My house is a disaster area and I don't know where to start

[MotherOfGremlins]

There is so much that I need to do - may I post here so I've got some sort of accountability please?

First thing is clutter busting - things don't have homes because there is too much stuff. This is a DIY issue because I need to put up some shelves in the shed and as pathetic as it is when I'm a fully grown woman, I've never done it before.

Eventually I'm going to move through changing my kitchen cupboard fronts, stripping wallpaper and re-doing, painting white woodwork, laying laminate throughout downstairs, sorting out the floorboards upstairs and laying vinyl in the toilet /bathroom, replacing bathroom lights, putting a cat flap in an awkward door, lots of flat pack furniture building and curtain sorting out, and then looking at the garden.

This is what comes of thinking that my DH is telling the truth when he's been going to get around to things for 15 years.

I've had enough, I need to grow up, put my big girl pants on and figure this stuff out.

Can I join you? My house is also a pit. I've got so many jobs that I don't know how to tackle, so much rubbish to get rid of and so little skill (or motivation) that I end up doing none of them.

Facebook pages like DIY on a budget UK for inspiration, motivation. You tube video tutorials. Buy in help, local FB page for local handyman. I plan to make a list of all the bitty jobs and get someone in for a few hours or a half day.

Totally welcome to join me on this journey out of uselessness and into handywomanship 😊

It's stuff like this that is driving me insane. It's just a bit of carpet that's poked out from under the holdy-down bar strip thing. I tried putting it back but it wouldn't stay there.

Haven't done any more because the toilet needs to have flooring sorted so there seems to be little point (I'm going to pay someone to do the landing and stairs), but I'll hit up YouTube later and see whether there's anything I can do temporarily.

@CarolNoE

Facebook pages like DIY on a budget UK for inspiration, motivation. You tube video tutorials. Buy in help, local FB page for local handyman. I plan to make a list of all the bitty jobs and get someone in for a few hours or a half day.

Great plan! I want to do everything that I can myself not even so much to save money but also because I think that I'll be learning skills that I want my children to have 😊

@MotherofGremlins good luck. Following as I need help with the motivation/a kick up the backside tbh. I read the FB pages as a way to ignore the mess am sitting in!i

Write a list and stick to it, go room by room. Definitely get rid of all the clutter first as you will then be able to see more clearly.

You need to give your husband a kick up the arse and he needs to get stuck in too.

My dad always did the DIY and so I sort of assumed that my DH would take care of that side of things (unfairly)!
A few years ago I realised that men weren’t born knowing how to do these things, and that as an intelligent woman I was perfectly capable of learning how to do DIY. Since then I have painted, put up shelves, treated damp and then sealed and painted the wall, fixed the fence, mended the front door...
YouTube is your friend!

@MotherOfGremlins

Totally welcome to join me on this journey out of uselessness and into handywomanship 😊

It's stuff like this that is driving me insane. It's just a bit of carpet that's poked out from under the holdy-down bar strip thing. I tried putting it back but it wouldn't stay there.

Haven't done any more because the toilet needs to have flooring sorted so there seems to be little point (I'm going to pay someone to do the landing and stairs), but I'll hit up YouTube later and see whether there's anything I can do temporarily.

@MotherOfGremlins

Step 1 register with screwfix - they're great for DIY bits and do a speedy click and collect service.
Order a new extra wide carpet strip like this:
https://www.screwfix.com/p/extra-wide-carpet-cover-door-strip-aluminium-0-9m-x-61mm/81951?tc=JT4&dskid=92700048793315984&gclsrc=aw.ds&dssrl=1244072&gclid=EAIaIQobChMIubH2pa6z6wIViKztCh2arwoFEAQYASABEgImSvDBwE

Measure the length of your doorframe/old strip and mark this on the new strip. Cut with a hacksaw (screwfix)
If your doorframe is shaped in any way you also need a ruler and hacksaw to trim the edges.

Unscrew old carpet strip
Glue down carpet edge to keep frayed edge flat and squash flat with new carpet strip. Screw into place.
Finished.

It's a pretty quick and easy job - you can do it!

@WaltzingBetty great tips, thank you so much I'll get that done - and how did you guess I don't own a hacksaw yet

I've had enough, I need to grow up, put my big girl pants on and figure this stuff out.
Go girl!
Can I just query your order-of-action a little. You can decorate and - bam! - it's done and stays done. Gardening is different. It needs constant tweaking. It grows and matures, so the sooner you start the sooner it starts maturing. There are also certain jobs that are better done at certain times of the year. Also gardening is nicer in the better weather and longer days. I'm suggesting that you don't put it at the end of your To Do list but do little-and-often as you go along.

First step first. Go though the house and get rid of any clutter. Books, clothes, toys, broken crap, unused items, unloved stuff and take it to the tip or charity shop. This could take weeks. Afterwards you’ll be able to work out just how much storage you really need. (Not much in my case)

Thank you @Porridgeoat, it's going to be a slow process I think, so I'm planning to sort out the little bits and bobs as I go just because it'll make me happy (not things like cupboard fronts or reflooring downstairs) 😊

Part of the difficulty with decluttering is that I've two autistic children who are monumentally attached to everything except for packaging and food waste, so I have to be really clever about how I do this otherwise it gets very stressful.

@senua re the garden, this year I've managed to grow things - courgettes and beans mostly, and I do try to keep it from going backwards overgrowth wise. You're absolutely right about little and often!

There are things that need actual sorting though - the fencing needs fixing (I've a broken post where a neighbour's tree has pushed the fence), the remains of a tall tree stump that needs to be taken out or cut down on the fence line so that I can put another panel in, the patio is uneven with rocking slabs and broken cement between the slabs, and the mother of all brambles that is continually trying to return the whole garden back to nature. It's basically a triffid that wants to eat the trampoline.

In the garden though, I'm starting with putting up shelves in the wooden shed (I need London Brackets and planks of some sort), and putting a small plastic storage shed on the edge of the patio for garden toy storage. That way I will be able to get to tools that I can store in the wooden shed and not feel defeated before I've begun 😊

I already got a scrap metal company to come and take the old rusty barbecue that had been taking up the space where the storage shed needs to go.

Honestly, I've had enough of inertia, and I'll fix this place bit by bit (one thing at a time) - 2020 is going to be a good year in this tiny little way in my corner of the earth...

Well done OP. Celebrate progress and let it motivate you to keep going

the mother of all brambles that is continually trying to return the whole garden back to nature. It's basically a triffid that wants to eat the trampoline.
I've always tried to garden in a fairly eco way but this year I snapped (after too many years of horsetail) and used glyphosate. Weedol is wondrous stuff.

after full renovating 2 flats a word of advice.

1. clutter
2. going room-by-room might not be the best way. Also look at it vertically. Mostly because of the tools you need. Eg we hired a tile cutter for the kitchen and few days later needed it for the bathroom.
3. make a list of all things needed, including tools! You have no idea how many trips you'll save with this. :)
4. laminate floors are easy, but you have to be precise with the cutting
5. cupboard fronts - depending on type, it could be an option to sand them down and then paint them. imo it's a nicer finish. Just don't go too artistic (as I did): painted 5 cupboards and 4 drawers with a 6 mm artist's brush in special diy color that had sand in it for an interesting texture. Took me bloody ages :)

on decluttering: would it work if you did it at night and in slow increments?

Following! Could have written this post myself. I fixed the microwave door from a YouTube video the other week and was so insanely proud of myself, it’s very sad. I have never put up a shelf though.

Loving this thread! We desperately want to move, but can't put the house on the market with it looking like this

We need to declutter, fix/new fence (next weekends job), and I think I need to do something with the bathroom flooring grouting. Not sure if I can fix or if I need to fully regrout

Need to do something with the main bedroom as well but not sure where to start!

declutter the areas you can if the kids stuff is tricky

Good luck Op.
I was totally clueless when it came to DIY but in the last year have taught myself to paint rooms, hang hooks, assemble flat pack furniture etc.
You can do it 💪

Shelves and cupboards mean somewhere to put junk and clutter so I have very few !

DIY not forums are worth a look www.diynot.com/

And maybe google how to lose the waste of oxygen.

One step at a time.

I've recently hired a large skip and cleared out 20 years of accumulated crap. I was just careful not to look at what I was chucking out - tried to keep in mind that I'd not thought about the stuff for years so don't worry about it. I feel really good about it.

I now feel I can focus on the next stage. My carpets are 'varicoloured' - original colours plus assorted dirt and stains. So, hire a carpet cleaner.

Following that: furniture suffering from 15 years of kids. Clean what I can, replace what I can afford.

Finally, and the really big one: redecorate a rather shabby house (or rather, pay someone else to do it, as I hate decorating).

Oh, and after Item 1, buy a robot vacuum cleaner. I went mad and bought one after seeing a YouTube video of cats riding on them and playing with them. The one I got (Roomba 981) is really good and I spent almost a whole day deliriously happy that the carpets were detritus - free without me having to doing anything (much).

This is the thread for me. My house has lots of diy jobs plus I need to find a builder to sort out some down pipes and a flat roof.

I want to demolish some horrible amateur built in wardrobes and that will mean sorting out the wall and floor where they are.

All the paintwork in this house is tatty. So much to do.

My friend had a "one job a day" policy.

The key thing is to make a list of all the jobs, then break them down into smaller jobs. For example, putting up a shelf:

1. Watch YouTube and make a list of what you need
2. Buy what you need
3. Put up shelf

That way, you have a new shelf in three days, and you're not stalled by looking at a task that is too big.

It's amazing what you can do with one job a day over 365 days 😀