Does anyone feel like me?? Never had a routine and don't know where to start??

nickm122

Mics_chick wrote:

I always seem to have loads of junk that I don't want to throw away but it doesn't have a home and it seems like a huge effort to sort things out effectively and efficiently.

Why don't you start by sorting through one room's "junk" and seeing if any of it can be sold either on-line or at carboot sales. That way your not throwing it away and may just make money too!!

Lysiane

Mics_chick wrote:

Lysiane - Does she keep the boxes in her bedroom or somewhere else?

yes she keep them in her bedroom , she play in the sitting room and put them back once she finished playing with their content.

moggins

You do know all of you are welcome in the FL challenges on oldstyle don't you?

I agree that you cannot tidy clutter. If something doesn't have a resident place and keeps getting moved around the house then it is clutter, if you haven't used it in the last 12 months then you probably don't need it.

Take it slowly, it's taken your house time to slide, it's going to take time to pick it back up again. And I also only have things so organised because I want guilt free me time. There is no way housework is going to take over my life, I hate it! But you do have to begin by chucking out what is getting in your way. That might be a husband in my case if he doesn't stop sleeping 13 hours a day!

Mrs_Pepperpot_2

i am exactly the same!

Don't know if this helps but I have two rules that seem to keep the worst at bay.

I do something in the adverts when watching t.V. It's amazing what you can get done in three minutes.

I always put away kids things after they have gone to bed. It seems to keep down the clutter and reminds me that I'm a grown up!



Good luck
X

Triker

Hello OP , I know and understand you because I am exactly the same.

Yep, yep, I know all the times that I do get a grip, I feel great.But I let my grip loosen quite quickly.

I have a theory or an excuse whatever, it works for me.

I had a very chaotic childhood, teenage life and young adult dooberry. I have to say there was never any order to my life, therefore I know how to function in chaos, I have a certain amount of control of that chaos (substitute piles of stuff, mess, paper mountains, must do lists).
Without getting into the nitty gritty of it all being together enough to make small even tiny changes to some of my too chaotic areas of my life, like my finances, is a significant move on for me.

I have a full time job, 2 children, a lovely hubby and a cat. My priority is that they are fed, I don't know why thats my priority it just is. Therefore I continuously shop for food, gadgets to make food and recipe books also it gives me a great distraction from actually doing.......................grits teeth, deep breathe.............cleaning.

Perhaps I'm uber lazy but I do not see the value in continuously cleaning an area, say daily, when one big push over a few hours will sort out the same area.
I know this is a definate 'them and us' area but I'm with the op and have to honest.

I would rather stare into space than scrub the skirting boards.

Mics_chick

Thanks Moggins for inviting us to the FL challenge but I did start reading the latest thread around 1st/2nd Jan and tried for 2 or 3 days to keep up but it just seemed to make me aware of what I wasn't getting done!! And that's with the OH at home full-time at the minute as well so we couldn't even keep up and there's 2 of us...

I suppose I just needed to hear the views of some others who are struggling rather than the ones who are getting a grip in the FL thread. Cos as the title says I've never had a routine since I moved into my own place and I sometimes wonder if I'm too lazy to ever get into one :eek:

Thanks to Triker too - I agree that honesty is the best policy but I feel that our outlooks are a little different because I really do want to sort myself out even though I hate cleaning too. Especially as I've sussed that the state of the house reflects in my mood which isn't good when suffering from depression... I think that I can find reasons why I don't like housework too but their completely opposite to yours Triker. My homelife was reasonably stable but my mum insisted on us helping her at the weekend rather than encouraging us to go and play with our friends. This may seem feeble to some of you but forcing kids to stay and do housework to the point where they give up asking to go and play with their friends is a bit sad...

Final thanks go to Mrs Pepperpot - God! this sounds like an oscar acceptance speech!! (I used to love the Mrs Pepperpot stories when I was a kid and read them over and over again - is this why you picked the name?) Anyway MrsPp I feel like I'm constantly tidying up the kids junk and sometimes I can't face even that - but I think that I'm going to have to organise their toys and chuck/give "younger" toys away and make room for the new ones (Xmas and ds birthday on 6th Jan).

I always think that I'm a bit strange cos most people seem to have tidier houses but cupboards so full of stuff that when they open the doors it all falls out - but I'm the opposite I can't bear to see messy cupboards so when I put stuff away it's very neat and all the mess stays on the outside of the cupboards waiting to be put away!!

When I put the kids stuff away I like it to be tidy and organised as well!! I think I'm going to have to let go of this obsession if I going to have a tidier house - that is organise storage so my kids can chuck their stuff in and then I just take the box back to their room.

I think I've got plenty of storage for the toys but I'm not sure how to use it for the best. Maybe this is something you nice people could help me with?? In the lounge I've got an ottoman and a pouffe that opens but the kids don't really play with the stuff in these cos they can't open them on their own or there's stuff stuck on top of it so they can't!!

I've got an Ikea unit in dd's bedroom with different sized drawers in it - don't know if you've seen 'em but she uses them as steps to her mid-sleeper bed cos she doesn't like the ladder!! It has 2 deep boxes, 2 shallow boxes and 2 medium-sized boxes. This has stuff in it that they haven't played with for months as well - out of sight out of mind!! I also have various plastic boxes with lids 4 square ones on castors and 2 oblong ones without.

I've read on other threads that I should swap their toys around every day/week/fortnight/month depending on the poster but I don't know how to deal with this cos I'd like their stuff out of site at night which means putting it in the ottoman or somewhere? But I'd like to keep their stuff separate cos they fight over toys!! So many problems so little time!! :eek:

I sometimes wish I had a spare room downstairs (only got lounge and dining-kitchen) that I could use as a playroom so that I could just throw everything in and shut the door - but wishful thinking doesn't get you anywhere...

Sorry this has turned into such a mega-post but once I got started just thought of more and more stuff I wanted to say...

Finally (hurray!) if anyone does want to tackle my toy organisation problem then please feel free - doesn't matter if you think you're stating the obvious I definitely think I need that!!

Thanks for staying till the end MC

Mics_chick

Hi - can anyone face my last humungous (sp?) post long enough to give any advice please?

moggins

Wishing for more room aint gonna help because you are not going to get it and more room just means more space to fill with stuff. If the children can't lift the lids on the toy storage then no they are not going to use it. What you could do is open the storage for them in the morning pull some toys out and allow them to play with those until lunchtime. Put them away while they are having lunch and get different ones out. Then when they are ready for bed just put them all away yourself. Or you could replace those with some wicker baskets with easy to open lids?

Mics_chick

Thanks for the advice Moggins but maybe it wasn't clear from my mega-post I was thinking of using plastic storage boxes with lids and ikea storage unit to keep stuff in kiddies bedrooms and just change their stuff over every so often (say once a week) and keep it in the ottoman during the week until I do another change over - do you think it's a bit daft doing it this way - that is emptying plastic box of toys into ottoman and then putting stuff that was in ottoman back in the now empty plastic box and putting it back upstairs?? What d'ya think?

moggins

No. I see where you are coming from with rotation. But you still have the problem with a heavy ottoman that they can't operate themselves. To be honest this year I have found that kids just have too much stuff. DD used to have boxes stacked on top of boxes, she never played with the stuff at the bottom as she couldn't reach it. Just before christmas I went through all her stuff with her agreeing on what we could get rid of, some has gone into the cellar to be brought out as a nice surprise in the holidays, some has gone to neighbours and charity shops. In the end it is your call but you'd be surprised what they don't miss. I'd definitely use some lighter storage in the living room that they can use, at the end of the day you can turn throwing the toys into baskets into a game that also helps mummy.