weekend? There seems to be no such thing any more. :(

Morning all.

Welcome chottie

Alice I am very excited about Christmas this year. Plus Sinterklaas arrives 2 weeks today!

November is unfortunately all about getting stuff ready for ML handover. Once that's done I will be so much more relaxed and can really enjoy all the baby prep and Christmas things to do.

I wish I was done so I could participate in NaNoWriMo this year, but as it is I have too much still to do to make sure my classes are done as smoothly as possible while I'm gone.

Ta da
DS and I showered
yesterday's wash away
wash on
washing up
emptied bathroom bin and kitchen scraps
home visit for post-birth doula - went well!

DH has buggered off to Rotterdam for the day for a music workshop. He was umming and aahing over whether to go (he's tired, he knew we had the home visit and that DS ran me ragged yesterday), but since I'm always nagging him to get some hobbies and do stuff I told him he should go if he wants to. So TV is babysitting today while I get some schoolwork done and tomorrow I will take some time for myself (we might go for a fmaily walk in the woods then I think the shops might be open as it's the 1st Sunday of the month, so I may go and buy some cute baby clothes and some bits for myself).

So, a no housework weekend now apart from keeping the washing going and doing evening routine.

Enjoy your Saturday fledglings!

Nowt more exciting than a baby for Christmas Engels! [smile

Morning all! A bit bleary eyed here. Was clearing up last night's supper party at 7am for an hour and a bit and then retired back to bed.

DD and I doing crafts currently.

TATM = TATT sorry a slip of fingers on the keyboard :)

I've sorted out my food cupboards today and started on the kitchen cupboards too. I found 3 separate S&P sets, plus two separate pepper grinders. I have negotiated with DP. We are keeping two S&P sets and one large pepper grinder, the others are in a bag and are going to the charity shop this afternoon, together with three vases and a bag of books. Even DP thought the kitchen cupboards looked good and as I found 13 tins of sardines and 8 packets of rice we are not buying any sardines or rice until next year :)

Sorry I meant to add thank you for the warm welcome - I'm now off to look at the urban dictionary :)

Oh dear, posts keep posting themselves, I've no idea why!

Ditto Bitchy seems to be a working day here as we were all still catching flies when the doorbell rang this morning. Maintenance work is being done in the office and dh forgot to leave out the key. Since then he has been making continuous business calls ... sigh. I've told him weather is too lovely to work today! HOpe you can catch up on sleep later!

A very warm welcome to Chottie!

Glad you caught up with shut eye after carrying out Halloween duties extremely assiduously Toffee! (Love the 'three ages of trick-or-treaters.') Hope you can make the most of your child-free time today!

Alice that's truly impressive about the Christmas prep. I love Christmas but I can't seem to get too excited about it until much nearer the event. DD doesn't break up from school until Christmas eve! (And it's much quieter and less commercial over here anyway!) But as Engels reminds me, have to get ready for St Nicolas's arrival on 6th and I have family coming ... so looks like I will be forced to get organised earlier than usual this year despite myself!!

Well done re: the decluttering Fuzzpig!

I'd better get on ... fairly solid list to get through ... entertaining again tomorrow and just confirmed that veggie will be among us. Need to visit shops again ... .

Enjoy the weekend everyone!

Just looked TATM up and widened my vocab :)

I'm still none the wiser as to what TATT is chottie !

Am feeling so huge and uncomfortable, haven't got any schoolwork done yet, but may have a kip on the sofa instead if DS allows me to!

SC My Christmas prep is not so much impressive as necessary. I can't decorate for Christmas unless the downstairs is clean and organised. I have 6 (or is it 7?) boxes of Christmas decorations plus a tree. There has to be room for everything (and to look tasteful!) plus a few more as I generally add to it each year (allows for breakage ).

Well, I was going to wallpaper, until it occurred to me that it might be best to do the painting first in my room, as some of it backs right up to the wallpaper. That way I don't need to panic trying to paint down a side without getting any on the wallpaper.

So..... one wall painted, quick break, and then starting on the next.

Afternoon all.

Beautiful day here and unseasonably warm.

Have actually done some stuff today.

Ta da:-
Finished big present shopping for dc's - big presents bought and now just little fun stuff to buy
Online xmas shopping done for nephews and nieces
Picked dc's up from stbxh's
Food shop
Washing on
Washing away
Sorted out finances (what little there is)
Tidied bedrooms
Cleaned kitchen.

Had a rather awkward convo with stbxh about Xmas. We decided that we would do year and year about. So this year I will have them xmas eve/xmas morning and lunch and then drop them off with him for xmas afternoon and boxing day and then next year we will swap. This gives me a year to brace myself for xmas eve and morning without them.

chottie welcome

alice stop being so bloody organised

To do:-
Skip trip
Drying on
Schoolwork
Bf's for coffee
Drop dc's off at stbxh for tonight and tomorrow
Back home to collapse

Enjoy the rest of the day.

ellie if I was organised, my room would be clean, and I wouldn't be climbing over a bed piled high with stuff to finish my painting in there.

Seriously, I am so tickled that the skirting board is no longer RED. Who paints their skirting boards RED for heaven's sake?? I still have one corner to paint - but it involves moving the wardrobe, so I'll probably do that tomorrow as by then the rest of the paint in the room will be dry. So fingers crossed I can finish that up tomorrow and possibly get some more wallpaper up, as I didn't get any done today, and I'm absolutely wiped out now. Any energy I have left today will be used towards putting my room to rights in about 15-20 minutes, once I've had a good break.

Pretty pleased though. I think on Monday I'll need to get the ladder in there (ceiling is quite high) and get the edges, along with caulking along where the wall and ceiling meet, then painting that as well. Again it's not perfect, but it is SO much better than it looked before.