Friday, February 25, 2011

Caught in limbo

Right now, my house is caught somewhere in between clean and organized and untidy. I did vacuum the other day and cleaned the bathrooms yesterday. I washed most of the dishes last night and most of our stuff is in it's place. But we get the new house tomorrow and that begins three weeks of moving in/out. We've taken out all the clothes that we'll need for the in between stage but since we're going to move most of our big stuff tomorrow, including our dressers, we can't have EVERYTHING put away. I've decided to be ok with this house like this. It's only for three weeks, if that since we'll be moving everything over to the new house starting tomorrow. I'm going in armed with Green Works multipurpose spray to clean out the kitchen, bathroom, everything I can so that once all our linens, dishes, etc, get moved in, everything else is clean for them! I'm going to figure out which cupboard I want used for which dishes and I'm going to label them all. Honestly, I wish we could skip this step and wake up in the new house and have everything clean and organized and ready to go, but we can't so I have to figure out the best system that will work for us. It will all be worth it when it's done!

Thursday, February 10, 2011

Cleaning up some loose ends

Wow, it's been awhile since I've written on here. Ok a week, but it's amazing how when you're not focused on cleaning or tidying up all of the time, things get a little bit out of hand. But this week, we've been busy cleaning up some loose ends. For example, subjects are removed on our house, so it's SOLD! So I called the mortgage company and notary and set up financing for the new house and paperwork appointments to get everything signed. We're all ready to go (almost).

As far as cleanliness at the old house, we've been doing alright. Not fantastic, but not horrible. So today, I took some time to get back on track. Threw in a load of laundry, tidied up some recycling, dishes, the bathroom, made the bed again. Basically a room by room quick sweep of what could be picked up. It's SO much easier to do all this withOUT a toddler in the house. Hopefully once this all becomes automatic to me, I'll be able to do it with a toddler, a newborn, and anyone else who wants to stand in my way.

I also took some advice from Martha. At the beginning of her Homekeeping Handbook, she has a bunch of lists. There's are daily, weekly, monthly and seasonal to do lists. So I took her daily and weekly lists and made my own. We have task lists at work and I can follow those so why can't I have one for at home?

Here's the list. I might laminate it so I can cross things off with a dry erase and then start over the next day or week. This way, my husband, K, can also see the list, can see what's been done and can help out where needed.

Photobucket

I'll keep you guys all posted on how well it works!

Tuesday, February 1, 2011

Almost unrecognizable

Me, that is. Today was a great day. I still got to be myself (lazy mom) but got everything done! Who am I?? I knew my work pants needed to be washed so I threw in a small load this morning. A few pairs of pants and some towels. I lazed around on my message boards while my sick two year old daughter, M, watched TV. Then I got dressed, got her dressed and we went to the doctor. No antibiotics needed, just a virus, should get better on its own. After the appointment, we went to the local bakery and got some buns, turkey and a giant happy face cookie. We came home had some lunch (that was a fight since a little girl just wanted to eat her cookie), then someone got to have a few bites of her cookie because she ate her meat and her carrots. While she slept (I got almost a full two hours today!) I hopped back online and turned on some Friends. Man I love old school TV. Instead of fast forwarding through the commercials, though, I moved the wash into the dryer, did the lunch and breakfast dishes, made the bed and tidied up the house. I even phoned hydro and set up the new house on the account for our move in/move out dates. Got myself dressed for work just in time for someone to wake up to a sippie cup of milk and the rest of her cookie. This all happened just as K walked in the door from work. I even had a few minutes to type this out before heading off to work (3-midnight shift today). Laundry? Dishes? Tidying up the house? MADE THE BED? And all in one day? WHO AM I?!??!

A few other good (clean) news! Our house is sold! Well it's under contract, we'll know for sure next Monday as long as the inspection, which is Thursday, goes well. So we officially have to be moved out by March 19th (and we're going to recruit some of you local readers to help!). I picked out the washer/dryer combo that I want for the new house, since the ones there now are OLD and gross. The new set should work for cloth diapering, which I want to do with the new baby. There's a VIP sale at Future Shop on Thursday and as long as the price is right, we'll pay for them and schedule them to be delivered the day after we get possession. Then, as I mentioned above, I phoned hydro and they'll add the new house to our account on possession day, February 24th, and they'll remove the townhouse on March 19th. I just have to phone Shaw (TV, phone and internet) and Terasen (gas) to have those accounts do the same. We have to set up internet at the new house since K's mom will need it right away. And we won't have any lapse in service, either!

Ok, time for me to head off to work. Seriously, we've been out of bed for like not even 7 hours and I can't believe I got all that done. Now to keep the trend up!