April Flylady. In which you’ll find Cake for the Fledglings and Compassion for the Frazzled. All welcome as we sort our houses out!

[Cagliostro]

Hello everyone,
Welcome to the Flylady thread for April, where we follow (sort of) the Flylady system with baby steps, missions, daily focuses (foci?!) and decluttering. But more than that, we are a supportive bunch where we share the trials and tribulations of everyday life. We post our to do and ta da lists and chat a whole lot.
Newbies, lurkers and returners always welcome!
Back tonight with links for tomorrow!

and for Bower, Cag and anyone else who needs them.

Excellent decluttering foxes and Fooland!

Big wing flaps to everyone else. Really must start tea now. Where does time go in the evenings?!

Hi everyone, it’s so weird reading about snow and stuff when my major problem at the moment is sunscreen stains on everything and the fact that going to the beach results in about 2 loads of extra laundry.

One big ta da from yesterday.....I PUT AWAY ALL THE LAUNDRY!!!! So proud! Didn’t take that long either, wish I’d done it ages ago!

To do:
Morning routine
Swimming lessons
Shopping
Run
Book a haircut
Wash the outside of the windows (maybe tomorrow for that though).

Glad to hear lots of encouraging declyttering stories, and to anyone who needs it.

Well done stressy and persis

I have done stuff but cba listing it

Guys, what is swish and swipe?!

Sorry not caught up yet. Stressy stresshead here

ta da
✅didn’t kill or maim anyone
✅made dinner
✅put wash on, it’s now dry as DD moved it along
✅read essay for dyslexic DSD
✅tried to think of how I can improve things
✅comforted needy melatoninless DD
✅didn’t kill or maim anyone (yes it’s that big an achievement it needs repeating)

Links shortly

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Friday 6th April
babystep 6 is about hot spots. AKA my entire house
Friday means decluttering your car and purse
last mission in zone 1 is about cobwebs 🕸🕸🕸
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

PersisFord Swish the loo brush round loo, swipe the bathroom surfaces clean. iyswim?

My dare not ever mention being bored. I have a magic list of things he is not allowed to get out of doing if he mutters those words. It is funny how quickly a child can learn that the words I am bored will result in tidying up and cleaning chores.

Just in. Had to run some errands after work. Looking forwards to when ds is back because I can settle and do less in the evening instead of going Oooooo freedom to do all the things! Some of it is fun. Some not so much. Missing the boy but it is only fair considering all the contact visits he missed due to the bad weather.

Morning all

Up at 5 with ds3

Ta da

Change estimate income for year on hmrc website

You got me instead afresh !

Ds was up at 6 but then went back to sleep but now I'm awake . Got to bed really late (for me anyway!) last night as was working then dd woke up for a wee just as I nodded off. She is perfectly capable of going to the loo on her own in the night (she's four) but she has a singing hand soap. Yes that's right a singing hand soap some crazy person got it for her for her birthday (no it wasn't me)

Hope everyone ok!

Ds3 is grumpy. Assume his teeth again. He does not want dd anywhere near him. She feels the need to sit next to him/put her feet on him whenever i leave the room

Singing hand soap will run out soon hopefully foxes?

Ta da

Change estimate income for year on hmrc website
Ds3 up fed changed dressed
Dryer on

afresh that made me smile about your dd...is she trying to be affectionate? I've told my dd to ask ds if he wants a cuddle before grabbing him as she was really winding him up! She asks him and he goes "nope" and she goes "alright then!" and leaves him alone. But to be fair sometimes he says yes so that keeps her happy!!

I still haven't moved out of bed. If I do I'll wake the dc so I may as well just sit here. Wish I'd bought my book or the laptop up though.

No. She is doing it to piss him off. She can be lovely with him but seems to also enjoy making him cross

oh dear! Nothing like a bit of sibling rivalry. Right one of mine is up now so better go and feed her and stuff.

Today i must grow a pair and brave the cellar to read the gas meter

Morning all .

foxes, we had a singing hand soap for a while too .

Hoping for a lazy day here, as much as possible anyway. DH has a day off so plan is for us to help DD1 with one of her brownie badges. Much easier to do this when someone else is around to occupy DD2. They also have a bit of homework so may as well get that done. Swimming lessons later and possibly a fish and chip tea. DD1 already saying she is bored but if she wants to do another brownie badge (she has brownies on Monday) the time is now. She has started a few and lost interest.

Also I am hoping to declutter the top of DD2’s wardrobe as then I will have gone through all her room. Then need to find somewhere to put all the BRCs from her room that are currently in our room .

Must get on as nobody has had breakfast yet.

Singing hand soap? I think that would send me over the edge. I don't miss all the lights and sounds toys for babies, toddlers and pre-schoolers. DS used to have this guitar that would randomly come on itself and scare the life out of me.

Ta-da (between the 3 of us)
Had a good go at cleaning greasy tiles behind cooker
2 loads washing done and hung up
1 very dirty blanket in washing machine now
3 loads of washing put away
bathroom cleaned
washing up done
kitchen and utility room swept
recycling taken out
showered
started packing for weekend away
Lego tidied from floor in DS room
upstairs hoovered (downstairs hoovered last night)
prescription for DS picked up
1 lesson plan done (DP's got a new teaching job - maternity cover)

To-do
Dusting (ugh)
Put out one massive hotspot in kitchen
Finish packing for weekend away
Collapse in a heap

fool one of the dc bath toys starting singing of its own accord recently and it was freaking me out in the middle of the night. We binned it in the end. It was still singing from the bin! The hand soap is a Trolls one so it sings one of the songs from that. Dd doesn't use it too much tbf as she doesn't want it to run out but she always knocks it and sets it off in the night if she gets up!

Well today has not gone to plan. Went to our pre-booked activity, spent stupid amount on a crap lunch then ended up leaving because the queue was out the door despite us being early and then it got to half an hour past the time it said on the ticket and nobody had even gone in yet it was boiling hot, ds was either running away or having a tantrum and dd was fed up. So we just left. Then I forgot to pay for the parking and had to go all the way back. Ds kept lying down and I forgot to bring the buggy. And just found out the work I did last night was all wrong and it has been sent back. someone pass me some !!!

Anyway. Home now.ds sleeping in the car I'm sitting on the front step like a crazy lady with my tea. Dd watching TV and eating her Easter egg. She doesn't seem too disappointed by how the day ended up. She is so laid back (thank goodness!)

Must try and get something productive done today

Ta da
Daily routine almost done
Deep cleaned kitchen sides (the sunshine this morning showed up all the crumbs at the edges!)

To do
Finish daily routine
15 minutes decluttering utility room
Declutter bag car purse
Make a banana loaf as we have some seriously black bananas here

I was saying on another thread that this time round I am comfortable being a bit of a toy snob. Not buying any flashy beepy singy toys for the moment. We have so little space anyway (and money) that it gives me a good reason to be picky. I know she will end up acquiring stuff anyway so may as well enjoy choosing what I buy myself. :o

Sorry I’m not being the hostess with the mostess this month! Felt so crap yesterday (and in fact AF has shown up today, or at least the weird semblance of it that seems to be the status quo since the baby arrived ) but it was productive at least as I did have a proper conversation with DH about it. He’s finally convinced me to get a breast pump so he can take the baby. I’ve been putting it off. Compromise is that he still won’t bedshare with her - we happily did with the other two but I’ve read many things about it being statistically far less safe with dads and I can’t unread them :( so it will more likely be the last feed before bed (her own bed as she does start off in there) or so he can take all 3 Caglets out in the day.

It looks like soon his shifts will become more predictable and family friendly, coinciding with him dropping to four day weeks, so I’m really hoping this will help too, and we are hoping that I can find a local class that I can actually commit to if I know what days off he has. Thinking tai chi or maybe ballroom.

He took the baby out with him this morning for the first time but it was only an hour. We changed the pram to the pushchair and she liked it! They went to the woods... I was going to watch a film but needed to help DSD with the essay again so not exactly relaxing but at least it distracted me from worrying about the baby :o

I also said I’m going to start carving out more time for me in the day, mainly by playing piano. It’s ridiculous how little I play, I think because it’s in the living room I feel guilty or like I’m dominating the room or something. Which does make me wonder about the state of my self esteem TBH.

Anyway. Feeling slightly better today and am just about to drag the Caglets upstairs to help pack up some books. It’s not even their stuff TBH but I feel like I need to commit to making them help every day as we had a deal!

cag my piano is arriving tomorrow! Maybe we can spur each other on! Ours is also going to be in the living Room and I'm very self conscious when I play especially since I haven't played properly for so long so I need to kind of teach myself again. Hope I do manage to find the time to play!

Also totally know what you mean about plastic beepy toys...wish I had been more selective too! My friend's house is full of beautiful wooden toys I'm always very . My dc do have some wooden toys but a lot of plastic! And we got ds a toot toot garage when he turned one. That was a mistake it's so annoying! But he does love it.

Ta da
Finished daily routine
Broken up many fights between dc. Ds has woken up in a bad mood and keeps snatching everything off dd and shouting at the TV because it isn't duggee

Hope dh gets home soon...

I'd better do something I suppose.

Oh dear foxes, sounds like a trying day.

Ta da:-
Did some painting with DDs. I can’t bear the mess and chaos of it . DD1 still needs to do some more painting for her badge but DH is going to do that with her now.
Put away a few things but hardly any really.
Tiny bit of homework
DH has washed his car.

To do:-
Homework
Swimming
Laundry
Etc, etc.

Omg foxes 🎂🍰🍫🍨🍦🍧🍬🍭🍩

That sounds sooo stressful

Ds3 has developed nice habit of kicking off not only when being put into the pram but everytime we stop. So in quees in the shop, at the traffic lights, if i look at something for more than 10 seconds.....

He is in noisy toy mode. He really likes toot toot cars. You do not want to be hit round the head with one of those btw it fucking hurts

afresh that does sound painful. Yes ds isn't keen on his buggy unless he has food.

Done my list , cake is in the oven, dh working on the porch (and got a load of sawdust in my handbag )

Dinner is beef noodle stir fry spicy for us and plain for the dc. (Well plain for dd anyway but ds seems to like a bit of heat at the moment)

That selection of emojis looks like one of the pages of the very hungry caterpillar 🐛😂

Hope the stroppiness ends soon! YAY about the piano, and yes let’s poke each other about practising! It’s silly as it makes me so happy when I do it, I really need to make the time for it.

I’m looking into classes. Need to figure out bottles and hope she will tolerate them. Did you express at all foxes and if so can you recommend a pump? I am clueless 😭

I expressed with dd but not with ds cag. I only had a manual pump think it was a Philips one. It worked for me but depends how much you'll use it as an electric might be better if you want to express lots. How old is cagletini now? Neither of my dc ever took to a bottle. DD drank out of one a few times but as soon as she was about four months she used to have expressed milk or formula in a Tommy tippee sippy cup. Ds I just gave formula in a cup from about five / six months and dh would do the same if I was out / asleep.