It's February - Fledglings are Flying (let's face it there's not much else to do).

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Here we are on the February 2021 Flylady thread - this time last year we were just starting to realise that the world was going to change in a big, big way. The Fledgling threads have pulled us all together and been a great source of comfort and distraction from it all.

This is a friendly housekeeping thread based (loosely... Extremely loosely sometimes 😂) on Flylady's housekeeping system . Welcome one and all, lurkers and long-time posters alike. Join in, hang out, but above all remember you are not behind, just jump in where you are.

The beauty of Flylady is that you don't have to flatten yourself trying to get your house clean to begin the routine upkeep; the first - and only - thing she asks you to do is to shine your kitchen sink. Routines - morning, afternoon and evening - are built gradually through her Baby Steps. To those, you add a Daily Focus and a weekly area to concentrate cleaning on. By the end of a month, your whole house will have had some attention. If you miss a bit, never mind, it'll come round next month!

For this month, I'll be posting daily links to the Launch Pad on the Flylady site so you can follow the daily focus and cleaning missions. You can sign up to receive emails from Flylady, but we suggest you don't - she sends masses, which will clog up your inbox and drive you insane into the bargain.

Because this thread has been running a while, there are some acronyms we use to make life easier
S&S - swish and swipe, round the bathroom to keep it acceptable daily
LOL - load of laundry. No, we don't find washing that funny!
Ned - born of a typo, a mythical being who assists with laundry mountains
The pointy stick ----> to motivate people
PO3 - Power of 3, if you can only face a few tasks. People often find groups of 3 tasks stack up over a day!
The Naughty Corner - where we head when it's all Too Much. Usually stocked with fresh coffee, fluffy throws, delicious snacks and the opportunity to sit quietly with friends or build a blanket fort and sulk in it if you need to.

During the Pandemic, we have also been using the KCC or Keep Calm Corner, invented by long-time poster / thread leader SC. This is a regular dose of memes, questions for discussion, random trivia etc to distract us from the rest of the world. All contributions welcome!

Remember - No Fledgling Left Behind!

Bridgerton is on my list! ATM I’m watching the first series of Malcolm on the Middle, and a crime drama on iPlayer.

I’ve spend loads of time on my journal today which was nice me time, and I am starting to feel a tiny bit more motivated with sorting house stuff.

But then had an exhausting Big Conversation with the teen. Sigh. Think I got through to her a bit this time.

Feeling very peopled out the last few days though and pretty much only posting on here and avoiding most social media etc 😩 glad I don’t need to get up tomorrow morning.

Hiya everyone hope you’re doing alright today!. It’s been so cold here today, we went for a walk earlier and I was dithering. We did colour mixing today, with water and food colouring and then made different colours mixing the ones we already had. We also did jelly digging, I put some toys in with jelly so it set around them and gave Elijah some little tools to dig them out. I definitely think it’s giving us a bit more routine which helps in lockdown. I had to go to the post office to collect a parcel today, I walked all the way there and it was closed. I had checked the opening times before I left and it was open! I think I’ll get DM to take me in her car tomorrow, so at least if it is closed I wouldn’t have had to walk there.

zoo I’m glad the new routine seems to be working well so far! There’s nothing to be ashamed of for feeling upset, it’s completely understandable that you feel that way. I feel similar sometimes, black sheep of the family and don’t speak to anyone other than DM and Nan, sometimes when I see my cousins posts on Facebook and them all having a laugh I do struggle. Be kind to yourself!

Thanks for wishing the snow away up! I’m glad your day off went well! The bare minimum plan sounds well, I might join you there!

red I’m in awe that you coped with so much on your plate! I do understand though, sometimes when you need to get into a routine it works much better than if you just want to. I hope you can get the house back together soon! I’m the same with toys, we have a box for them and I just chuck them in there before bed. The volunteer job sounds great, understandable you’re a bit apprehensive but I think it will be good just to contact them!

I completely feel your pain hills, I have barely any routine! I hope you can try and get into a routine soon. Sorry to hear about teen! I have no advice, if he does drop out of GCSEs does he have a plan for what he wants to do instead?

Good news about some time off for DD1 to be able to catch up on her work sing!

You got loads done waders, glad to hear the foots on the mend!. That fruit and veg box looks amazing! So sorry about the exam issues, I hope you manage to sort it out!

dancing you for loads done, it sounds like homeschooling is getting a bit better too!

ta da
Not much really! I don’t have much to do in this zone and am just keeping up with the basics really.

waders I have no answers but good grief that sounds like a pickle and a half re exams.no wonder DD retreated to bed!hoping a solution can be found

Hills my routine floundered so badly but I'm pulling it around.cleaning etc til D's online then minimal wandering away from him,but crochet in hand.hope you can find some sense of routine that'll work for you
Regarding teens,dd2 is similar.also knows best and after a set to needs time to think options thru.exhausting doesn't cover it.wifi seems to motivate her a bit,but the dramas and screeching do make me wonder sometimes if it's the right thing.

Than look s for the supportive kind words everyone I cried a bit last night and today's a new one and all that

Bbl

*than looks from thanks everyone?(shakes head and disappears to feed furry overlords)

Spinning out of control is normal for around here.
Me -10pm - teen shut up I want sleep, night everyone.
massive crash and 1 broken computer for person A
information about deliveries tomo
another crash and shouting at teen
dealing with person about faffing and worrying about device
settling everyone down for night
crawling into bed wide awake and trying to wind down
Watch some calming youtube and fall asleep mid video around 1am.

Wake up in blind panic that forgot to reset alarm to wake me up before an appointment. Sigh in relief that it is not yet 9am so not over slept and slowly get going. Tbh if there was no one here it would be fine. I just can't keep up with the people's dramas and crazy.

Re -drop out options does he heck have a plan. Why would he have a plan. School conversations are bouncing back and forth about him atm.

waders love the frog emojis! Thank you x

Zoo big hug! I dont have anything to do with extended family as they are all self centred and think about themselves.
You are a lovely person. I always ask myself this....when I went through the worst time ever with my mum in hospital and dangerous nursing homes...where was the extended family? If they aren't there in the bad times, do you want them there in your good times? (Hope that sounds ok?)

Sing- hope you are ok and get some extra sleep today.

Butta- i love the jelly idea too!

Red- sending to hot tea and buttered toast...just because...i remember how I felt after having to leave my job.

Better go....the kids .....

Slept till gone 10 this morning after a late night. Still really anxious this morning after the previously mentioned Big Conversation. It’s so difficult to stay on the right side of teens (ie not making them think we don’t understand them or don’t support them) and also keeping them safe

Sharing a lovely link on behalf of zoo 💖 sophiecliff.com/blog/2020/1/31/a-joyful-to-do-list-for-february might give people some inspiration for a brighter month! Goodness knows we need it after January!

Can I hide in bed all day again? 😩

FFS, just lost my post.

I am opening up the naughty corner, it seems as though lots of Fledglings are in need today.

For those that do want to fly, here is today's launchpad link launchpad.

Our mission is to put away any leftover holiday decorations (I still have some Christmas stuff on the landing waiting to go to the loft). Thursday's daily focus is Errand Day and babystep is writing positive messages to yourself on post-it notes.

Tada!

Made bread dough
Half an hour plus of swimming club admin
1xLOL now in dryer
Breakfast eaten
Discussed coursework with DS, but he's gone off to a live lesson now.

I’ve washed up a bit, put non tumble dry washing on, separated my earrings onto the proper little plate, and put a few bits away. Also helped DS with some maths (although it was more like a logic puzzle) and I need to do some Italian on futurelearn with him now. After the current Malcolm in the Middle episode has finished (for some reason I find the mess and chaos comforting 😂). Also must clean the bath!

Today's cakes are chocolate fudge, lemon drizzle and a nice crumbly fruitcake. I quite fancy a toasted teacake too.

Not sure about everyone else, but it's chucking it down with rain here and altogether a bit miserable. However I went out into the garden earlier and the first primroses are coming into flower, that cheered me up a bit.

Just ducked out to take a photo of the primroses. We get lots of them here, they have self seeded all over our garden over the years

I want a like or love button
Ravelry spoils me.

Lovely picture ED

Gorgeous pic!

AAAARGH someone tell me why I am procrastinating big time over choosing a dishwasher 😫 everything just feels too demandy right now 😰 and I want to hide. There are lots of little things I’ve been procrastinating over too and I feel so guilty about avoiding people and letting them down.

But we really really need to sort the dishwasher. It’s ridiculous - it is something that would make an immeasurable difference to our lives (understatement) but I get so stressed over making decisions like that. I know it’s worse because of the slightly smaller space we have, so I’m worrying about things not fitting etc.

Anyway the big Caglets are upstairs so while it’s relatively quiet we will put on bacon face for Cagletini (who is currently naked other than one of yesterday’s socks) and try and make a damn decision!

Lovely primroses ED they are very cheering!

DH put the last of our xmas decorations up in the loft at the weekend (after me nagging him about it for quite a while, I am a bit pathetic about ladders )

Today is not going particularly smoothly. I am snowed under at work today (just stopping for a quick lunch), my computer keeps crashing which means as much as I want to keep up with the work, I can't! I lost all the log ins for dd schoolwork and had to wait for dh to text me them (I don't even know what happened!), couldn't find the phonics work on the system and then her teacher said she couldn't find it either so gave up with that. Her teacher called this afternoon and I said that dd had mostly been watching Horrible Histories and we are just having one of those days, she said just forget it for the rest of the day and let her veg in front of the TV, we all need that sometimes. I think I love her right now

Anyway, despite that, I will try and do a bit more with her this afternoon if I can get back on top of things work wise. I've just had an email from a director to say that they have changed loads of the templates I use for work so I'm now not sure if I need to re-do what I've done today...argh.

As for flying...I've loaded the dishwasher, and unpacked the veg box but tbh I wish I hadn't done that because I really should have cleared the fridge out first, there are a couple of very questionable cabbages at the bottom. I usually keep up with the veg boxes but even they are piling up on me now ha!

Oh and ds asked for a snack so I chucked half a packet of left over chocolate drops at him...

Parenting at it's finest today!!

Right, back to work and neglecting my children!

x post sing - don't be hard on yourself, everything definitely does feel too demanding right now! Hope you come to a decision and feel less stressed

Sing - I struggle with these decisions sometimes too (insurance is my worst). Why don't you tell us which dishwashers you are looking at and see if any of us have any advice? I can look them up on Which? as I have a subscription.

Foxes - that all sounds very stressful. I started using a password manager about 18 months ago and although it took a while to get the hang of it it makes life a lot easier now.

Hills - the whole DS situation sounds mega-tricky. Mine hasn't got a clue what he wants to do when he leaves school.

Zoo - hope you're OK under there.

Better go, things need doing

Ah thank you both! My mum also has Which access but thank you for the offer, don’t want to add to your workload 💖

My main worry ATM is whether it has to be a freestanding one? Integrated ones are smaller but aren’t they fitted in a different way? I can’t work out if it’s ok or not (don’t care what it looks like it’s just whether it can work). I have started a thread.

Ours is freestanding and we've got the equivalent integrated model at work, they seem to be the same size but not sure how deep both our counters are.