21 day challenge day 4

Today I "rested" from my new work out routine by doing yoga. Which isn't really resting, but it's not high cardio.

Connor was a monster, he pulled the coat rack down and dumped my purse, pulled the hat I started off the needles, and destroyed a skein of sock yarn.

He's the most destructive child I have ever met. And I was a preschool teacher in a two year old room.

So my organization today is easy, it's my laundry area. I'd had a brain fart earlier in the week on how in the heck I was going to manage this space.

The problem is our washer/dryer. It's stacked, and crammed into a tiny little cubby at the end of the hall. There is no door, only an accordion panel. The fit is so tight the ironing board barely fits in there. So the laundry supplies (soap, bleach, dawn, cloth diaper detergent, dryer sheets) were either on the floor in the hallway, or crammed on top of the dryer.

We also have a laundry basket on the floor in front of the linen closet door holding laundry to be washed. It looks bad, but there isn't anything I can really do about it. Even a hamper would have to live in the hallway, we have very little space for 4 people's laundry.

So I moved the rest of the soaps onto the shelf in the linen closet I cleared just for them, and removed the piece of plywood in the hall, I have no idea why it was there, just always was!

I'm open to suggestions on how to house the unwashed laundry without taking up my whole hallway, or blocking the linen closet.


Tomorrow i'm going to switch out my purse, and clean TRY and organize it in the process. Mom purses are like Mary Poppins bags, they must have everything all.the.time.

21 day challenge - day 3

Today I sorted toys...lots and lots of toys. Toys I'm not even sure why we still have! Mr potato head parts with no body, Barbies exploded all over the closet floor.

My lovely daughter is a hoarder.

I tell her to sort her toys to make room for new ones. I find the bye bye toys crammed in the back of the closet!

I was truly only able to sort the stuff in the main part of their room. I'll have to tackle the closet toy boxes on a weekend when Ross can take them to the park or something.

Tomorrow i really organize the laundry area!

21 day Challenge - day 2

Ok so my day started much better today. I got up on time, got kae off to school with zero crying! (That never happens)

Put Connor in his jumperoo and got in some Zumba (ozmg kicked my ass)

Got pissed at the mean librarians about them losing another book so we keep getting fees. I know a lot of people lie, but we're super careful about library books. This is the 4th time it's happened!

Then got to work on the hall closet.

Before:
we had a few sets of sheets for each bed, pillowcases, random quilts, towels..omg the towels.

After:

so what i did was sort the sheets by set and stored them in their pillowcase, i found it on pinterest, works well actually. This way kae can grab the spare sheets for her bed all at once. Refolded all the towels, threw out the parts for the vacuum cleaner that doesn't exist anymore, and look what i found! MORE PAINT CANS! /sigh but now i have a whole shelf clear for laundry stuff. which means the new vacuum has a home! hurray.


Up Tomorrow, under the Kids beds and non-closet toys!

21 day challenge - day 1

First day! My day didn't start as expected. Connor was up at 3am, and didn't go back to sleep until 6:45.

Also I was expecting kae to be back at school today, but it's a teacher planning day.

I slept in, until 9:15, when Connor woke up again.

You see where this is going?

I didn't get in my scheduled morning exercise (My Dolphina Bellydance dvd), since my other resolution involves weight loss - go fig.

Then, around 10:30 an online friend reminded me about this, yes, even though it's in my phone, which beeped to remind me, I forgot :(

So I packed the kids up and headed to the Depot. Online it says they carry replacement medicine cabinet shelves...they do not. So I had to improvise...twice!

First trip I bought plastic sheeting, pretty thick. And convinced the guy who cut wood to cut it for me. He was nice, and my kids are cute. This collapsed almost immediately.

Second trip I bought 1/8th inch thick laminated particle board. It's only slightly sturdier than the plastic, but its holding.

So now for the before and after pics. Please keep in mind this bathroom is used by 3 and a half people!

before, useless cabinet, cluttered counter top.

AFTER!

not so cluttered countertop, just the stuff we use everyday that doesn't fit anywhere else, our toothbrushes, paste and hairbrushes. the big silver thing is a hands free soap dispenser we got for christmas. oh, and kae's zooble that's drying next to the sink, she accidentally dropped it in the toilet, it was very dramatic.

Shelves! top is medicines so the kids can't reach them, middle is...stuff, bottom is more stuff..
yes, if you count there are 5 bottles of female perfume on the bottom shelf...4 of them are mine. the two on the far left are mostly empty.

Stay Tuned for tomorrow's episode of see how messy my house is! The Linen Closet!

21 Day Organization Challenge

so my first "resolution" project of the year involves getting the house decluttered and organized. again. it's constant work that i just don't always want to do. ever.

but the list i'm going to use, and the challenge set up, is easy, you start with small items, and don't overwhelm yourself by trying to get everything done in a few days.

i'll be starting when kae goes back to school on monday, and if i remember, I'll post some before and after pics of what i get done. I'll probably be making a lot of trips to goodwill, and posting a lot of stuff up on Freecycle.

Some of the stuff on this list just doesn't fit into our house, so i'll be replacing it with things that do. Example, we do not have an attic, or a basement. so i'll be doing the Bookshelves, and My Desk/Kae's Desk. also my jewelry box doesn't need to be done, so that's "Kids toys (Again)".

I'm also going to try and include some of the home organization projects i've got on my Pinterest. a ton of ideas, none of them get used.

December Reading List

December
1-72 Once Burned - Jeaniene Frost (12/4) - free/library
2-73 Lover Reborn - J. R. Ward (12/16) - free/library
3-74 First Grave on the Right - Darynda Jones (12/20) - Free/Contest Win
4-75 French Girl Knits Accessories - (12/23) - free/library

i also had an attempt at Opening Atlantis by Harry Turtledove. This seemed fantastic in theory. the premise. but in execution, not so much. I, personally, found it very boring. And i LOVE alternate history.

First Grave on the Right was a contest win through St Martin's Paperback, i honestly don't even remember entering..it must have been through goodreads lol

I have a whole huge list of books i plan to read for 2013:

January
Oliver Twist
Queen Bees and Wannabes: Helping Your Daughter Survive Cliques, Gossip, Boyfriends, and the New Realities of Girl World
book 2 Tree Shepherd's Daughter
Book 3 tree Shepherd's daughter

February
The adventures of Sherlock Holmes
nurture shock
Miss Peregrin's Home for Peculiar Children
Skinwalker (Jane Yellowrock)

March
The Crucible
because i said so
Water for Elephants
The Mark of Athena

April
peter pan
10 mindful minutes
The Child Thief
Nightlife (Cal Leandros)

May
The Witch of Blackbird Pond
raising your spirited child
blood rights (commare)
i am number 4

June
siddhartha
Darwin's Ghosts
the forest of hands and teeth
lament, the fairie queen's deception

July
The Jungle Book
Consider the fork
 Rosemary and Rue (October Daye, #1)
 Ever Shade (A Dark Faerie Tale, #1)


august
the beautiful and damned
Cleopatra : A Life
hood
everneath


September
the Iliad
cleaning house
Royal Street (Sentinels of New Orleans, #1)
Hemlock Grove: A Novel

October
the secret garden
Planting Seeds: Practicing Mindfulness with Children
Daughter of Smoke & Bone (Daughter of Smoke & Bone, #1)
 Faerie Wars (The Faerie Wars Chronicles, #1)

November
The Bell Jar (Paperback)
Fingerprints of the gods
Blood Faerie (Caledonia Fae, #1)
 The Changelings (War of the Fae, #1)


December
 A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court (Mass Market Paperback)
Freeing Your Child from Anxiety: Powerful, Practical Solutions to Overcome Your Child's Fears, Worries, and Phobias
Ironskin (Ironskin, #1)
Falling Under (Falling Under, #1)





 This list includes one unread "classic" a month, as well as one non-fiction. almost all the regular fiction on my list has been on my To Be Read list for a year or more, granted i have wiggle room for new releases (new Anita Blake, New BDB, New Mercy Thompson).

Some people would look at the fact that I've made a list as controlling and weird. but with two kids, both of them needing a good amount of attention, and you know, housekeeping and crap. I need to actually SCHEDULE reading time these days. (Girl Scouts cookie sales starts in three weeks...NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO)

 Oliver Twist is part of a KAL/RAL for the Storied Yarns group on Rav, i technically have three months to read it, but i plan to be finished by the end of January. I'm also doing a Buddy read in the 52 books in 52 weeks group for Cleopatra : A Life. If anyone who reads my blog wants to read along on anything, lemme know :D

Bullying

When I was young, it wasn't called bullying. A kid picked on you, you grew thicker skin. These days, someone calls you blonde and it can be considered bullying.

I though kae was just over sensitive to things, that her idea of getting picked on was just her blowing things out of proportion.

I was wrong.

We went to kae's class today for their winter celebration.

It was chaos, the kids were running around like Pygmy warriors. But not a single one even said hello to Kaeley, or invited her to play with them. Not even the girls in her scout troop.

Also not a single parent acknowledged that Ross or I existed. I'm pretty sure the teacher only did because she had to. Even my assistant girl scout troop leader ignored me.

Children learn by example. And I've come to find out, via eavesdropping, that they have group play dates, every single day, and kae is the only kid excluded.

At the parent conference with kae's teacher it was expressed to me that there are people who don't think kae should be in a gifted class....who gets to say that? If it was teachers, counselors, I could understand, but other parents? Who gives a fuck what they think?!?!? The bitch step ford wives who volunteer don't get to decide.

I've decided I'm done with them, my assistant leader can do the rest of the scout year, since they hate my daughter and I so much, I'll sit and knit while she handles 11 seven year olds alone, like I've been doing while she gossips.

The problem becomes, of I try and protect kaeley from this, will I make it worse by keeping her from them. Am I making her more of a social outcast by keeping her from the petty bitches than hurting her feelings by forcing her to interact with them to spite the selfish moms... /sigh