KonMari 2016 - The Life Changing Magic of Tidying Up

GreyQueen

I have to watch that, too, Fen1. At 5 ft 10, with short hair and relatively flat-chested, I can be taken for a feller at first glance by the absent-minded or just plain ditzy.

When I was about 20, and had my hair hanging half way down my back, and was wearing makeup including a bright lipstick, I was once called 'sir' by the assistant in my local shop.

I didn't bat an eyelid, just concluded my transaction in my (very feminine) voice and they went into a moodie as if I'd somehow misled them, lol. I'd've thought if anyone was entitled to be huffy it was me.:rotfl:

But I agree with you about polo shirts, they're not a garment I'd choose personally, on those very grounds.

Just kondo'd some money to my utility company, less than expected as they read the meter alternate times and always over-estimate my usage so this was a reading not an estimate and I've had change from £30 for the quarter's leccy usage and my gas account is still in credit from the previous (estimated) bill.

Pretty chuffed that my leccy use is down 25% on same quarter last year but dunno if that one was a reading or an estimate, if it's the former, I am very pleased with myself indeedy *insert smug g*t face here*

Cunning plan is to have an early meal then head lottie-wards once it has cooled down a bit. I have been given a bag of horse manure by a pal. And not any old horse manure, this is the poop of a thoroughbred racehorse.

I'm expecting my fruit bushes to be suitably appreciative and grow like billy-o.:D

MMF007

Bad news. The sunny weather made DH recall that the large sunloungers are still in the house and he wants to use them. I may have to pray for rain! I am happy with the sturdy plastic chairs that live in the garden and are not annoying. Oh well, marriage is about compromise I suppose

Only Kondo-ing today was dust!

As well as cleaning today I helped a client write a letter (elderly lady struggling to write nowadays), mended a necklace, and took someone to a scenic spot to sit in the sunshine and natter. All in a day's work

GreyQueen

Guys, it's a Bank Holiday weekend coming up. You know where I go on Bank Holidays, don't you?

Yup, Clutter Central, aka the parental home. There may well be kondo-ing in the near future. There will certainly be me treadle-washing the biggest of her readicut rugs in the bath tub, as it'll be a scorcher and it'll take several days to dry outside.

Going to water the allotment. GQ x

GoingToDoIt

Brilliant GQ looking forward to some more pearls of wisdom from your dad as well as tales from the homestead

greenbee

:j:j:j:j:j:j:j:j:j:j:j:j:j:j:j:j:j

GreyQueen

Allotment watered, coach ticket purchased online, revved and ready to go.

The parents have decided we'll have An Outing in the car on Sunday, we'll ride around some of the ancestral villages inc my birthplace, put flowers on family graves, that sort of thing, and go to a nature reserve and enjoy the great outdoors.

Me being me, I shall probably feel the urge to reach for the secateurs and start in on some brambles at the reserve.:rotfl:

Dunno what (if anything) I'll be allowed to kondo at Mum & Dad's; and it may well be too hot to venture loft-wards, but there are the three backyard sheds to play with and I think the dump will be open even on the Monday, so we may be able to get some Stuff up there for the various recycling bays.

We'll have a look at the old cottage, the one most recently offered for prospective purchasers at about a third of a million. Sheesh, and the neighbours thought we were being ripped off by being charged £1 a week back in the 1960s (they were being charged 10s as retirees from the estate farm). Of course, they were proper pre-decimal pounds. Why, I've heard tales of how you could live for a week on a 10 shilling note and a white fiver was big enough to double as a bedsheet.

The factor said to my parents, as he showed them around: Of course, these cottages will never be modernised.

Doubt he's alive now but I bet he'd be astonished to see them all beautifully modernised and tarted up within an inch of their lives and deemed, in this crazy world, to be 'worth' a third of a million quid.

Darn fools, it's still a tiny village which has diddly-squat in it and more population pushing up daisies (hello maternal grandparents, passed in 1967 and 1971) than walking around. We'll leave flowers on their graves. The rabbits will eat them. It's traditional.

greenbee

Have done my watering too GQ. I found some gadgets you put on plastic bottles to drip water and have stuck them in the new raised beds with the newly planted fruit bushes and borage in the hope they work and keep things damp over the weekend.

I think I'm going to leave the growhouse open, and put a lot of water in the gravel trays and hope... I've got lavender and nicotiana in there which I'd quite like to survive as I'm going to have a lot of garden to fill when the landscaping is done (hopefully only another 2-3 weeks).

iamsalt

I have a long weekend starting this morning, so after a very good nights sleep I feel refreshed and ready to kondo as I pack!

I definitely have a collection of things ready for the charity shop, but I am sure I can find more to head off.

I have persuaded mum to recycle 30 years of a particular magazine that she has been getting. So the first tranche of them go in the recycling today.

I potted on my tomato plants so some are in fairly big tubs ready to move with me, and some are in the greenhouse for the new people as I struggle to reject the less strong plants!

More drama stuff will leave the house tonight, but the box one item came in is perfect for a couple of ornaments I love so it will return ready for a new use of packing.

Looking forward to the updates from GQ family HQ

S x

Karmacat

GreyQueen wrote: »

The parents have decided we'll have An Outing in the car on Sunday, we'll ride around some of the ancestral villages inc my birthplace, put flowers on family graves, that sort of thing, and go to a nature reserve and enjoy the great outdoors.

I did the whole Ancestral Places thing in Liverpool with my brother at the beginning of January ... it was ... I can't lie, it was awful. He's lived there all his life, and he wouldn't leave the car to cross the road with me at all in some areas :eek:

Dunno what (if anything) I'll be allowed to kondo at Mum & Dad's; and it may well be too hot to venture loft-wards, but there are the three backyard sheds to play with and I think the dump will be open even on the Monday, so we may be able to get some Stuff up there for the various recycling bays.

Sounds good, GQ, for us anyway

Why, I've heard tales of how you could live for a week on a 10 shilling note and a white fiver was big enough to double as a bedsheet.

:j :rotfl: :j :rotfl:

iamsalt wrote: »

I have a long weekend starting this morning, so after a very good nights sleep I feel refreshed and ready to kondo as I pack!

I definitely have a collection of things ready for the charity shop, but I am sure I can find more to head off.

Envying you the sleep, iamsalt ... I woke up at 4am, and I was *really* bored but still sleepy by 6 ....

Consoling myself that today a *lot* will leave the house, though I won't notice as its all already stashed in the shopping trolley. I keep going over the same areas: clothes, and books and papers.

Had a good result on the clothes front, my policy, adopted from GQ's posts, of only wearing *some* of my clothes is bearing fruit - couple of pairs of knickers can legitimately be thrown now, old pair of bootee slippers too, and a very good quality cotton blouse has cuffs that are actually fraying - my sister suggested I turn it into a short sleeve shirt, I may try! Bit by bit ...

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GreyQueen

I once had a much loved mint-green French-cuffed blouse which was well-worn plus one cuff had acquired a prominent ink stain.

I turned it into a short-sleeved version of itself, used some of the sleeve fabric to make to patch pockets for the chest, and added a dylon hand dye which turned it into an interesting mushroomy-pink (nicer than it sounds, I assure you). It had a lot more use in its second incarnation and eventually wore out and went a-ragging (buttons were salvaged, tho).

Righty, heading out now, dunno when I'll be posting over the weekend, but you may imagine me by 9 am tomorrow standing in the parental bathtub sans culottes, treading water and handwash detergent thru a LARGE hand-hooked rug.:rotfl: