Operation tidy up

I'm off work today, but Chubs is off to daycare. My project for the day - clean up the crap. Our place is in a disgusting state. We make the places on Hoarders look well organised and tidy.

No computer today. (I'm actually writing this Monday night and will schedule it to be posted on Tuesday morning.) No distractions, just cleaning, sorting, tidying, ruthless decluttering and rearranging.

I do feel like I'm coming down with a cold, but I can't give in. These non work days are few and far between - four days every twelve weeks, to be specific. Of those four days of 'holidays', one and a half will be spent at work, one (today) cleaning, one day at a function and hopefully that leaves some time for me. I really hope that nothing goes wrong and that I can have my first day off in almost a year!

Linked

Toys

The toy monster is taking over. Chubs' room, our room, the living room, the car, the stroller, other people's houses - everywhere! We're doing a bit of a purge and a clean up at the moment. A beautiful problem to have; too many toys for a special, beautiful girl. What's your way of corraling the toys?



Miscellaneous thoughts for Mondays

It's been a bit crazy here the last week. Chubs was still getting over her gastro, so even though she was fine in herself daycare thought she was contagious so she got send home Tuesday and couldn't go Wednesday. Thankfully we have two cars this week (borrowing a friend's car while she's away) so that made doing the juggle a bit easier. I'm fighting a cold and Dear Husband is getting over his gastro too, so we're all lying low.

The house is a disaster which is stressing me out. I usually have a pretty high tolerance for mess, but this mess has gotten to the stage where it's counter productive. I can't find anything and am well into 'get through the next five minutes' mode, at the expense of the next five hours. For example, I need bench space so I just move everything to somewhere else, but then when I need something that was actually supposed to be in that spot on the bench, I can't find it because it's messed in with everything else which wasn't supposed to be on the bench. Needless to say, this needs to be fixed as it's not working.

I've been knitting a bit more (mostly when Dear Husband is driving in the car and I'm a passenger) in an effort to have some me-time. Ugh - the car needs cleaning too. I’m working on a slipover, a few squares for an idea I have forming in my head, and a baby beanie for friends of our who have just welcomed their precious bundle Earthside.

The laundry monster has been particularly fierce the last two weeks. Gastro means more washing at the best of times, let alone with a little baby who can't use the toilet or a vomit bucket, poor girl :( . It's all clean and dry now, but as usual, it's the folding and putting away which is my rate limiting step.

The menu plan went better this week. Last week's plan was
Monday: Chicken curry (slow cooker) - me. Went very well and I made a double batch, so there's one in the freezer
Tuesday: Stir fry - him . All good :)
Wednesday: Bolognese (from the freezer) - me Thankfully this was a freezer night. Chubs, who usually goes to bed at 7 - 7:30, didn't go down until after 11pm. We tried everything, including taking her for a drive which didn't work. Thankfully this was done and only needed to be microwaved, and Dear Husband cooked me up some spaghetti to go with it. I love love love freezer cooking.
Thursday: Steak and veggies - him. There weren't any nice steaks at the shop on Monday so Dear Husband did stir fry again. he did a pork one which I wasn't really fussed on since we usually have beef, but it was certainly sufficient.
Friday: Bolognese (from the freezer) - me Didn't happen. Neither of us was very hungry and I bought Dear Husband some sushi for late lunch, but he didn't eat it until about 6pm. I was happy to scavenge too so I left the Bolognese in the freezer. I did have some fresh mince in the freezer which I had bought on Monday (and forgot about) so I cooked it up into two dinners for the freezer. It's good to know that this week I've put more into the freezer than I've taken out.
Saturday: BBQ chicken and veggies - chook from shop We went around to my mum's for a BBQ to celebrate my grandma's birthday, so we didn't need to cook that night. We did take over a nibblies platter. I made apricots with cream cheese and walnuts, and then some cheese and dips with crackers. Fairly simple but quite adequate none the less.
Sunday: Scavenge for leftovers We defrosted one of the Bologneses from the freezer and had that.

This week's menu plan

Dear Husband is away for the latter part of the week, so it's just me for some nights. This is good and bad as far as meal planning is concerned, so we'll see how it goes.

Monday: Chicken stir fry - him
Tuesday: Chicken curry (from the freezer - me)
Wednesday: Beef stir fry - him
Thursday: Bolognese (from the freezer - me)
Friday: Hmmmmm - see how we go?
Saturday: Scavenge
Sunday: Bolognese (from the freezer - me)

We will see what this week brings. What do you have in store?

Tackle the to do list...

Today has been a day tackling the all-too-long list of little jobs. Here's the list as it stands:

To do list (done)

Grocery shopping - done

Post marriage certificate to uni - done. I have tried to upload my marriage certificate (as proof of name change) but their website wouldn't let me. I was told to email it in, but when I first scanned it I had the settings too high and the file was huge. I scanned it again and emailed it; they then said that I needed to send a certified hard copy. (I did ask when they wanted an electronic copy didn't they need a hard copy, but they said electronic was fine...) I had one certified copy left (plus my original) which I posted in, but they say they never received it. I then had to arrange for more copies, get them certified, and then go to the post office. I wanted to send it Registered Post this time so it can't get 'lost'. We will now wait and see what happens. I know that in the whole scheme of things this is a minute problem, but it's frustrating when it takes so long to complete such a small job.

Clothes shopping for Chubs - Lots of shops have their summer clothes on sale now, so I bought a few clearance things for Chubs in size two and three for next year. At $2 an item, I'll be thankful next year.

Kitchen cleaning - it was a disaster. The less said about how disasterous, the better. Suffice it to stay that I spent a long time in there, and it is much better now.

Bulk cooking - I did up five lots of Bolognese for us - four are in the freezer and we ate one tonight. I also made up some baby Bolognese too. I also did some pureed pears and steamed carrots.

Laundry - two loads hung out, three bought in and folded (one was still drying from the night before) plus nappies washed, dried and put away. I still didn't get the non-nappy baskets put away - ugh.

Work stuff - I needed to do some work which I got done. There's always more to do, but it can wait until tomorrow.

Packing - I packed Chub's daycare bag and made her lunch (stewed plums and Weet-bix and baked beans + two bottles of EBM and some Cruskits.) I still need to finish making my lunch and packing my pump, bags etc.

Bathroom - cleaned the shower, still need to do toilet and basin tomorrow.

Little jobs - emptied bins, changed bin bags, washed icky bin juice out of bin, tidied up a million toys in the living room, cleaned out the esky from yesterday, cleaned out the leftovers/ mould experiements in the fridge.

Didn't do list:
Take camera to the camera shop - totally forgot, sorry visual learners :(


Laundry - one load still on the line, and I've still got some folding to put away. Again.

Bills - must do tonight before bed

Emails - I've got a few there that I must reply to


Have done list
I think it's important to write down what you have done, not just what you need to do. It reminds me on crazy days when I don't get anything done that I usually am getting things done, just now what I hoped to do.

Nappy changes - can't remember how many I did...

Feeds - I think Chubs had six feeds today, or maybe seven? I can't quite remember

Putting Chubs to sleep - two naps took about 10 minutes each to get her off, but tonight was a doozey. It took almost two hours to get her to sleep. She didn't cry much, it was mostly just playing and giggling and fussing on her part, and patting and shooshing and feeding on mine. When my husband came in to relieve me (we tag team a bit) he said 'time for sleep' and she turned, smiled, and displayed her new trick - blowing rasberries. It's so hard not to laugh when she's being so cute!



When I write the list, it looks bad that there are still so many things that I haven't done, but I did get through many of the little jobs. Having a day to tackle all the little jobs is important I think. It's not as rewarding as one big project but still needs to be done.

Linked to Tackle it Tuesday.