clean my bedroom and bathroom at my dad's house

until after Labor Day. After my parents finish separating their belongings. This room won’t be used (except by me and maybe my sister) until then, anyway. Once September rolls around, I’ll finish this up and, ideally, help my dad turn it into a home office.

I may head to my dad’s house this evening, as I have an appointment in town at 8am tomorrow morning. If that’s the case, I’ll plan on getting there a couple hours before he gets home from work so I can finish this goal once and for all.

But whether it’s tonight or sometime in the near future (dammit!), I need a game plan…

• wipe down boxes currently stored under the bed, stack in the closet
• dust off the contents of the armoire, stack in the closet
• clean up stuffed animals, bag up, and place in closet
• dust off remaining furniture
• vacuum the bedroom and hallway
• wash towels and bedding
• make bed and restock bathroom with towels
• sort through box of toiletry items in bathroom
• quick bathroom cleaning, if necessary

That looks like a lot, but if I really focus it shouldn’t be more than an evening’s worth of work. End result? Finally completing a much-overdue goal AND setting the stage for my dad to turn the room into an office. Which, if he doesn’t do on his own, might be my next project…

I went to my dad’s on Sunday and he made a comment about the pile of junk in the upstairs hallway. He rarely goes up there, so I just wasn’t worrying about it. But I bit the bullet and took care of most of that clutter – putting piles of schoolwork and books into my closet and sorting out the things that will be donated to Salvation Army (or wherever). One more small step in the right direction, and it took less than 10 minutes.

My dad cleaned the bathtub. I guess he got sick of waiting, though I have no idea why because he never goes upstairs. I feel bad that he got to it before I did, but that’s a huge chunk of time that I can dedicate instead to cleaning up my bedroom.

Now, for carving out that time. Maybe I’ll get started on that tomorrow morning (yeah, probably not how I’m going to spend my last vacation day) or Tuesday evening. It should be REALLY easy – dusting off boxes and piling them up in the closet, then vacuuming the whole room. However, things are never as easy as I hope.

I am 95% moved out of my dad’s house. I know I have random things throughout, like a few DVDs in the basement, magnets on the fridge, blah blah, blah.

But my worse offense is that I never finished cleaning my bathroom or clearing out AND cleaning my bedroom. I’ve been to his house a handful of times over the past month, but I never feel like working while I’m there. That’s not fair to him to leave that space so dirty.

I’m heading out there tonight for a brief visit. I’m hoping to at least quickly clean the bathroom floors so they’re not gross while my sister’s staying there over the holidays. Eventually I’ll also need to clean the bathtub… that’s for another day. MAYBE I’ll designate a few hours during my time off to finish everything in both rooms. It would be nice to start the New Year without having this worry looming overhead. And then my dad can do whatever he pleases with that space.