The feathered nest

Housework.

Just think about the word.  It's two words:  house and work.  For many of us it calls to mind negative words like "routines" and "tasks" and "chores" and "drudgery."

But then I think of the phrase "feathering the nest."

It alludes to how birds (and it's probably the girl birds) who line their nest/home with feathers to create a comfortable and safe environment for their family.

Most of us have been blessed with a home that is warm, safe, dry and comfortable.  We have added furniture for seating, sleeping and eating; appliances to keep and prepare our food, wash and dry our clothes, and generally make our lives easier.  Even the most humble American home or apartment is palatial when compared to how most of the world lives.

If birds are happy just to methodically gather up feathers to cushion their nests, why do we view taking care of our homes as menial work to be avoided as long as possible, and then done under duress?

Don't get me wrong - I've often viewed it that way too.  And some tasks are not particularly pleasant, but if they're done regularly, they really aren't that gross or off-putting.

These thoughts went through my mind as I did a fairly deep cleaning of our bedroom and bathroom this week. (I have no idea if I'm in sync with FlyLady or not; I follow her general philosophy and do general surface cleaning regularly, and focus my efforts on various areas of the house in a somewhat regular rotation.)

On this particular day, I stripped the bed down to the mattress, tossed the mattress pad and blanket in the wash, rotated the mattress.  While the laundry was going, I let some bleach work its wonders on the shower grout, cleaned the bathroom and then hopped in the shower to finish wiping it down and wash my hair.  When the bedding was dry, I remade the bed and hung fresh towels.

All-told my efforts took about an hour.  When I was done, the bathroom sinks were shined and the toilet scrubbed (as they are each week); the baseboards were wiped down and all the shower crevices were bright and clean again, and the linens were all changed.  Vacuuming and mopping had been done just a few days prior, so I skipped it.

An hour to "feather my nest."  How can I view that as drudge work?

Happy cleaning,

Home, sweet home

Houses are a bit like us girls - they can use a day of beauty every now and then, ya know?  We can't take a house to a spa, but we can treat our dwelling to a day of refining and beautifying.

No, this isn't yet another post about our new house.  We recently offered our old place for lease (read: we stuck a sign in the yard) and were pleasantly surprised by the immediate response (within hours!) from several families interested in renting it.

As I showed the house and eventually made arrangements to lease it to one particular family, I began to look at our old home through the eager and bright eyes of a prospective occupant, rather than the weary eyes of the one who moved out.

The whole-house paint job looks great, but I realized the blinds needed cleaning (they weren't gnarly gross but they wouldn't pass anyone's white glove test.)  Ditto for the windows.  And the floors.  And the bathrooms and kitchen were passable, but I knew if I were moving in, I'd have to spend some time cleaning before I put my own things in the cabinets and drawers.

So this past week, I spent several hours (over the course of several days) deep cleaning and gently buffing and polishing everything to move-in condition.  At long last, the storage towers and hanging rods were installed in the bedroom closets, a new wire shelf/rack was up in the hall closet, the spot where the TV hung in the master bedroom was painted over, the bathrooms were sanitized to operating room condition, and all the floors were mopped and gleaming.  A flipped-over closet switch was righted (up is on, off is down), and the front door lever now operates properly.  It's the pesky little things you live with when it's yours, but you wouldn't wish on anyone else. (And after you do them, you wonder why you didn't find a few spare minutes to do it months or years ago!)

As I worked, I thought back to our own move-in experiences over the years.  As I reminisced, I thought how nice it would have been to find a few essentials and niceties to welcome us.

So I put myself in their shoes and made sure all the toilet paper holders were full and the bathroom sinks each had a dispenser of hand soap. I wiped out all the bathroom drawers and put a penny (heads-up) in each bathroom (because everyone needs a little luck, right?); changed out the filter on the HVAC system, and left the rest of the three-pack in the laundry room to encourage changes when needed.

New lightbulbs were inserted in all the the sparkly clean light fixtures and ceiling fans, and I tucked a few starter packets of dishwasher detergent under the sink; a scrubbed and bleached almost-new kitchen trashcan and a few trash can liners is at the ready.

On a whim, I snagged an inexpensive plastic  pumpkin and filled it with candy (they are moving in over the weekend and I have a hunch their trick-or-treating will be pre-empted by packing-and-moving.  As a final touch I filled a small basket with some apple-scented dish soap, new sponges and dishrags and a cute Thanksgiving towel to say "Welcome Home!" 

After I finished giving the old place its spa treatment, did I wish we were the ones moving in?  It did look pretty and welcoming.  But I am very content with our new home and I don't regret any part of our decision to find and move to a different home.

I have very high hopes for the future of the new family moving in.  I wish many blessings and joy on them as they make our old home their new home.

Happy moving in (and on),
 

A Bounty of Figs

Thank you, author John Boyne for giving the term "flying fig" - and the lack of concern it measures - some historical context. A few years ago, Boyne included the phrase in a novel about the famous mutiny on the British ship, the Bounty, which occurred back in the late 1700s. I can now tell myself the phrase is historically accurate and not just a euphemism for another phrase that is far less polite.

What does any of that have to do with real figs? Why nothing, of course. But I did have a bounty of them drop into my lap this week.

Despite my canning ambiguity this year, I had been mulling over if there was any way I could snag some fresh figs locally (they're a rare bird around here) and by chance overheard a friend talking about a tree loaded with figs, ripe for the plucking. As luck would have it, the tree's owner doesn't give a fig about getting out in this heat and picking them, so my friend/source is welcome to them. And I'm welcome to what he picks as long as I give him back some preserves, including a jar or two as recompense to the tree's owner. It's a sweet deal for everyone.

Yesterday morning I started with this - about 3 quarts of figs, washed and stemmed.

It's a miracle there were any left after I started nibbling on them.

 After a few hours of cooking down (meanwhile I scrubbed and sanitized a dozen jars) and a few minutes of filling, sealing and a quick dip in a hot water bath, I wound up with this pretty array of jars, plus one in the fridge because I misjudged the number of jars needed:

Fig preserves; they're like sunshine in a jar.

But the nice neat stack of jars comes at a price.  This is the kitchen after the preserves finished their water bath.  Canning is not difficult, but it does take time and it is messy.  Very, very messy.

How many kettles does it take to can?  All of them.

Is it worth it?  Oh yes.  I'm not much of a jam/jelly/preserve fan, but I am looking forward to using these preserves in some upcoming cakes and cookies.  And I'm hopeful I might get another batch or two of figs.   Maybe in a year or two my fig tree will reward me with some figs.  Assuming it survives transplant shock, poor baby.

Happy preserving,

Me versus the pressure washer

It occurred to me yesterday (when our pressure washer nearly knocked me off my feet for the umpteenth time) that 2500 PSI is probably a lot more force than my 5 foot 2-inch frame is really equipped to handle. I have learned to brace myself if I'm on a ladder when I'm power washing - the first time I tried it I nearly launched myself into the hot tub, much to oldest son's consternation. (Well, at first he was concerned. Then he was merely amused.  My kids are pretty accustomed to my klutzy antics.)

But even though the force can and does push me off-balance with regularity, I refuse to turn over the power washing to anyone else. Power-hungry or simply empowered? Either way I get a lot of satisfaction from successfully wielding the wand and knocking the grime off windows, walls, gutters and concrete. I go easier on decking (after I figured out what that kind of pressure can do if you aren't careful.)

Something tells me I'd flunk...

And yes, I am aware I run all kinds of risks by power washing in flipflops, but I keep my toes out of the way.  (Don't ask me how I learned that lesson...I just know, okay?)   I also prefer sunglasses to safety goggles, shorts and tank tops over full length pants and waterproof gloves.  Ear plugs, pshaw.  What fun would it be to power wash if you had to wear all of that?

This year I've had double the power washing fun - old house and new house both needed some serious power washing. New house's deck and guttering along the back are cleaned (and the deck is stained and sealed.) Old house's windows, siding, gutters and north-side sidewalks are cleaned.

I think that just leaves a little deck work at the old house, and then I might have to put up the power washer, at least until I'm ready to tackle that big wraparound porch on the new place. Trim, rails and concrete to be cleaned - woohoo! Sounds like a fun job for a hot July or August day.

Happy powering!

Moving: Out.. No, Really. O-U-T.

We moved into the new house a month ago this week. Moving in took some pre-work and some hard work on moving day, but it went fairly smooth and stayed on schedule. Moving OUT of the old house? Not so much - it's been neither smooth nor on-schedule.

Almost every day since we moved, I have visited the old house, picking up a few things here and there, sorting things, shuffling them around. But still there was a LOT of stuff to contend with. Some of it we need, some of it we don't, and some of it I'm not sure if we need or not.

But it's time to quit dithering and decide what moves and what gets sold or donated or just plain tossed. This past weekend, I hauled a carload of books to the Friends of the Library (they sell them and use the proceeds to help support our Linebaugh Libraries), and a couple carloads of other stuff back to the new house.  The boys helped Mr. Official clear the attics on Monday. It was blazing hot outside and even hotter in that attic. But they hauled it all down and we sorted and stockpiled. Every family member has a pile, and there's a massive and growing pile for a garage sale (coming soon!)

After we finished that exhausting exercise, I continued tidying and cleaning, picking and choosing. The big curbside trashcans were empty and are now full again. The garage sale pile is steadily growing.

I'm giving everyone a week to cull through their own stuff and decide what they are keeping and what they aren't. Oldest son has the biggest pile (and ironically, an attic of his own to haul it to.) Hopefully by next week at this time, the garage will be empty except for the garage sale pile, and by the week after that, THAT stuff will be gone too. In the meantime, the painters are lined up and ready to start painting. I hope. Because I'm ready for them to start and the paint is waiting in the den for them to begin.

We are meeting with our Realtor to discuss the market analysis she's prepared, and we hope there will soon be a "For Sale" sign in the yard of this newly painted and spiffed up house.

Happy moving, for reals.

Has anyone seen last week? I can't find it.

We closed on our new home (it's no longer a house but it is now home!) four weeks ago yesterday. We spent that afternoon mowing the knee-high grass and pulling weeds from the flower beds, and the next day tearing out the shower in the master bath.  That's just how we celebrate home ownership, I guess.

Week 1, the "real" work began - painting five rooms in five days. Mid-week an early morning storm cut a swath about a half-mile from the house and tore out power lines, so our five days were squeezed into four. But we (middle son, swimmer girl and I) finished on time.

Week 2 saw a frenzy of cleaning and moving in. From crown molding to quarter round, everything got a good wiping down. Mirrors and pictures were hung, dishes were transported, washed and put away. On Friday morning, the movers came and carefully carted our furniture and placed it just-so. Best of all, it all fit exactly where we needed it to go.  We were in!

But week 3 (last week) is blurry. I was supposed to finish cleaning out the old house and get it ready for painting. It didn't happen.  One week overdue and I'm barely halfway to that goal (and that's being generous.)

Somewhere I lost last week.

I know I was busy, but I don't have anything to show for it. I'd like to think I consciously chose a week of downtime to recharge, but I fear I didn't.

It's a muddle, I tell ya.

Week 4 has been another whirlwind of activity, trying to make up for last week's sub-par productivity. In spare moments, I've been cleaning the old house bit by bit and we finally put some trim in place that should have been down several years ago. As Mr. Official said when we left there a few nights ago,  "We've done nothing but work on that house. We worked on it before we moved in, we worked on it after we moved in, and we're still working on it after we moved out." Which is one of the reasons we were careful to choose a turnkey house this time around.

Word to the wise: you do not double your joy when you double your home ownership. We hope this situation is very temporary. (June 1 is our date to have it ready to be shown - and hopefully sold quickly. The sooner, the better.)  And if you see my lost week, will you send it to me?  I could really use that time next week.

Happy Friday,

Time to lighten the load

The move-in date is upon us.  This week has been a frenzy of back-and-forth trips getting bathrooms, kitchen and closets set up and ready to move into.  The furniture gets moved tomorrow.   After that, I will have to look at the remaining stuff and make tough choices. I'll be honest, the urge to purge is upon me.
I have torn away my clutter blinders and I'm looking with clear eyes at all the S.T.U.F.F. we have accumulated since we moved to Tennessee almost 11 years ago. Added to the moving van load o'stuff we hauled here with us. It's embarrassing to consider how much stuff we have.  (At least we never broke over and permanently rented a storage unit.  But that's only because we let it pile up in attics and the shed.)

But enough is enough - it's not all coming with us.  The new shed is smaller.  The new walk-in attic is fanTABULOUS, but it is not big enough for all this stuff.  And even if it were, WHY would we take it all? My vow is we are going to move lightly (figuratively speaking of course.  Because all that pottery is heavy!)

I have two litmus tests I am administering to decide what stays and what goes:
1.  If it is not loved and/or used at least once a year, it's not going.
2.  If we haven't used it since we moved in here, it is absolutely, positively, not going.  

The superfluities can be sold, given away, recycled, tossed in the trash, burned...I don't care - but they cannot enter our new abode.

Of course, every rule has exceptions, and since there were two rules, we have two exceptions:
1.  My wedding dress, although I'm even debating that one...swimmer girl is not keen on its 1980s style; and
2. Mr. Official's baseball cards.  I just hope he doesn't rupture a disk hauling them down and up the stairs from one attic to the other.

Happy moving,

Shark attack!

Don't panic - I'm not in Florida, I'm not swimming with sharks, nor am I under attack. But the dirt on my floors is at risk.

Yes, I'm mopping.

With a shark.


A purple shark, to be precise.

I am beginning to grasp just how much contiguous hard flooring I now have - the whole downstairs except for our bedroom is either hardwood or tile. The two full baths are huge, especially if you're looking at them from hands and knees, trying to hand mop them. As soon as I got the hall and upstairs bathrooms clean and ready to move, including an old-fashioned hands-and-knees mopping and baseboard cleaning, I went shark hunting. I love using steam to sanitize, so this concept was right up my alley.

So far, so good.  The true test will come when I get busy cooking in this new kitchen.  Spills happen, at least when I cook.  And when the dog drinks from her bowl.

Speaking of kitchens, today is move-the-kitchen day.  The car is loaded with pots and pans and bakeware and my trusty Kitchen Aid.  Of course, you might find me taking a break from moving and attacking the floors again. Or stopping to admire my shiny clean floors. (The novelty has not worn off yet, obviously.)

Happy cleaning,

Clearing out the cobwebs

Our coat closet is one of my biggest cleaning enemies

(Hmmm.  Have you ever noticed how "nemesis" is almost a perfect anagram of "enemies"?)

This closet - like the other storage closets in our home - is not large, but it is a convenient catch-all: old photographs and negatives (yeah, negatives), spare birthday and shower gifts for emergency situations, school supplies, front door seasonal decorations, and of course, coats, scarves, mittens and hats.  It hasn't been completely emptied since I painted it..many years ago.  Until today.  This morning, I will face the mess I can see and whatever lurks beneath.  As much as I dread it, it's time.  I refuse to mindlessly move these things to the next home without culling out everything that doesn't belong here and isn't loved, oft-used or otherwise absolutely needed.

I'm hoping the actual cleaning will be less dreadful than the anticipation of it.  Sometimes we put things off, and let them build up to overwhelming, seemingly insurmountable obstacles in our minds.  I think I have a few mental closets that could also stand to be emptied out and cleared of some useless stuff I've held onto for far too long.  The multi-tasker in me wonders if I can do both simultaneously.  It's worth a try.  If all goes well, the linen closet is next.  Same song, second verse.

If I'm brave, I'll show before and after pics of both later this week.  (Posting them might shame me into not letting any new closets get to this level of messiness.)

Happy clearing,

The "right" way to clean house?

Is housecleaning like algebra?  One right answer, and only one way to get there?

Setting aside Flylady's methodology (do a little every day, focus on one room each week to gradually get it clean through and through), I am curious:  how do we decide the "best" way to clean a house? And why do we think that's the best way?

I am not convinced there's only one "right" way to clean a house or a room.  But I agree with the principle that some ways are more effective and/or efficient.

Personally, I am a room-by-room cleaner.  I guess I could dust the entire house, then vacuum the entire house, then mop the kitchen and bathroom floors, then deliver lightbulbs and extra toilet paper where needed, but why make all those passes over the same terrain?  Is it efficient?  Probably.  Is it effective? That depends on how you define effective.

I confess I am a transformation junkie:  I like seeing a room (or closet or drawer or cabinet or refrigerator) totally cleaned and organized before I move to the next target zone.  Getting one area clean motivates me to tackle the next one. So my method has effectiveness going for it, but I'm not sure how it ranks on the efficiency scale: I find myself carrying an arsenal of supplies with me as I make my way through the house.  My typical entourage includes:

• the vacuum and the microfiber duster with the telescoping handle to get under the beds and couches;
• a plastic tote full of bathroom cleansers and scrub brushes, disinfecting air sanitizers, furniture polish (allergen-reducing and multisurface) and LOTS of clean rags and microfiber cloths (yes, it's a big tote);
• paper towels and Windex and a magic eraser for smudges;
• extra trashcan liners, lightbulbs and spare rolls of toilet paper

That's a lot of stuff to haul around, but I do because I'd rather not scurry back-and-forth to the laundry room every time I need one of these items.  Efficient?  Or effective?  All I know is it works for me.

In our single-story house, I start at one end - usually our bathroom and work my way to the other.  If i get sidetracked, a same-day re-start is highly unlikely, so I block out enough time to knock it all out in one fell swoop. I've also learned from FlyLady some tips on not getting sidetracked.  Major closet cleanouts or desk organizing are tactical missions and I don't attempt them on a whole-house cleaning campaign. I don't want to get bogged down in one room and not have the time or energy to finish the rest of the house.

In each room, I start to the left or right of the door and work my way around the room.  I know I probably should clean top-to-bottom:  dust first, vacuum last - but I don't always do that.  Sometimes I vacuum, dust, then vacuum a final time.  With two long-haired pets and a family with allergies, my Dyson, microfiber cloths and dusters, and allergen-reducing furniture polish are my cleaning day BFFs.

The wet areas (kitchen and baths) are handled differently.  I spray the toilet to start it soaking, then start with the least-dirty area and move to the most-dirty areas:  sinks, shower, then toilet, buff them down and clean the mirrors, change lightbulbs, replenish the toilet paper, remove trash, sanitize the trashcan, add a liner, then finish with a hand-mopping of the floor.

The kitchen starts with a sink full of hot, soapy, bleachy water in which I soak the sink mats, strainers, and dog bowls.  When they're clean, I run a fresh sink of hot soapy water and wipe down everything, clean the oven, straighten drawers, remove smudge prints, and otherwise clean.  Mopping sometimes coincides with the rest of the cleaning, other times it is an independent operation that occurs randomly on quiet afternoons.

All the while I'm cleaning, I'm also running the washer and dryer.  It's nice to have a break every hour or so to stop and fold a load, and start another one going.  By the time the house is done, the laundry is usually close to being finished.  Final step is to clean the Dyson so it can air dry until the next use.

When we had our first few apartments, cleaning and laundry took a couple hours.  With each larger home, more time has been required.  Now it takes pretty much my entire Saturday to thoroughly clean this house from one end to the other (not counting the kids' rooms since they are old enough to clean - or not - their own space.)  And we're buying a larger house?  Hmmmm.  Do they come in self-cleaning models these days?

So how do you clean your house? Tips? Advice? Ideas?  Share, please!  'Cuz I'm going to need them soon!

Happy cleaning,

Holiday Sprint Week 2: Merely Organized or OCD?

I report, you decide.

But first some background.  You know the saying, "Be careful what you wish for, you might get it." Well, a couple years ago, I wished for a walk-in pantry. And my awesome husband and dad granted my wish: I have a truly palatial pantry that measures 4 feet by 10 feet (actually a tad bigger than that.)

Now, before you wonder what on earth I could complain about with this pantry, consider how many times most of us have wished for a bigger closet - but know in our hearts we'd just cram it full of stuff? Or a bigger purse - ditto. Or a bigger car, house, whatever. Bigger is not always better. We know this.

And I'm really not complaining - my pantry storage is awesome. It almost makes up for the fact that my kitchen workspace is a compact 9x9 (with another 9x9 for eating area. It's the smallest kitchen I've had since our first apartment, and we've lived here ten years - far longer than we've lived anywhere else.)

But back to the pantry. Do you know how much stuff you can store in a huge pantry? Let me tell you, it's a lot. And if you don't have time feel like putting away all the canned and boxed foods from the grocery store trip, it's okay - just slide the bags in the pantry and close the door. Channel Miss Scarlett O'Hara and tell yourself you'll think about it tomorrow.

So my slovenly ways finally caught up with me, and I found myself stepping over week-old bags of groceries randomly scattered on the pantry floor. That makes for an interesting gauntlet to cross when you dash into the pantry for something you need to add to your sizzling dish on the stove, right. this. second.  I'm embarrassed to show this picture, but here it was:

The "before" shot. Now you know why I keep the pantry door closed.

I gritted my teeth and went to work. Combined two boxes of quart-size tea bags into one. Combined the two boxes of individual-size green tea bags into one. Found I had two open boxes of many things ('Nilla wafers, cereal, snack crackers...the list goes on.) Dug deep and found a headless chocolate bunny from Easter. (It gets better.) Kept digging and found a headless chocolate Santa from last December. (I detect a homicidal pattern, and I'm pretty sure I know which child did it.) Found a can of mandarin oranges had ruptured and spilled down the back of one shelving unit. That was pleasant. Not.

Okay, so all the nastiness was tossed, the drippy stuff cleaned up, the floor under the shelves all vacuumed, the out-of-date items were scrapped, the new groceries were put away and the older stuff rotated to the front. I could stop right there - job done.  I probably should have stopped there.

The "in-between" shot - much better.

But there's just something alluring about taking organization to that next level - bordering on "Sleeping with the Enemy" kind of tidiness. (I think we were supposed to be disturbed by the scene with all the perfectly arranged canned goods, but I found myself admiring the neatness and organization and wondering if I could replicate it without being creepy. I digress.)

I realized as I began to clean and organize more deeply that I had allowed myself to pile things too deep on the shelves, which meant I was constantly reaching behind (and knocking things over) to retrieve or return something.  So this time around, I ruthlessly sorted and organized in a one-deep layer (except for canned goods.)

See, the labels are not all turned *perfectly* towards the front. No scary music playing.

And just above that, my triumph, my pièce de résistance:  my flours, grains and sugars are now all labeled and stacked in modular containers.

Yes, that is a big bottle of Bacardi.  It is vanilla-in-the-making, for culinary purposes only.

And the pastas and rice are all neatly organized and visible.  (Yes, I buy warehouse-size boxes of macaroni and spaghetti, along with white and brown rice.  We heart carbs in all shapes, sizes and textures.)

I don't think I alphabetized the boxes...

Now I'll let you be the judge - is it just good organization, or is it obsessive-compulsive?  Either way, now that I'm done I realize how much food we have stowed away.  Time to stop stockpiling, and see if I can use up a lot of these items - now that I can get to them.  My menus for the next few weeks will definitely be incorporating a lot of the excess buildup I found, and hopefully I can clear out a lot of the surplus before the holidays.

Happy organizing,

Dog + Dyson = Da Big Stinky

I adore my sweet dog.  She is 80 pounds of gentle playfulness - she sings, she sneezes on command and her Samoyed smile melts your heart.  She's also 80 pounds of beautiful white fur.  We keep her coat trimmed because she is an indoor dog, venturing outdoors only for a little R&R or to hang out with us when we're working around the yard.  But even trimmed, she sheds like nobody's business, as does the resident longhaired Mainecoon cat named - appropriately - Luci (short for Lucifer.)  Notice I'm not singing Luci's virtues...in fact, you can probably hear the crickets chirping in the deafening silence.

Little dog is not so little any more...

Anyhoo, I am the proud owner of a Dyson DC24, which slurps up everything it finds on our hard floors and area rugs.  (With the two resident beasts and the visits from "little dog" Sadie-the-grandpuppy, carpeting would be completely inbearable.)

Before the Dyson, I went through a series of cheap little stick vacs - not as powerful, but lightweight, easy to use and did an admirable job on the hard flooring.  When the most recent one died, and I finally broke over and got the vacuum of my dreams...or so I thought.

Let me preface this by saying I'm no stranger to the concept of cleaning the vacuum; in fact, I think the producers of Friends could have shot this vacuum-the-vacuum scene at my house.

The one major drawback to the Dyson is the difficulty in getting rid of the pet hair smell in between vacuumings - and it goes stale faster than an open bag of Lay's chips at the beach.  I thought it was just me, but after some Googling, I know I'm not alone in having problems with odor in my Dyson.  And when I say odor, I don't mean a little aroma - it's a hold-your-breath-or-you'll-gag kind of stench.  Vacuuming necessitates a second pass through the house with Febreeze or Oust spray, and even then I'm doing the "sniff sniff" test for hours afterward, certain I can still smell the telltale odor of pet hair.

After scouring the web for commiseration, tips and tricks, my next attempt to curb this problem involves a can of pressurized air to clean the cyclone chamber, and then a scented dryer sheet tucked into the dirt canister, after I take it apart and meticulously clean and wash all the filters and the plastic canister of course.    I love my dog, I love my Dyson, I love my dog, I love my Dyson...

Happy vacuuming,

A little potty talk

Not that kind, silly.  This is a serious water closet conversation.

I occasionally mention Flylady - in fact, I typically sing her praises.  I think her ideas and routines are awesome.  Wish I followed them all, but I don't.  (My sink is shined every night and those of you who know anything about her system will know what that means.)  I embrace her general principles and salute her passion for helping us all become more organized and in control of our homes and lives.

However, there is one area where Flylady and I aren't on the same page:  the toilet bowl.  She advocates a daily swish-and-swipe of your bowl, using nothing more than a little soap (leftover shampoo or something similar) or just water from the toilet bowl itself.

Not to get too graphic or gory, but errrmmm, that would seem to make your bowl brush a breeding ground for bacteria.  So I don't heed her advice on the daily swish thing, instead preferring a weekly scouring with a disinfecting cleaner, and then a buff job with a soft cloth.  I know my way leaves everything fairly clean from one week to the next, and I can always do a midweek emergency cleaning if need be.  (My desire for a clean toilet has always been driven by the fear of someday coming face-to-face with it in a time of crisis.  Hugging the bowl is most definitely a low point anyway...you surely want to know the bowl has been recently disenfected, right?)

This came to mind because my bowl brushes are about ready for replacement.  Every time I read her admonition to swish and swipe each day, I wrestle with the desire for a daily tidying vs. getting the heebie jeebies just thinking about a gnarly bowl brush sitting there beside each toilet.  Maybe I'll scout out some new brushes that have a little deeper water-tight compartment, and try the daily thing with a healthy squirt of disinfecting cleaner and water.  (No young children or curious pets to worry about getting in it.) 

And while we're on the delicate subject of uhhh, toilets, I can now say I've bought toilet paper at the strangest place ever: Staples.   They carry the Marcal Small Steps brand of toilet paper, which is 100% post-recycled paper.  (Yeah, recycled toilet paper..there's a joke in there somewhere.)

Kroger's carried this brand for a while, but the last time I needed to stock up, I couldn't find it. When I spotted a 48-roll pack at Staples for $16.99, I snagged it in a heartbeat. But I felt a little self-conscious lugging this ginormous package of TP from an office supply store.  At least it will last us a while...maybe Kroger's will have it in stock when I need to buy more?

Housecleaning 101: Fight fire with fire

When I dashed out the door Friday afternoon to scoop up a car load of girls and haul them to the mountains, the house wasn't in shambles, but it wasn't really clean, either. Laundry was done, but not put away.  Bed was made, but I didn't have time to change the sheets.  Dishes were done, but left to dry next to the sink.  You get the picture.

Our return was heralded with suitcases full of dirty laundry, shopping bags of new acquisitions, and quite a few leftover groceries, which I frugally refused to throw away when we packed up our belongings yesterday.  The house-sitting son worked most of the weekend (that's his excuse and he's sticking to it), so tidying up behind us or himself was not high on his list of to-do's either.

So here I am with a clean desk: a peaceful island in a churning sea of wreckage.  (Kind of makes me just want to hang out at the desk all day, but I guess that's not really an option.)

How do I clean a ravaged house?

Conventional wisdom says, "dig in and clean."  Phooey on that.  I figure I should first make a BIGGER mess, THEN I can really clean up.  (Otherwise, I would be cleaning up, only to mess it up again.  Two birds, one stone, all that.)  So instead of launching an assault on the mess, I grabbed some buckets, headed outside and picked grapes.  I should have picked them last week, but I knew there was no way I could squeeze juice- and jelly- making into that schedule, so I took my chances the birds and insects would leave a few for me and indeed they did.  I enjoyed our "cold snap" (those weather forecasters have a zany sense of humor) and sweated and swatted long enough to pick about ten pounds of grapes.  They're smaller than last year, probably due to the dry weather while they were ripening.

As expected, the grape juicing process made a mess - bright purple splotches and stains on the counters and several sticky pans and a Foley food mill to wash up.  Much better to do this all at once, eh?

Good news:  the kitchen is now much more respectable.  Now on to tackle the laundry and get fresh linens on the bed before bedtime!

Clean Desk Mission: Day 7

As promised, an update.  One week in, and the formerly wrecked desk is still clean.  (Yes, this is what I consider clean.   I never said "clear," just clean.)

Admittedly, I had a close-call on Day 5, when I was busy printing and editing and reprinting various items for our 2nd annual school supply giveaway (tomorrow at 10 - woohoo!)

Very late Wednesday night, I was ready to call it a day, but my desk still had notebooks and papers strewn everywhere. (It  looked like the "good old messy desk days.")  And I was tired and drained and tempted to leave it that way, but I knew I didn't want to start out the next morning with it in shambles.  So I took a few minutes to shred the discarded paper and tucked the remaining papers into their proper places. 

Transforming the desk also transformed my mood:  I caught my second wind and felt relaxed and calm, instead of stressed and exhausted.  So I pulled out a daily devotional book to catch up on some overdue reading.  I first had to figure out which day of the year I was on.  Since my calendar blotter was visible, I determined it was day 209 with just a quick glance.  That's a first.  Usually it requires moving a stack of something out of the way to find the calendar.

Then I pulled out my new prayer journal and updated it with a prayer request, and then I spent some time pouring out my heart to God...also a little overdue.

In case you're worrying, no, I'm not setting the stage for some variation of the "Cleanliness is next to Godliness" mantra.  But having a clean desk did let me spend some quiet time in prayer and meditation.  Just saying.

In other related news, I cleaned out the pond pump filters a few nights ago.  My efforts were rewarded with crystal-clear water and an opportunity to meet our newest resident, Mr. Froggy.

Alas, this picture isn't of him.  It's his stunt double or stand-in, or whatever they call them.  Seriously, I didn't have my camera handy when Froggy was doing his underwater acrobatics routine at feeding time.  (I have had the camera "at the ready" since I first saw our new amphibian friend, but no frog spottings since.  I don't know if he's camera-shy or what; time will tell.)  I snapped this picture a few years ago to prove that indeed frogs do hang out on lily pads just like in the storybook illustrations.  We almost always have some frogs around the house and pond - here's hoping they catch their weight in flies and mosquitoes each day!

Success is....

1. Having a freshly-made bed, a clean bedroom and closet (no more pile of lost little shoes hanging out in there...)
2. Seeing the top of my desk again. Hello, old friend - it's been a while!
3. Seeing the top of my dryer again.  Amazingly, it was still there after I excavated a mountain of unfolded clothes and towels (which are now folded and ready to be put away.)
4. Seeing my laundry folding counter again.  No more trays of leggy tomato seedlings desperately waiting to be planted.  (Thank you sweet husband of mine!)
5. Taking care of all those pesky, easy-to-forget chores like emptied wastebaskets in out-of-the-way rooms and a clean air filter on the A/C unit.
6.  Having a full-week's menu planned out, with some new recipes to boot.. 
7.  Getting it all done while it rained, so I didn't waste precious daylight doing indoor chores. AND the deck plants got watered courtesy of Mother Nature.


Sun's shining...time to hit the grocery store!

Just another manic Monday in a mad March

What a month March has been: we pulled off two dinner parties, got new Fiesta Ware, spent a week sick, then nursing other family members back to health, (hopefully that was an extremely isolated incident); had a fabulous spring break trip to South Carolina, and Bruce Pearl got our boys all the way to the Elite Eight for the first time ever, and within two points of being in the Final Four. Next year, baby.

Not to mention the mad, mad weather patterns that plagued us this winter, even into March - who knew we could get snowed out of our annual ski trip??? Friday is supposed to hit 80. I'm sooo ready for it.

So now I'm looking ahead at April (if only I could see my desk calendar, I'm sure April is next), and I'm setting some goals for my non-working hours:

1) Clean off my desk before April 1 so I can change the calendar.
2) Clean out my car (I think we hauled home a half-ton of beach sand.)
3) Finish two different newsletters this week and start the next issue of a third newsletter, due out May 1.
4) Paint the hall and den before Bunco on 4/12.
5) Update the mantel with pictures and stuff from our beach trip.
6) Sand and stain the low dresser that's been sitting in the garage since last April.
7) Pressure wash everything - deck, sidewalk, gutters, shutters...everything.
8) Trip to Rita's in Jackson to buy spring flowers - bring home and plant them
9) Get the vegetable garden planted with peas, shallots, and lettuce, then tomatoes and peppers after the last frost.

Nine goals, four weeks: no sweat. I'll save the sweating for the gym; after this morning's tepid performance - barely 3 miles - I need to put in some early morning hours there.

The dreaded four-letter d-word

No, not that one. Another d-word. d-e-s-k. Also answers to "center of my universe," "command central," "arch nemesis," "the black hole," "Bermuda triangle," etc., etc. You get the idea. This relationship is beyond love/hate - it makes the "War of the Roses" (the movie, not the actual war) look like a tale of wedded bliss.

This desk is where I spend the majority of my waking hours, and yet I can't seem to keep any semblance of order, at least not for very long...a day or two at most, and then the detritus slowly builds: papers that should be filed or round-filed, clipped coupons, pens, stamps, paperclips, checkbook, junk mail, is that a bottle of contact lens solution over there? Yep. They all lay here, silently accusing me of sloth and disorganization.

Today is a new day, a time for a fresh start. Today I am cleaning it for real (not just tidying the stacks, or transplanting everything to the floor in my classic Scarlet O'Hara "I'll think about that tomorrow!" maneuver.) Really, truly clean. Filed, tossed, put away. If I'm not heard from in 24 hours, someone put out an APB - you'll know the desk finally swallowed me whole.

In other news, the Dutch oven has been broken in: she gently cradled a pork tenderloin smothered in onions, garlic and seasoning yesterday, at 325 for 2 hours. Yum. The sourdough starter is still going, but it was getting a little watery, so I drained off the hooch and thickened up the flour addition. It bubbles, but doesn't double in size.

Weather-wise, it seems we are deep in the icy frost pocket of winter's thick coat. The 10-day forecast is bleak - the best we can hope for is to edge toward the upper 40s towards the end of the month, but not before we have a few more brushes with some snow next week.

Update: Okay, so it's late afternoon and the desk is *almost* done. (Where have I heard that before?) And as a reward for digging to the bottom? I found a sale ad for new Fiestaware. Square Fiestaware. Be still my beating heart...

Second Monday in January

Believe it or not, it is national "Clean Off Your Desk Day." Yes, it's apparently an actual holiday - I found a reference to it in Boardroom.com's Bottom Line. I beat the rush and cleaned mine off yesterday, which could explain why there's a chance of snow again today. Cleaning off my desk is such an unusual activity, it might just trigger a weather phenomenon.

In other news, our dinner party was so much fun, thanks to our guests who joined us for a wonderful meal and time to just sit and talk...something we don't do enough of with friends. Tonight is Bunco, and yes, it does involve dice and money, but it's not gambling. I'm making a pot of potato soup to take with, as the weather is still very much wintery-feeling.

Middle child had his wisdom teeth taken out today. I guess oral surgery has changed - what was a half-a-day ordeal is now 30 minutes from start to finish.