MAKE IT MAGIC

9:34 am

No, I am not talking about Christmas already. It is just that today is one of those days when I lack the motivation to get started. It just simply sounds like too much. I haven't done my my 10 min in a long time and it feels like it is time to revive it. It worked well when I did it. I can do it. 10 min of work 10 of play. Lets gt started! 

10:27 am

The first 30 min are done. The baby is back in bed, I talked to a friend on the phone, I had breakfast. That sounds okay for an hour, doesn't it. Let's see what I can do in the next hour!

11:27 

40 min taken care of. Washer and dishwasher are running. Kitchen is almost done,I am trying to talk myself into going up to the attic. Well. Maybe once the kitchen is taken care of. 

16:57

I got a total of 2,5 hours done. I cooked, I got Halloween costumes out. I did some yard work. I sorted out a costume that is too small for any of my kids. 

16:58

Picked 8 things off the patio to throw away. My inner "Monk" kicked in and made me find 2 more to make it 10. I will declare myself a hero and put dinner in the oven that I pre-made yesterday.

7 a day, 1 costume, 1 shoe, 8 pieces of trash of the patio, 2 more from the living room, 5 piees of clothing out of my husband's wardrobe

surface of the day: girls' room floor

I FELT LIKE WHINING

Today I was going to whine about how I don't ever get around to decluttering anymore and how there is no progress. But guess what. I got rid of what seemed like a cubic meter of baby clothes today. And a baby hammock. And let us not forget about the old bike trailer that a neighbor claimed to have use for. The reason non of this feels like I got it done is because it took weeks and weeks to bring that mountain of baby clothes together. Every time I found a random piece some where I put it in a bag in one of the towers of doom. Yes. They are still in the living room. But back to my success. I AM making progress. It might be slow. it might be barely visible at the moment but in the long run my hard work is definitely paying off 

7 a day: mountains of baby clotes, bike trailer, 1 shoe

surface of the day: the inside of one of the towers of doom

BERMUDA TRIANGLE

Believe it or not, I have my very personal Bermuda Triangle. The whole house is one stinking Bermuda Triangle. Things have become a lot better but just today,I spent at least 2 hours looking for something that I as willing to bet knew exactly where it was. On the dresser, in the hall. IT was right there. On the dresser, for the last 2 weeks. The second I need it. Gone. Okay. I haven't seen it the last few days I guess. But, can you believe it? It evaporated. And ever person living in the Bermuda triangle claims they have never seen him. So obviously it sucks up memories, too. Downright tiresome. I need it by Monday. It better resurface. 

7 a day: cheap toys, paper, paper, paper

surface of the day: top and 2 drawers of the the dresser it has been sitting on

CHILDREN'S CHORES

Let's face it. A lot of the daily disaster is created by the kids. Why not let them clean it up, too? I have heard from people that my poor children have to work quite hard. Interestingly enough that comment usually comes from moms whose kids are spoiled rotten in my opinion. They call it child labor. I call it raising responsible adults.

If you had asked me 15 years ago if I thought that a 4 year old could unload the dishwasher I would have said:"NO WAY!" Yes way. A 4 year old can unload the dishwasher, and will be proud of being given such a responsibility. Sneaky me rearranged the kitchen so the kids could reach everything easily to set the table. Positive side effect is, they can reach it all, too, when it comes to putting the clean dishes away. I didn't really want them to handle the glasses, so the glasses stayed up high.

When one of the kids had difficulties at school, we talked to a specialist. The topic of household chores came up. She was delighted to hear that our kids had responsibilities. The only thing she would have changed was to teach the kids to take a chair to climb on, so they could put the glasses away. I had mixed emotions about it. I decided we would stay with the "put away what you can reach" rule. 2 weeks later the very kid we had been talking about came to the living room with a proud smile on his face. "Mommy," he said, "I put the glasses away. I got myself a chair and when I climb on the chair I can reach the shelf."

Problem solving skills, self esteem, responsibility. And an empty dishwasher. All in one. Awesome! Now if only I could get them to pick up their toys!

7 a day: enough paper to fill up the recycling. I am not sure where it all comes from. SERIOUSLY!

surface of the day: I attempted a shelf in the livign room and failed miserably. At least I picked out everything that could be thrown away. The rest is homeless stuff and I don't want to deal with it today!a

"CANDLES"

Why on earth would I keep this? Beats me. I really don't know. I guess I was under the impression that one could make his/her own candles out of stumps. Right. Very likely.

NOT! Well. No worries. The stuff is gone. The big achievement is not in throwing it away, the big achievement is in noticing that it is trash and making a mental note, so next time things like that will make it to the trash with out a detour to the attic!

7 a day: candle stumps, a pair of pants, 3 socks, 2 pairs of shoes

surface of the day: no surface, sorry, it's SATURDAY!

I LOST FOCUS

A couple of weeks ago I decided to make the choice of being happy. Yesterday I noticed that I lost focus. For the last week feelings of overwhelm and dread started to wash up my happy little shore again. So today once more, I chose to be happy. I also started taking vitamin B. Last week was crazy, but lets face it. This Monday morning there was less left to do than on after a normal week. So I am doing great. I will not let myself be defeated by minor things.

One of my bigger accomplishments is sorting more game pieces into their original boxes. I am not sure why I dreaded this so  much. Maybe because it is one of those tasks where every time you think you are done one more piece surfaces. But you know what? I don't care. I found the instructions to a game, that I gave to my sister. I scanned it, sent her an email and threw away the instructions! Okay. So it took me 3 days, but I finally did it!

Surface of the day: basket full of random

5 a day:game instructions, kid' art, game pieces

"CRAZY" DOES NOT DESCRIBE IT

SOMETHING. EVERY. DAY. I am not made for a schedule like this. It's been going on for weeks. Something basically every day. And the next 2 weeks are no different. How on earth is one supposed to stay sane?
I have a friend who thrives under those circumstances. I don't. I feel like a rabbit on the run. It stresses me, and wears me out. I tried to maintain the house and failed. Things could be worse of course, but I still feel like I should have done better.

Thanks to James things didn't completely fall apart.

THURSDAY IS THE NEW TUESDAY

How does Taxi-Thursday sound to you? Well it sounds horrible to me. But it looks like it might turn out to be just as terrible as Tuesday with the amount of shuttling kids back and forth. If I am lucky I can work around it still. I feel like I got absolutely nothing done today. The phone rang all morning and I was going all over the place all afternoon and a friend stopped by at night. The laundry I took care of in the morning feels like it got done a week ago. Tomorrow will be crazy, Saturday will be crazy. My life has been crazy for a few weeks and it doesn't sound like it will calm down any time soon. I am not sure how decluttering will go during this time, but I refuse to give up. 

The last few days I did well putting parts of games back in the original box, a task I have avoided for months. I guess if I managed to keep up with maintenance. not forget any of the 27 million appointments on the calendar until the end of the month and get 5 days out of the house every day I will be a happy woman. 

surface of the day: a basket full of ironing

5 a day: uhm. Well. hm. nothing. Tomorrow. I promise!

I READ A WHOLE BOOK

Today I gave myself permission to simply read a book. More or less a whole book. I did start it yesterday. My friend gave it to me yesterday. She got it for herself to read, but gave it to me first, saying:"you'll be done with it a lot faster then I will be." True. But I am already reading a book. And I abandoned that one to read another one I got from a friend last Friday. (Yup. I finished it and returned that one already.) No wonder she ever has time to dig through her stuff you will say. I guess it is a way of decluttering for me. This way, the book is read and returned in less than a week. One more thing off my list. I think it would be easier to just say:"Thank you so much for thinking of me, but I really don't have time for this book right now. I'll get back to you."

Well. The book is read. The 3rd load of laundry is running, the dishwasher was loaded and is read to be loaded again, 2nd load in the dryer, 2 loads folded and one put away. It is not like I was idle. I even got all the kids to do a chore around the house. And got a hold of the repair man for the washer finally. And music lessons sorted out. Most likely I am doing a lot better than I think,it'S just hard for me to give my self credit for the things I do get accomplished. 

Surface of the day: kitchen counter (always a surprise how much stuff ends up there)

7 a day: indoor trash can (Ironic, I know, throwing out a trash can, but the thing was old AND broken) 2 plates

VISITORS

Nothing like a bunch of visitors to get you motivated. I even had nightmares about them coming over. But. The downstairs is clean. At least something. I even spend some time on my miscellaneous drawer in the living room. It's a tiny drawer and it mostly contains cards and other game pieces that lost contact with the mother ship. Not only did I get a lot of it back into the original box, I also found 3 things to throw away I must say just getting started on that drawer helped me feel better. It might be one of my least problems, but it's been on my mind for a while now.

7 a day: 1 pair of shoes, 5 socks, 3 random items from the game pieces drawer

surface of the day: lets count that drawer

BACK TO THE BASICS

I had a hard day. Just overemotional, and a few insensitive people crossing my path telling me I must do this and I must do that. I am sick and tired of it. I feel stupid when they do that. They don't make suggestions. They don't offer solutions. They say:"Katja, you must change your attitude, you must do this, you must do that." 

By 2 pm I was in tears. When I have meltdowns I don't get anything done. And then I feel bad. I finally got myself to drag myself and the little ones to the fair as promised. Now they are all asleep and I decided to go back to the basic. Not 10 magic minutes, no , too demanding. 1 by 1 is the solution for tonight. Immediate success, as even I can put away one thing. Or even 2. 

surface of the day: area by the front door

7 a day: I know the kids need to write and draw and cut to exercise their fine motor skills but why am I the one who has to throw out all those pieces of art?

HAPPY ANNIVERSARY TO ME!

1 year of blogging about my hoarding. Here are a few things I have learned:

• sorting is just a nice word for churning
• parting with things makes you feel lighter
• if you haven't used it in 5 years, why would you need it still?
• giving things away makes other people happy
• it's nice to have space
• it's nice to be able to let people in without having to shut all the doors
• it's nice to find things when you need them (and not 5 months later)
• you don't have to take things people want to dump on you
• having less things gives you more energy to do other things

I could tell you quite a few more, but I will leave it at that. I am not cleared yet, but I am well on my way. I also recognize behavior that gets me in trouble. And even if I still fall into a few of the hoarder traps, it is a lot less often and most of the time, I get rid of the stuff before it takes up permanent residence!

I will continue dehoarding and hope you'll stay with me for the journey!

THE CARDBOARD BOX

Today I threw away a card board box. Why do I fell the need to tell you about this? Well, because it is a huge accomplishment. I got the box from a friend, with children's clothes in it. It was emptied in the sorting process and has a new owner. Now the box sat in my house, empty. For days I have been telling myself that I should throw it away. But what if I needed it? To store things? ARGH! Guess what. I  will not need the box. Because I don't have anything that I will put in a box. Especially not anything that will go into a card bard box that used to have diapers in them. I had to tear up the box to go through with throwing it out. But I did. And if felt like the sensible thing to do. I can and I will do it. 

7 a day: my cardboard box, paper, lots of clothing items

surface of the day: 2 boxes out of my brand new hoard room