set up FLYlady routines

Going to try to get in the habit of decluttering 15 min./day. Skipped yesterday but tonight was good. I’m somewhat staying on top of things in general, but laundry/shopping day (laundromat and store are right next to each other) still seems to take way too much time. I can’t wait to live in a house with a washer/dryer.

Some things are really working and some aren’t. My house still falls apart on a regular basis (I’m writing this amidst giant piles of papers to file) but my sink is usually shiny and my bathroom is usually swished & swiped. I’m terrible at 15 minute decluttering though. Need to get back on that one.

Kind of falling apart with the holiday rush. Had a party last weekend and house is still a wreck from the aftermath. Laundry is in the dryer at the laundromat right now (God I hate the laundromat). Did manage to clean behind the stove (hadn’t been done since we moved in and there were all kinds of science projects back there) and fix the bathroom curtain (procrastinated on that one for a couple years). Just keep thinking how much worse it would be if I hadn’t been doing the bare minimum (shining sink, swish and swipe).

Last night my obsessive neat-freak boyfriend came over and said, “Now that is a CLEAN kitchen!”. I was very proud. He was even afraid to pour something down my shiny sink, but I told him no worries, I shine it every day. Still have more projects to do (behind the stove…ick. And the surface under the burners…shudder) but it’s looking good. Decluttering the surface of the fridge really helped.

Sink still shiny. Toilet/bathroom sink clean. Menus for the week planned and shopped for (though I still have to make an emergency milk & garbage bag run tomorrow). I’ve been making my bed most days (not today) and am barely staying on top of my hot spot.

However, I think this is going to get tougher. I can feel myself resisting so I need to slow down adding new things. It’s a lot of work when I’m not used to doing so much on a daily basis. I’m trying to get to the point where it’s automatic, but it’ll take time.

Been really bad about 15-minute decluttering, and the weekly plan just scares me right now. Gotta babystep this.

FLYlady rocks both my proverbial and literal house. I’m taking a slightly loose approach, for example, choosing a small project that’s really been bugging me instead of 15 min. decluttering. But my sink has been shiny for 12 days, and even my brother is washing his dishes when he’s done with them. I’m still on Babysteps, but I couldn’t resist integrating swish & swipe into my morning routine, and I love not watching my bathroom get dirty and dreading Sunday when I would usually clean it all. It really takes hardly any time!

Talk about negative voices though…my BF is really OCD about having a clean apartment, and he’s always trying to clean my piles of business receipts and stuff, which makes me very panicky. I told him just to lay off until my routines kick in more, but I feel a lot of pressure from him to have a 100% clean apartment NOW. It’s hard to be nice to myself about it when I feel that, but it’s the only way I’ll stick with this.

Lately our apartment has had a lot of uninvited guests moving in, namely flies – both house and fruit. And they are GROSS. So I was thinking I need to do a really big clean and feeling overwhelmed about it, thinking about flies, and finally remembered flylady, which I stumbled into awhile back and forgot about.

This time I actually joined and dutifully cleaned and shined my sink. But then something weird happened. I didn’t expect it, but I just stood there for a long time staring at it and feeling things. Mostly how I judge myself for not staying on top of housework, and how I feel judged by my OCD-clean-freak boyfriend, and how awe-inspiring it was to stare at my never-shiny-until-now sink and know that there was not a single piece of crud or unclean funk hanging around there.

Sorry for the long story, but this is one I really hope I stick to.