Organize my household

The process has officially begun … no messing around. Time to get it done. After moving in with my husband from my mobile home… which is now on his property, everything I owned entered the house he grew up in …. the farmstead. beautiful, yes. potential, yes. He and my stepson were in an apartment, everything from there came into the house. Long story short, when his dad passed his mom kept many things and much of it was kept here when she moved in with her new husband. (They have both since passed.) My husband and his former wife and three kids also had a home here on the property. It burned down, and they lost everything. They moved into the farmhouse, and began remodeling and restoring… haphazardly working in all areas all at once. Then the divorce. And so things were left mid-projects everywhere. So here we are: me, my husband and his younger son…now 17; every possession each of us owns, and remnants of past households… in a house that needs much remodeling and renovating -some tasks to just be comleted and some to be completely started. Needless to say in the whirlwind of fixing immediate necessities and learning to live with each other, it’s been a little overwhelming for all of us. We moved in August, married in April 08. And still many areas of this house didn’t have a designated purpose…dining rm or family rm… guest rm or computer rm, where should this go… needless to say, after endless sorting cleaning and donating … and some fifty or so bags of trash, drywall paint and installation of a wood stove and radiator system to replace the old inefficient set up, we still have rooms with a huge variety of miscellaneous and mismatched items. Nothing has had what I call a “home.” My husband used to laugh until he became shop manager for winter with his construction outfit, and as employees used this tool or that, he noticed himself becoming irritated having to search for tools that were not where they belonged when he needed them. And one day he came home and said you did it hun, you wore off on me…I’m turning into you at the shop… and he explained how he’d had enough searching and he said to the guys:”you know everything has a home, put it back where it goes when you’re done!” FINALLY!!!... he understood what I couldn’t get through all this time. So I decided: first each rm must have a designated purpose, not throw whatever where ever… no more “where’s this” and “do you remember if that’s with the boxes in the attic or the basement?”.... so I set it on paper and we discussed it … yes to the dining room. the spare rm/guest rm/craft rm/storage rm is now designated computer/craft rm… and so on. Each now with a purpose, can be furnished and decorated accordingly and the rest can be neatly organized and stored … my way (with clearly labeled boxes!!) I figure first set up then decorate, then begin to incorperate some kind of family/household schedule or at least a basic routine to start. There really is hope. Thank Heaven. Needed this… the level of overwhelm was really getting too much to bear.

and I did dig in right away so all chores of the previous days are done, except for the washing, but the machine will take care of that. Making the shedule was actually easy, now I just need to stick with it and spend no more then 1,5 hours a day on it. Thi one might be easy after all… Would be nice for a change!

of doing what when so everything gets done almost automatically instead of having cleaning, bill and washing days out of my normal work shedule. Organisation is the key to have more time to do other stuff, more important then washing dishes or clothes.

After all, before I had kids, I was super-organized – a place for everything and everything in its place. Now that they’ve all left the nest, I can’t seem to get things organized. Don’t ask me where anything is – because I can’t tell you!