💕Longer days, shorter month: February Flylady thread 💕

[HazelNotHungryLC]

Love is in the air! But do you love your housework/cleaning routine?

Whether you're starting to build a new routine, stuck in a rut, or been around for years, join us on the Flylady thread. I'll try to keep us on track for the month, with baby steps, daily missions and weekly zones.

This is a long running thread, but we are a friendly bunch and all are welcome to join in.

Do NOT sign up for the Flylady emails - it's an excessive amount sent every day.

There are Baby Steps for starting out: add one thing at a time to start good habits and routines.

There are 5 zones that we will rotate through:
🩷Entryway, porch and dining room
🩷Bathroom & one other room
🩷Kitchen
🩷Master bedroom & master bathroom
🩷Living room

Don't worry about finishing it all this month, it'll come around again next month! Flylady is NOT about perfectionism!

Daily focus: each day of the week has a different focus.

• Monday: Home Blessing (or as we call it, home bleugh)
• Tuesday: plan & play
• Wednesday: anti-procrastination
• Thursday: errand day
• Friday: clean car & purse out a week. It's also date night (with your significant other, or friends, or yourself!)
• Saturday: family fun day
• Sunday: renew your spirit

Common acronyms we use:

• LOL: load of laundry (washing is certainly NOT funny!)
• DW: dishwasher, we are not rotating wives by any means, although an extra pair of hands could come in handy sometimes 😆
• S&S: Swish & Swipe (wipe the bathroom sink & toilet)
• LMS: lose/lost my shit
• DNLMS: did not lose my shit

There are more, feel free to ask us to explain something. I'll try to update links every day, if I can get them to work, she's updated the website! Although if you can, it's worth downloading the newly updated app, you can even have it send you notifications (although I only have it for when the zones change). You can also modify the tick lists to suit your home & lifestyle.

Links are below 👇

Daily missions (for the zone we are in): https://beta.flylady.net/daily-mission

Baby steps (on a different website, since the link isn't working on the new site yet): https://mymerrymessylife.com/flylady-31-baby-steps/

Feel free to ask any questions you may have, some of us have been doing Flylady for a very long time, as well as others just starting out. We may have other things to add that we have found works for us that could help you too!

Sunday is renew your spirit day. Take a walk in nature, go to church, read a book, take a bath, whatever would refresh you and get you ready for the week ahead.

There are no missions on the weekend.

Baby Step 1: shine your sink. https://mymerrymessylife.com/flylady-31-baby-steps/

Thank you for the new thread Hazel!

It's a lovely sunny day here and I'm feeling like spring might come one day soon!

Thank you for running the January thread Dilly! You did great!
I'm so ready for spring here as well, but strangely it's almost like we haven't had a proper winter here yet, so I fear we have more snow and cold weather to come, just not in the next 10 days (according to the weather app)! Today is supposed to be warmer too, so it'll feel like spring!

Thank you for the new thread @HazelNotHungryLC I didn't know you could put emojis in the titles, it looks so pretty.

Thank you for last month too @DillyDeclutter I must go and loom atbyhe website and app again as it sounds as though they have improved.

I had another go at the Boots recycling on Friday prompted by the posts about it on the last thread and success! My usual conditioner was on half price at £3.25 (I never pay £6.50 for it as it's always £3.25 in Savers). But anyway, bought two bottles, so £6.50, got my blister packs out and tada, £5 worth of points on my card. Going to go in again tomorrow if I have time as I have got more blister packs. I can see why they are doing this, if it gets people in and spending little and often that's good business. Our branch has just had a refurb and seems much better stocked too.

Well, I'm not really doing things in the 'right' order, but I took the car to the jet wash and washed it today.

In the house, my main issue is needing to declutter.

ED there are definite improvements to both. The link above takes you to the new website as the old one is still there, not working properly.
Well done on your trip to Boots & being able to recycle.

Welcome @WearyAuldWumman 👋
It doesn't matter on which day you do what really, just as long as it works for you! Well done on cleaning your car, I really should have done mine too, but today was such a nice day that I'm sure the queue at the carwash would have been extremely long!

Ta das:
🩷 had coffee with ILs (they came over to visit)
🩷 took down outside Christmas lights
🩷 swept front porch & carport
🩷 cleaned front door
🩷 switched from Christmas wreath to a heart hanging on the front door
🩷 put out inside valentine's day decor
🩷 started on some truffles
🩷 did my nails
🩷 rotated DW
🩷 cleared a hotspot again!
🩷 got my clothes out for tomorrow
🩷 showered, including used a body scrub

It was such a nice day outside today, I enjoyed spending time outside! It really didn't feel like winter out there today.

Monday is home blessing home bleugh day:
🫧Quick vacuum around the house
🫧Empty bins
🫧Change sheets
Only spend 10 minutes in each room. This can also be spread out across the entire week. Or, like me, you can do it on a different day. I do mine on Tuesdays, when I'm not at work. It usually takes me a couple of hours, but I don't always get everything done either.
I've also added on my app:
🫧 dust
🫧 mop
🫧 bleach bathrooms
🫧 clean mirrors & glass doors

The mission hasn't updated for me yet, I'll try to check it when I wake up. Unfortunately I'm 7 hours behind the UK, I'm sorry!
If nothing else, sweep your front porch/ entryway, it should only take a few minutes and makes a big impact.

Baby Step 2: https://mymerrymessylife.com/flylady-31-baby-steps/2/
This one can be controversial. Get dressed to shoes. We're a shoes off household, but I take this as get dressed, ready for the day, so if you need to leave the house in a moment, you're ready to go. It's more motivating to get dressed vs staying in pajamas!

Don't forget to shine your sink before bed too!
I didn't go into detail with this one, but there's no one right way to do it. But you must start with an empty sink, so wash those dirty dishes first!

Flylady suggests filling your sink up with hot water, add bleach. Let it soak for a few minutes. Start draining it, as it's draining wipe/ scrub. Finish it off by drying it and shine it up with glass cleaner and a dry cloth.
Use whatever products you like/ can use, especially if you have a sink that's not stainless steel.
I usually just use dish soap on a daily basis. When it needs it I'll use either barman's friend, or a brillo pad.

Good morning. Last night I made chicken stock but left the dirty saupan in the sink. This morning, once I'd rotated DW and had space I cleaned the pan and sink. But I will go back over the babysteps.
I've not been on this thread recently but have been focusing on swish and swipe, esspecaly as ds had a tummy bug.
This month I'll do the babysteps, skip any that have become habits allredy, sink cleaning has slipped through!

Thanks dilly and hazel.

Hi all. Thanks for the new thread. Successes for January - some things decluttered. Two upstairs rooms and bathroom kept pretty tidy. 15 mins of exercise done almost every day. Pretty much on top of laundry.

Plans for Feb. To carry on with the exercise/laundry routines and to start doing missions alongside a bit more decluttering.
Tonight I intend to do a whb of the downstairs - so quick pupa, dust and hoover of the kitchen and living/dining room.

I'm hoping that by March I'll sort of be in sync with the zones.

Sorry I'm a lot later than I planned. The mission has updated: put out the hotspots in the front porch, entryway & dining room. This may take you longer than 15 minutes, so set your timer for each room and fly!

Always well done on getting your pan and sink cleaned this morning. With the bugs going around it's a good idea to keep on top of S&S. That's something I'm working on doing better.

Jumping that's a great start for sure! It took me a minute to figure out what pupa was! I'm assuming it's pick up, put away?

Yes Hazel, pick up put away.
Tonight didn't go as planned - got sidetracked but cooked dinner, did laundry and my exercises.

Here is the link to the missions page on the new website: https://www.flylady.net/daily-mission hopefully it'll update at midnight so you don't miss it waiting for me!

Baby Step 3: https://mymerrymessylife.com/flylady-31-baby-steps/3/ get more familiar with Flylady resources. She doesn't mention the app though and the website has been updated, but there are other links on the page that you might find useful.
Don't forget to shine your sink and get dressed to shoes!

Tuesday is plan and play day, so plan what you're going to eat/ do the rest of the week/ a holiday/ for a birthday etc. Then go do something fun for you!

Jumping don't worry about getting sidetracked, either do a little every day, or just wait until next week (although I don't think I could do that, not in this house with 2 dogs!).

No flying here today, other than helping DS rotate DW. He was home sick today, nauseous, headache etc, so figured I'd help him do his chore today.
I did work all day though.
Oh! I did take the Jeep through the carwash on my way home as there was no queue! It really needed it.
I do need to do a quick S&S before bed though.

My day off tomorrow (Tuesday) so I should get more done then.

Today's mission is to remove any last holiday decorations from your front door & porch. Set your timer for 15 minutes and get them down and put away.
I did this with DHs help on Sunday, and put up valentine's decor.

To dos:
☕️ LOLs (I never did any on the weekend after all 🤦‍♀️)
☕️ finish meal planning for the week
☕️ grocery shopping
☕️ admin that I keep putting off but really needs to be done
☕️ weekly home bleugh
☕️ make some of my treats (truffles & caramels)

I'll be back with some ta das later.

I'm embarrassed to admit that I realised that I'd left half a dozen Christmas cards on top of the painting above the mantelpiece... Now removed.

Weary it's actually not that surprising. We get used to seeing things around so we become "blind" to them! It happens to me a lot!

I'm so sorry. I'm new here. I haven't read previous threads either. But I really don't understand what rotate the dishwasher means? Do you mean load and unload it? I really want to join in but feel I can't when I don't understand the concept of rotating a dishwasher 😫

Ipseven yes that's exactly it, well, more unload and load perhaps. Empty out the clean stuff and refill with the inevitable mountain of things waiting to go in.

Welcome!

Ahhhh thank you for clarifying! Haha I was thinking I was missing an important task and was mystified!!! 🤔

Ta das so far:
🩷 cleaned both bathrooms
🩷 sheets washed & dried and put back on bed
🩷 2 more LOLs going
🩷 grocery shopping
🩷 admin done
🩷 groceries put away

I just had lunch with DH, still more to do once he goes back to work.

@Ipsevenenabibas 👋 yes, I'm sorry for not being more clear. Rotating DW is just less to type than unload and load dishwasher!

Have done my meal planning. (This included buying fish cakes and a lemon from The Fish Van.)
Hoovered.
Dusted.
Continued to treat the caustic soda burn on the wooden kitchen floor...
Cleaned the cooker hood and filters.
Did a wash and tumble dry. Put away the towels.
Managed to book a Practice Nurse appointment to tweak my HRT. faints

Clutter continues to be my problem. Need to do a charity shop run tomorrow.