Day 270 of 365

It's FlyLady time.

After Mommarock posting a comment about FlyLady and me thinking about FlyLady as I was piling up trash yesterday, I decided it was time.

FlyLady is about housecleaning and management of housecleaning. It's about cleaning in zones. About shining your sink before you go to bed. About always getting dressed - including shoes - every day. It's about a household notebook/control journal and the use of the 27 fling boogie for decluttering.

I've done FlyLady for years. Because of her, our sink is always shining before we go to bed. We've had a household notebook sitting on our kitchen counter for the last several years. Most days, even when I'm home by myself, I make sure I have shoes on.

But the 27 fling boogie she writes about has long disappeared. The zone cleaning has stopped, even though I have lists typed up in my household notebook, a notebook that is rarely opened. I even have a monthly menu plan that was used years ago (but hasn't been looked at since).

So today I'm back to reading the book that has been sitting on my bookshelf for years.

My first few items I tackled today? One of the printers, one of the staplers, and one of our bath scales are headed to the donation bag. And a start on revamping our household notebook. Today we have new zone cleaning lists specific to our house, all on different colors of paper, ready to slip into sheet protectors for checking off.

The cleaning lists might not seem picture-worthy, but I know having them hanging out here on the blog will give me an additional reminder to keep on top of them. (As well as an additional layer of guilt if I don't.)

Baby steps.

If you haven't heard of FlyLady but are interested, under today's picture I've posted where you can find the book on Amazon. She also has a website http://flylady.net/

Day 269 of 365

I have too much junk around the house. Not really junk, just too many things. Boxes, envelopes, computer cords, plastic containers.

I tried downsizing several months ago but lost the itch to get it finished. Now is the time to try again. After yesterday's (and today's) den cleaning, I realized there is an abundance of things that I really don't need. Like our four staplers. One in the desk drawer, one still in the package in the desk drawer, one that resides in the pen holder, and one in my sewing room. The only stapler we ever use is the one in the pen holder. Printers? Just as bad. We have three even though only one is used.

Pens and markers? In the pen holder. Plus in the desk drawer in two different places - in a big drawer and in a little drawer marked pens. My husband's plastic container on the bookshelf has some more of his, and my plastic container on the shelf has some more of mine. That's just in the den. (Let's not talk about how many other rooms where we have dozens stashed.) Scissors, paper clips, blank envelopes, glue sticks, and post it notes can all be found in multiple places around the house. We've accumulated stuff I didn't even know we had accumulated.

We're even accumulating pies. In addition to the pies my daughter and I cooked up, my husband bought one from a student (another pumpkin). Then just tonight he collaborated with Marie Callender to make a chocolate raspberry pie.