Get some rhythm in my life.

At my new apartments I hope to find a rhythm that includes meeting with other people. I always feel motivated by groups, because I know a group depends on each other to all be faithful and attend.

Besides exercise and cooking, I’m hoping to find people who will perhaps be willing to share chores with me. I’ll come to their house and help if they’ll come to my house and help. I think cleaning with a partner is much more fun and motivational than just trying to do it alone. Having company over is motivation to be sure your clutter is picked up, so the focus can stay on actual CLEANING, such as wiping down all surfaces, dusting, and vacuuming.

When I was in school I responded well to the rhythm of classes changing every hour, but repeating every day. That kind of freshness with familiarity keeps things from becoming too boring for me. Plus, having an appointment to accomplish a task is MUCH more motivational than knowing you can do it just “any time”. “Any time” usually ends up being “never” when I’m left on my own and can procrastinate.

What is the term for doing something approximately right before you are able to do it really right? Like the way a toddler walks before they can actually walk, when they’re still falling down a lot on their diaper. I think the technical term is “shaping” or “modelling” or something like that. Maybe I should just call it toddling.

I’m toddling towards housekeeping.

I’ve decided one rhythmic beat I can probably kinda keep regularly is to aim to get my machines all running at 7:30am. Or at least by 8am. The noise of the machines can be part of my morning ritual in waking up my son for school. And getting them going is a very positive step towards keeping the house maintained daily.

(When I say “the machines” of course I’m referring to my dishwasher, dryer, and washing machine.)

I still get a kick out of the mental image of those machines as my “housekeeping minions”, or like something similar to “Rosie the Robot” who kept house for the Jetsons.

Today I made my bed (for whatever that is worth). My sheets and all need washing, but at least it’s made. I’ve made a deal with myself that as soon as I get my star quilt finished I’ll wash it, then re-make the bed with all fresh sheets and everything.

Actually, as I walk past my bedroom and see the bed made, it DOES give me a lift, compared to seeing it sprawled out all undignified-like.

Also did start the laundry. Folded and put away stuff. It’s nice to listen to the hum of the machines while I relax. I’m proud that the floor of the laundry area is clear, so I’m hypothetically “caught up” for now. Which is a lie, because really I know there is lots of dirty laundry on my bedroom floor, not to mention EVERYONE’S bedsheets. But at least we aren’t stepping over piles in the hallway now.

I baked biscuits for breakfast. The kids love that. (So do I.)

I need to go shopping again today and get a few things that will store well on pantry shelves, or will carry well to school for my daughter.

I’m thinking of taking some old towels that we no longer use and cutting them down to washcloth or hand towel size, for use in cleaning the house. We have a bunch of cleaning rags already, but I don’t like them because they’re all different sizes and they’re hard to fold neatly and store. If I make a whole new batch I can make them all the same sizes, and that will make my closet neater when they’re folded and put away. I have about seven big old towels that could be cut up and made into these new cleaning cloths. It will be a fun project, because I love ripping fabric. Then all I have to do is zigzag around the edges to keep them from fraying.

The star quilt is almost done. I think I could complete it today. I have just a few more seams to do. Like maybe eight or ten or so. Should take me about two hours. It’s tempting to do that first, but I should save it for this evening after it’s dark and I can’t do anything else, and I’m watching TV with my kids.

The weather is beautiful. I really shouldn’t miss the opportunity to go shopping. The movement will do me good. It’s important for me to get moving again, and get used to walking to the bus. I want to revisit my “joyride” goal, but that will never happen if I don’t overcome my resistance to just leaving the house.

STOP TRYING TO CLEAN HOUSE WITHOUTAEROSMITH AND VIVARIN!

1. Making the bed: I’m already in the habit now of making my bed the second I roll out of it. I have sometimes considered skipping this simple chore, but have never once regretted sticking to it. It is extremely nice to glance in the bedroom and see the bed made nicely. It makes everything else look like a minor detail.

2. Shower: Seems obvious, but for a while there I was putzing around not bothering to shower until “later”, which as we all know is a time which doesn’t exist. So I would miss days. Now I’m back to my rhythm of showering first thing in the morning. Showering at night would be better, but I haven’t gotten that one down yet.

3. Laundry: Laundry is easy if it’s a habit. I try not to even let myself walk past the machines (on the way to the kitchen) before starting them. One load per day will keep me caught up nicely. Needing to discipline myself to actually HANG UP and FOLD clean laundry instead of leaving it to wrinkle in a basket of clean clothes I’ll get to “later” (see caveat on 2). The laundry piles in the hall have been eliminated, and now I only have leftover stuff by my closet to worry about.

4. Dishes: Dishwasher is emptied first thing, and spare dishes put in right away. This starts the day off well. I can get my child to run the second daily load and put them away if necessary. This keeps counters and sink tidy, and foils flies.

Those are all the daily beats I’m currently doing well.

I want to add sweeping, mopping, vacuuming, bathroom cleaning, mail, and general tidying up to my daily habits. I haven’t got those things nicely caught up or regular yet, but I have confidence I will.

I lack structure. I’m thinking I’ll try to enroll in college this fall. I am one (ONE!) class short of my Associates of Arts and Sciences degree. I don’t know why I haven’t done this before. Now seems like a good time.

One math class stands between me and having a college degree. I’ll get to go to class every day and make friends, and have a reason to get up and moving. I’ll eat pizza with my study buddies. I’ll share my notes with someone who feels intimidated by how fast the teacher talks. It’ll be great.

I made out like a thief today!

I got to my appointment with plenty of time to spare. Spent a couple of hours going over all kinds of important information about my housing, and ironing out some forms and questions I had.

Then went shopping. I stayed pretty well within my $50 budget, but I got even more than I had hoped for! It was a very lucky day of shopping for me.

• 1 blue jeans
• 1 tight leggings (for under skirts on cold days)
• 2 simple undershirt shells
• 1 fancy embellished tank top
• 2 fancy overshirts
• 1 fancy blouse/tunic
• 2 dresses
• 1 skirt (floor length sueded silk)
• 1 red suede jacket

And, incredibly, though this is a secondhand store, at least five of those items were actually BRAND NEW (tags still attached)!

Everything fits perfectly, everything is colorful and well-made and in good condition, everything is flattering and all together probably would have cost me HUNDREDS of dollars new. I’m so stoked!

It really is true that I can often accomplish more in the first hour of the day than I will the whole rest of the day.

The weird thing is that if I laze about and DON’T accomplish anything in the first hour, the whole rest of the day tends to get wasted as well. If I do hit the ground running, with a plan and a list and an unthinking kind of automated do-things mode, I will accomplish AMAZING things before breakfast!

Many days I wake up late, after having stayed up late the night before. I shuffle to the computer and start my daily rounds of checking on all my favorite websites and e-mail, watch a few videos, make a few comments, and tell the kids to keep moving so they wouldn’t be late for school. My mothering role on those days is purely supervisory, because I’m surely not DOING much.

Days like that often disappear like sand between my fingers, as my butt hardly ever leaves the computer chair except to eat and such. Sometimes I don’t even bother changing out of my night clothes. It’s so sad. I can lose weeks that way.

Today I woke at 6am after having gone to bed quite early last night. I had a note by my bed of an important appointment I must not forget today, so I reached over and grabbed the notepad and listed a few more things I don’t want to forget. Before even getting out of bed, I had a plan for my day. It was all simple stuff, like buying trash bags and doing laundry. Then I added in the fun stuff I knew I was going to do anyway, like mess around on the internet or play games. But I put a definite time frame around it. I told myself I could spare three or four hours today for that. That would be much more appropriate than spending 18 hours on it like I sometimes do.

So when my feet hit the floor I was already moving. I cleaned out and started the dishwasher, emptied the trash, and started cooking a good breakfast of chicken with spinach, onions, carrots and peas. (We eat “dinner” for breakfast a lot here.) I have checked my internet stuff, and now am ready to take my shower and leave the house. I have plans to actually make it out the door by 10am.

While I’m out I’m going to have an appointment, shop for a few groceries, and also shop for some new clothes. I need a new skirt, pants, three shirts, and possibly a dress. I should be able to get all of that for about $50 secondhand.

I still need to do laundry this afternoon. Towels need folding and shirts need washing. I need to take a pitchfork to my bedroom floor and discover the carpet again. For weeks or months now I’ve dropped all my clothes on the floor whether they were dirty or clean and just not what I wanted to wear that day after trying them on. Now it’s all a nasty mess and I have to start from scratch.

Next week I’ll plan a purge, where anything I don’t like or that doesn’t fit will get banished to the far side of the closet. If I don’t change my mind about it in a year, it is gone.

Having an appointment today really helps. I know if I’m going to make it by 11am I have to leave the house by 10, and to do that I have to get off the computer now and go take my shower and get dressed.

Today is gonna be a good day.

NOTHING gets done around here after dark. In the wintertime, that can mean a whole lot of loitering around the TV. The sun begins to go down at 4pm, and when it’s dark it just feels like evening, so there’s no motivation to start anything new.

Yesterday after my last “rhythm” post I did paint the top half of that wall. My daughter tried to help me paint the lower half, but her style of pouncing the technique was different from mine, just the way her handwriting is different from mine. So we agreed that I should finish the whole project myself, to keep the pattern consistant.

Cool thing about this parchment technique is that you can start and stop pretty much anywhere and anytime you want. Unlike normal wall painting you don’t have to be so worried about “dry edge” lines, because everything is randomly scrambled anyway. There are no straight edges to catch your eye.

So in the past three hours I’ve painted the top half of that wall, and cooked lunch, and watched a bunch of reruns of Good Eats. I’m learning more about cooking Christmas Dinner. (Which knowledge I may never use, but it’s still interesting.)

Last time I painted I noticed that it would be way smarter to paint from the top down, so that any drips can be handled when I paint the lower part instead of having to go over things twice.