Fix up my house - clean, organize, repair, maintain, decorate

since I created subgoals.

I can’t even tell you how remarkable it has become for me… and how it is impacting other (seemingly non-related) areas in my life.

I will aim to check in weekly.

March Goal: Clean out my garage

March Goal: Decorate the Purple Room

March Goal: Create a sacred writing/reflecting space on my front porch

I’m calling this “done”, but maybe it should be “I give up”. It’s too broad a goal for me. I’m going to set it aside for more accomplishable and specific goals.

and the mindful aspect of it managed to make me feel so much better than I had felt when I started sweeping.

As I was sweeping I was thinking about which part of my house I want to focus upon first, in a project way.

I never got to Katherine or Emma’s room this Summer. I hit barriers that I couldn’t have foreseen. (Feels like the story of my life for the past several years actually, but rather than dwell on that, I want to claim a room.)

The room I decided on is what I call “My Purple Room.”

It is at the front of the house – is meant to be a dining room but I set up our eating area in the kitchen and meant to use the purple room as a girly sitting room where I can write, paint, think, entertain… away from the noisy-ness of the other rooms which have electronics and media type things.

Its time for me to reclaim that room, turn it into a mini-sanctuary for me and the girls, tooo, when they want to entertain.

and am instead going to work with smaller, more specific goals. I think that should help me to get more accomplished.

Drastic measures on the living room. Letting kids bring food in takes a toll. I decluttered all the shelves down to nothing. Zip. Nada. Took out all the furniture. Scrubbed the walls, baseboards and floors and then cleaned each piece of furniture: front, back, inside and out, before moving it back into a new arrangement. Kids video games are out of the living room and looking for a new home.

I just need to put all the pictures back up and get some black baskets for dvd’s and remote controls.

And if anyone has any clue how to get dried pancake syrup out of microsuede, I’d love to hear it.

I took out the ugly brass shower doors and put up a nice new shower curtain (and rod) with a modern design and a matching bath mat. New soap dish, pump and holder for the toilet brush, all in blue ceramic and wicker to match the new paint.

Really freshens up the place.

Also primed and sealed the bathroom door. Still to be painted.

• I put in some supports around the still young apple trees and tied the branches into position. Hopefully I’ll be able to get them to set into a decent shape.

• Pruned back the magnolias and unknown hedge in front of the front door, reshaped them and exposed the lower trunks because I think it’s more balanced that way.

• gave all the front yard shrubbery a good clipping

• Cleaned up the front yard, swept up the spilled birdseed

• weeded the back garden, but it’s way out of control!

• Cleaned and decluttered both kids rooms

• found the floor in the master bedroom, vacuumed and decluttered

• Got all the laundry organized and put away

• Gave the bathroom a really deep cleaning, decluttered the cupboards and countertop and bleached every surface

• tidied the foyer

• cleaned and decluttered kitchen #2, down to all the surfaces bare and shiny!!

• Decluttered the playroom, got rid of 2 very large bags of broken, mismatched, or never coming clean toys; Reorganized so that there is one less toybox in there and nothing is left out in view.

I guess Dominion Day means getting control over my “dominion”!

First time this year. We’ve had a weird spring, and the lawn was thick and high with dandelions all over it, but I never had an opportunity to mow it before, too much rain.

So I feel like making an entry about such a mundane thing, because of the enormous effort it took. Thick, long grass, wet moss underneath, dull blades and a hill. Plus my back yard is big. I am so sore now, I feel like that was a huge athletic endeavour. Left all the clipping on the lawn looking like shit, but it’s good to have that jungle gone!

I wrote this in my journal today and thought it was worth sharing here, also:

Cool things are happening today.

I just spent the last forty or so minutes in my kitchen, eating my breakfast (a bit late), scrubbing the sink, cleaning out the fridge � a task I started yesterday, taking photos, journaling and doing some sacred reading.

I don�t know when I felt so accomplished in so short of a time.

I don�t remember oatmeal with a smidge of brown sugar ever tasting quite as flavorful.

Right before my time in the kitchen I visited gaia.com where I oftentimes use the �Questions and Reflections� as a writing (and contemplative) prompt.

This is the question that came up:

�When do you feel the most accomplished?�

I wrote the question on the top page of my journal and began scrubbing. I knew when my initial scrub was over, I would go to my journal and write. I was having a splendid time, cleaning with the same passion I usually use for my art.

I sat down with my cup of coffee as my oatmeal cooked and wrote, �I feel most accomplished in this exact moment. I am on task witih my personal studies. I am working on my business, actively. My creativity and art is consistently flowing, my relationships are flourishing�

AND�.

I had a huge a-ha yesterday (well, it was several yesterdays ago actually, on Friday, when I was seeing my therapist.) This �a-ha� springs from my home, my house, this place I have lived for nearly 18 years now.

I have come close to losing this house more times than I feel comfortable admitting. It is one loss God managed, somehow, to spare me from each and every time.

My house has sheltered me. My house has protected me. My house has been the place where I have grown as a human being in ways I never expected. My house has put up with my apathy towards it for wayyyy too long.

Now it is my turn � my long overdue turn � to fully love my house back. To show up and hug my house, cuddle my house.

It started several years ago, actually � on a New Years Eve when I painted my dining room a gorgeous shade of purple with a deeper purple ceiling and gold accents on the wood. I have continued in fits and starts, like in pulling up most of the carpeting last Summer revealing hardwood floors again. Now, I see the hugging, the cuddling, the caretaking of my house as a part of my complete and overall life alignment.

I see this alignment reappearing in so many ways.

Now, here it is, in my beloved home.

Today I scrubbed my kitchen sink with a toothbrush. This may seem ordinary for some of you. I have read about it on Flylady, but I have never actually done it myself. I knew of it, but I wasn�t intimate with it through experience, through touching, through the process. Today, I became intimate with the joy of scrubbing the sink with a toothbrush, working towards making it sparkle and shine. I think it even winked at me, although I am not completely sure.

Maybe that was Divinity winking at me.

My hand smells like cleaning solution.

Today that is what accomplishment smells like.

Dietrich Bonhoffer said, “Action springs not from thought, but from a readiness for responsibility.”

I am ready for the responsibility of loving my home deeply and showing that love outwardly. It isn�t talking about �Oh, I can scrub my sink with a toothbrush� it is about showing up and doing it. And then repeating it. And being grateful for each part of the process.

Showing up in this way feels so good.