Tuesday, September 28, 2010

Introducing: Tackle A Task!!

Yes, just what you've been waiting for!  I know, I know.  I can feel your excitement.  I can see all the mail heading my way, thanking me for this wonderful "household management condensed into 5 weeks" plan now...

Tackle a Task, Fall 2010

Last week I sat, pondering why this is a challenging area for me. Like many others, I've been to Flylady's site. I've signed up and read the emails. I've bought a timer! I even had the purple zip-up folder thing. The ostrich feather duster was a temptation for sure. I've done the worksheets... the morning routine, the evening (I never could pick out my clothes the night before, though!). I loved the monthly focus... like the month I made my bed every morning, first thing. And who can forget the month you swished and swiped the bathroom right away? Great stuff. Then, life distracts me.

One of the challenges that I have that gets in the way of household management is that I love projects. I like to scrapbook. I love photography and blogging. I have quilt tops that need backing and edges completed. There's the cross stitch I've been working on for 5 years. There are other inspirations brewing in my head and heart just waiting for me to work on... holiday projects and gifts and... Well, you see?  Household management just keeps getting bumped down on the list!

Then there's my husband. He was raised by a meticulous housekeeper, Katie. When she says her house is filthy, you know she just needs to sweep a bit. Ha ha. No, really, Katie loves a clean and tidy home and she is great at organizing and putting away. She is also anti-germ. So, I am ever so thankful that my man is very patient with me. But I know that Scott loves those days when he walks in and everything is in it's place and the floors are mopped.

The holidays are coming and I have lots of projects planned, but there's this desire to have a tidier and neater home. To me, that means purging. I cannot just clean. I start to clean and I start to put away and then I notice that I don't like this or that or that I don't use this or that anymore! I like simple. Scott knows this so when he is missing something, he automatically asks if I have donated it to Goodwill!  Please, do not alert him of these grand plans!! (he is anti-purge-we-might-need-this-someday-man)

So, what am I to do?

I am going to take a stab at it. I am compelled to head to Barnes and Nobles and purchase Martha Stuart's big book of household management, but, then I'd sit and read through it for days and take notes on every chapter and chart out plans and my house would remain disorganized and messy. Then I came up with a new plan. I will grab hold of a notebook and walk room to room, making a list of tasks that need to be done in each room. I will include detail cleaning of the trailer in my list and I will even add in a couple problem areas of the garage. Then I will give myself a target date and I will go through my list and break it into segments that would take approximately the same amount of time. Next I will divide the number of days until the target date by the number of tasks... but give myself a couple of free days, too. Then I will work on a few things a day and hopefully by my target date, I will be delighted with the results. And during the whole process... I will add in some creative time in my day to work on the things that delight me. So, I think I just pinpointed the bottom line of my being household organizationally challenged.... time. I love time. I want to spend it all kinds of ways. So, I'm going to conquer this using time!

So, who wants to join me? If you do, start making your list of what you want to accomplish. My target date is November 5th so that I can enjoy the rest of November and December in holiday style! If you aren't so inclined to make your own list, I will post what I am working on every few days and you can join in any part that you want. Just leave me a note and share what you've done! Please? Are you with me? Who is with me??  


For those who like details (I don't!), I came up with a list of 36 items. One of those would realistically take 2 days. I combined some of those into one day and ended up with 32 days of cleaning/organizing. I gave myself one day a week to not tackle a task.

Once again, my target date is November 5th. For those who like details (I don't!), I could assign the tasks to days, make spread sheets or pie charts or use some such tool and track my progress by percentage rates, but... nah! Not interested. I'm just going to do it my style and give it a go!

So, for Wednesday, Thursday and Friday the tasks to be attempted are... (can you hear the virtual drumroll?)

Clean out and organize all kitchen cupboards (I'm enlisting a couple of young boys to help!)
Clean the outside of the cupboards and on top of the cupboards
Clean under the kitchen sink (and, yeah, organize)
Clean the fridge out... all nooks and crannies, inside and out

And, with that said, I am not going to obsess too much and I am going to try to work quickly. I think I'll reward myself with a trip to the dollar store or some such place and find some organizational tools like baskets or small bins... I hope I find red ones!

Now, I don't want to feel lonely, so, someone please join along and let me know what areas you clean and conquer!!!

1 comment:

Bright Sky Mom said...

I read your "day in the life" -- hope you haven't had to repeat the store trips lesson! :)

I'll tackle a task with you (unless I get distracted by life)! And I love details!!
Lee