Combining April showers with Fledgling powers (2016)

[SpareCrust]

Humungous thanks to Greymalkin for leading us so professionally and capably through March!

And thank you in advance to Einstein for covering the first four days of this thread (while I sidle off)!

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 support and chat along the way.

Flylady link here.

Don't let the somewhat sickly and barftastic language of the site put you off: the underlying system is sound!

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 swamped with masses of bumph. 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 minutes 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.

There are three key points to keep in mind throughout:

• No perfectionism allowed - this is harder than you would imagine and many of us on this thread struggle with this one.
• You are never behind - just start where you are and anything you do is progress.
• 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.

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 ‘ta-da’ lists but don't let that worry you. Do what you can, anything is better than nothing, and don't judge yourself against others.

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

Here's the launch pad for more experienced fledglings

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

I do love a Greggs visit :o

Knackered today but the morning was much easier thanks to DH being on late shift. We've got a fair amount of home ed done, but more to do before we pop out to the library to arrange my meeting (gulp :() and to get some printing and swap some books. Then we're taking DS to Beavers like last week, so I'm really hoping the weather holds!

Actual Flying will be approximately nil!

Goedenavond fledglings! Hope all well.

Didn't get huge amounts achieved other than a quick hoover around and usual routines but managed to remove cobwebs (sort of) from bathroom ceiling and change the curtains.

Then dd and I hit Ikea. Oh to be twelve and derive huge delight from the purchase of a laundry basket and a plate of meat balls

Congrats on all the home edding Caglio and hope Beavers went well.

Cotswold that's a good tip about the spa spin - thanks! Sorry to hear you are suffering; hope the meds prove effective.

Going to post links and get an early night now. Back to school tomorrow.

G'night all!

Baby-step no 19 for tomorrow, Tues 19th April is: here but is a totally ignorable gushing one about someone's home becoming a b&b and purple puddles and (imho) barftastic bumph.

We are in Zone 4: The Master Bedroom, Bath, Closet (April 17 – 23) what we call the boudoir.

Spend 15 mins decluttering in Zone 4.

When you have finished decluttering, the detailed cleaning list (if you are at that stage) for Zone 4 is here.

Tuesday's mission is here. Dusting and hoovering skirting boards and the bits of floor near them.

The daily focus for Tuesday is planning holidays, wardrobes, dental appts etc etc.

The monthly habit for April is www.flylady.net/d/habits-of-the-month/april/ making your bed!

For a summary of the above, see the flight plan : www.flylady.net/c/fp.php?tzm=-120 which should update itself daily.

**

Approximately nil on the Flying front here today too, I've been at work and DH at home with DS who finally goes back to school tomorrow (been off since Good Friday). Hoping this will herald a return to proper Flying routines.

I've got a day off tomorrow so I need to make a to-do list. Hoping the weather will be kind so I can get up to the allotment. Oh and I must do some OU work. Hmm.

Cotswold - I have a soft spot for a Gregg's sausage roll .

SC - that's great about the kitchen clearness

zero proper flying as predicted! although I am sorting out pens/pencils/crayons... you know that utterly essential household task.

Managed to just about avoid a full on meltdown from DD earlier though so that was something. Rather testing times though. And got all our printing done. Beavers was good - well I mean sitting at the shops with DD was, we mainly played hangman :)

DH is off tomorrow so hopefully we can catch up with the general tidying etc.

A Greggs sausage roll is a thing of slightly greasy wonder and a great stress reliever. Early mornings I tend to favour a large coffee (they do nice coffee) and one of their croissants, preferably an almond one (hard to find).

Didn't text rellie yet, DD doing OK though. Some laundry done and tea cooked. Also baked cakes and decorated with splodges of icing and various sprinkles to celebrate the birthday of a character in one of DD's electronic games yes, any excuse for cake no matter how flimsy.

My slightly menopausal brain is really struggling to remember things at the moment, so I need to write more lists and make better use of diaries etc. I just get so distracted. I am trying to plan ahead as the last term of school is always busy and yet DD continues to try and get more stuff in as if we've found a gap in the space/time continuum.

C'mon Tuesday, I'm almost ready for you ...

Morning all!

In middle of 3 hr 'proper' office work session but ta da so far is:

Ta da:
ironed dd gym kit
made dd packed lunch
morning routine inc animals, dw, wm, td & s&s
wiped down kitchen surfaces
school run plus dog walk no 1
signed more legal docs
ordered 2 good luck cards
ordered stationery
emailed friend

To do:
yet another parcel
prep stuff for volunteering tomorrow
sort laundry for tomorrow
do more laundry
clear office desk
cooking
(lots more I haven't thought about yet)
collect parcel
school run + dog walk 2

Whoknows enjoy your "day off" although knowing you, you will not be idling!

Good luck with the tidying Cag

Cotswold think you deserve a for baking a game character a cake! but please go easy with the all the yummy food references [menopausal dieter here; day 3 = tough going!]

Cheery wing flaps to all!

Any excuse to bake cupcakes and a stand mixer makes it all too easy. Probably one of the reasons I'm piling on weight tbh.

Will do some work before school pickup - have a couple of hours at home before going out again, which will sap another couple of hours! Have been out to get haircut this morning, looks nice now but have doubts about my ability to neaten the layers. The next home wash and blow dry will tell.

Collating calendars, notepads, diaries and sheets of paper to transfer dates around later on - I have an hour to kill waiting for DD. Still no luck with the secret of time travel.

Hello everyone

< sends strong will power vibes to SC >

Hope you and your DH are having a productive day Cag

Is the weather on your side today WhoKnows ?

DH and I were also musing on the Gregg's sausage roll Cotswold - we agreed that they are only to be eaten hot, if cold, they lose that certain 'Je ne sais quoi'

Big waves to all regulars and newbies, hope you're all well.

TaDa
Took DS to nursery
Fed cats
Washed my converse in the washing machine - they have come out like new!
Another wash load on now
Dishwasher unloaded and reloaded
Shed loads of hand washing up
Sorted through DS's toy boxes, found loads to get rid of
Hoovered living room and first floor landing
Removed bristle brushes from hoover for unclogging
Sold a load of old playstation games for a very nice sum on Ziffit
Wrapped up two parcels for posting
Cross checked calendar and diary
Meal planned
Online food shop ordered

To Do
Trip to post office
B&Q for a new door stop
Pick up dry cleaning
Finish writing a letter
Fill out an appeal form against a parking charge

Evening! Hope everyone has had a good day!

Thanks for the willpower Grey! (Much needed!)

Waves to Cotswold

Dashing to post links tonight because dh needs computer. 'See' you all in the morning!

Baby-step no 20 for tomorrow, Wed 20th April is: here. A good 'un: include laundry in your morning and evening routines.

We are in Zone 4: The Master Bedroom, Bath, Closet (April 17 – 23) what we call the boudoir.

Spend 15 mins decluttering in Zone 4.

When you have finished decluttering, the detailed cleaning list (if you are at that stage) for Zone 4 is here.

Wednesday's mission is here. Declutter the and sort and clean flat surfaces in your boudoir.

The daily focus for Wednesday is anti-procrastination. Don't delay! Do something you have been dreading!

The monthly habit for April is www.flylady.net/d/habits-of-the-month/april/ making your bed!

For a summary of the above, see the flight plan : www.flylady.net/c/fp.php?tzm=-120 which should update itself daily.

Ds1 and dd went to the Jungle Book at the weekend Grey ds1 loved it, dd wasn;t bothered...

speaking of which dh and ds1 went to Dr Faustus in London last night, lured by thought of Kit Harrington from GOT...they came back looking horrified, apparently it was a night of violence, vomit and blood And there was dh and I thinking it would be nice for ds1 to see some classic theatre...never ever chance those Jacobeans/Elizabethans, really not to be trusted in modern directors' hands. We did it at school and I remember no violence whatsoever, just religion.. Dh said it reminded him of the worst excesses of 70's theatre when everyone tried to turn every play into Brecht.. Ds quite enjoyed it, but dh said it was utterly frightful. Ds then admitted it was frightful too. And he wants to do drama Alevel, well he did want to do it before seeing Dr F.

Today I have been planting potatoes, a more wholesome subject. Dh planted up the lemon tree I gave him for Christmas which was looking a bit peaky; also planted my nasturtiums in cardboard pots and generally peered and prodded things in the garden. Still incredibly cold though. Dd and I wentto Staples and bought ds a swivel chair for his 16th along with printer ink and laptop for her to do homework. She is great to shop with, she loves it so much she is very helpful and carries stuff and stops me wandering off on a tangent She also did supermarket shop with me yesterday, not something I do often (usually do little and often) but that was really helpful too.

It is ds1's 16th tomorrow, we are not planning anything much as he doesn't want to have friends round. But have convinced him to try a singing class on Saturdays as he has had to give up the drama/singing/dance combo due to GSCE classes every Sat morning. That should be a bit of social life for him.

SC well done on the clear surfaces and decluttering of spices/condiments. Not looking good here...cat is chief clutterer as he is sitting next to the cheese grater and the ketchup. Ds2 now has added panini stickers to the mix. Ds2 has spent entire afternoon hanging out with his friend, going to his house and comign back again, computer games, running around...great stuff.

I don't like the sound of that play either knitting. Def better warm Grey (the sausage rolls!).

Attempting to plan for tomorrow, have a little bit of running around to do and will then crack on with the housework.

Pah. Tidying didn't happen at all! Had a nice day though, with plenty of learning. I've put another wash on and will try and crack on with more tomorrow. Got my regular pupil in the evening so hope to get it looking vaguely decent. And I know I'll be tired in the afternoon as we're going to a meetup/show and tell learning thingy.

Having lots of the craft drawers sorted is helping, and the suitcase I've been packing for mum's (toys/books etc that we can store there as we're visiting more frequently now) is coming together nicely. Next I need to sort out the home ed drawers - when we got the new bed in the DCs' room we had to move a Trofast unit (mmmmm... Ikea meatballs...) downstairs and it's got most of our resources in there, but most of the drawers are a complete mess as when we've been decluttering we've just been shoving stuff in so it's in vaguely the right place (which did work well TBF as it allowed us to move quicker IYSWIM).

Guess who had a sausage roll today? :o :o Totally lost track of time for lunch so DD and I grabbed them on the way to writing club. In fact she went into the shop, ordered and paid by herself (I needed to go to the cashpoint and we were in a hurry) so she was very proud and grown up. :)

We'll have to agree to disagree on the croissants though. I like the freshly baked ones from Co-op myself. Even though they probably all come from the same factory anyway.

Bedtime. Night all

Ah, the dangers of culture, Knitting!

No flying happening, although I did manage half an hour gardening yesterday afternoon. Still wading through a big editing project which doesn't leave much time for anything else.

Big waves and a vat of for all - going to need it!

today I have done
driven ds1 to school for revision class first thing
put a load of washing in
hoovered floor of ds1 room
remade his bed
dusted his mantlepiece
cleaned the bath, basin and loo in the grungy bathroom
detached and soaked loo seat in hot water
took ds2 to home ed meetup
ds2 went off his friend's house for a bit to play football in the garden (he claims)
dh bought food for ds1's birthday tea
dh wrapped the presents, and ds2 wrapped some more
did some more of the causes of the French Revolution in a very basic way. Now I know why I know very little about it, we spent so long on the Queen's Necklace/Necker when I was at school that we didn't do much else. For some reason this is not mentioned in any of the textbooks I am using. Will have to google.

Evening all,

Well, the weather was indeed kind yesterday and I managed a couple of hours at the allotment, which was very relaxing, I love it up there. Back to work today, so only popped up to water seedlings before picking DD up from school, I have lots of seedlings at home in the potting shed too.

Flying-wise - we seem to be getting back into our routines. I am very pleased to say that my new year's resolution of menu planning / shopping has become fairly embedded, we slipped a bit over Easter but back on track this week and it makes life so much easier.

Must go and try to get an early night though, night, night Fledglings.

Posting while there are a few seconds of Wednesday left!

Shopping this morning, sorted out a few bits, took DD to activity and left early to go to another meeting so DH collected her (yay!). Had tea (most of which I had cooked earlier in the day, chicken and potato cakes) and we are all shattered - particularly DD who said herself that she needed an early night. This never happens. I do want to meet up with someone on Friday though, so going on previous form I would not be at all surprised if she is ill! Let's see what tomorrow brings!

Good morning all! So sorry I didn't post links last night; doing so herewith.

No Flying achieved whatsoever yesterday but did: two school runs, two ballet runs, two x 3 hrs volunteering, hwk supervision, 3 dog walks.

BBL to catchup!

**

Baby-step no 22 for today, Thurs 21st April is: an ingnorable one about questions and answers on the Flylady website.

We are in Zone 4: The Master Bedroom, Bath, Closet (April 17 – 23) what we call the boudoir.

Spend 15 mins decluttering in Zone 4.

When you have finished decluttering, the detailed cleaning list (if you are at that stage) for Zone 4 is here.

Today's mission is cleaning boudoir doorknobs and light switch plates thoroughly.

The daily focus for Thursday running errands.

The monthly habit for April is www.flylady.net/d/habits-of-the-month/april/ making your bed!

For a summary of the above, see the flight plan : www.flylady.net/c/fp.php?tzm=-120 which should update itself daily.

I thought I'd posted yesterday but it clearly didn't work so I'll try again...

Just popped in to say hi and that I'm doing the best I can to fly with Meerkitten around and I think of the thread often

Here are a couple of pictures of Meerkitten who is now crawling (admittedly a bit of a peg leg crawl) and is also standing so she is keeping me busy bless her. She definitely isn't following the flylady way as she is creating mess everywhere!

I haven't caught up with the thread but I hope that everyone is well

Catching up ...

OOOhhhhh Dogsbum I've been wondering how you and Meerkitten have been getting on!! And there she is in full technicolour!! She's perfectly gorgeous!! [Love logging in to the thread and finding baby pictures!!]

Cotswold I know, it's sod's law isn't it, dc always ill when you have something special planned! Let's hope it was just tiredness and nothing else! Fingers crossed for tomorrow!

Oohhh vicariously excited for you Whoknows re: your seedlings coming up!

Knitting a belated "happy birthday" to your ds1 on his significant birthday yesterday! Hope you all had a lovely celebration! Arf at cat clutter

And yy to disturbing drama. Very sadly, contemporary theatre must set out to shock nowadays. Too many male, young directors trying to make a name for themselves. Theatre aside, I think I must be getting old because it's sometimes hard to find a calming telly prog to watch. DD had had another violent nosebleed the other day and we were both looking for something to take our minds off it, and turned on the telly to find a dog having a haemorrhage on the operating table on one channel and a poor distressed woman going through a forceps delivery on the other. Best stick to the potting shed I say!

Caglio whey hey on finishing the craft drawers [star

oops, didn't mean to press post just at that moment

Here's an extra for you Cag!

Blue hope the big project is going ok! [Proffers sustaining ]

Feel absolutely beyond shattered today for some reason so not a lot is happening. Usual routines, wrapped parcels, went to PO, dog walk, laundry, made jam tarts, sat on bench in the sun on the terrace and shared a lamb and salad sandwich with the dog

Mmsnet v wierd atm, will catch up later!

Did mean to ask though, Dogsbum how are you doing?

SC we're pretty ok generally although we've had a couple of bouts of Meerkitten being poorly since Christmas, one lasted about five weeks which is I think when I lost track of the thread.

Also she is currently suffering with teething, lots of drooling, chewing everything, lots of dirty nappies and a very sore bottom! Poor thing. She still doesn't have any teeth either, so there is nothing to show for all the suffering. We only had one really bad night when she kept me awake a lot so I think we are doing OK though.

DP is doing far too many hours at work so he is pretty worn out but enjoying coming home to Meerkitten as she is mostly a happy baby.

I'm finding it quite exciting this stage now that she is on the move and wondering what will happen next as she seems to change daily in terms of what she can do.

Oops posted too soon. I'm typing on my phone with Meerkitten snoozing on me doing a cute little baby snore. Although I suspect it is only cute to the doting parents

It's her birthday at the end of May, so less than six weeks now, I can't believe it.

Lovely weather here at the moment so that is nice. I think yesterday was about the first time this year I went out without a coat on.