19 Jun 2011 Leave a Comment
Kids at creek
It’s amazing to me, now that I have kids, how fast the time goes. I just uploaded a bunch of photos from flickr, and went through and labeled them all after the kids were asleep, because I know that if I don’t get it done, I won’t get a chance until I’ve forgotten what was happening in the photos. I make all these lists of things I want to accomplish each week, and 90% of it never gets done. Like today, I was going to sew up a drawstring thing for my new Goodwill skirt, so I can wear it to church tomorrow. But I only got about 60% done today, because every time I sat down to sew a few stitches, one of the kids needed something, or it was time for lunch, or or or… and I don’t know if I will go to church tomorrow, since M and I are both up late tonight, but I will feel guilty if I don’t go tomorrow, because I know I won’t be able to go for sure next weekend since I will work the night before… I guess it’s all about prioritizing, because there is no way I can get to everything on my mental list.
Time just feels very fleeting right now.
Boom, six months gone. Boom, another six months.
24 May 2011 Leave a Comment
in organization
I just installed Blocksite to my browser and blocked access to the three sites where I waste time on a daily basis. I may ask my husband to change the password to one that only he knows when he gets home, because there is really no reason at all for me to be wasting time at these places.
My son is two years old now and needs to have his own room. We live in a 4-bedroom house. I only work about 20 hours a week outside the home. The only reason why one of our spare rooms hasn’t been cleaned out for J yet is my own laziness and lack of motivation. It stops today.
To do list for the week:
24 May 2011 Leave a Comment
in organization
Plant tomato plants
Plant seeds
Sweep and mop kitchen
Fold and put away all laundry
Vacuum carpeted rooms
Work one shift
Developmental therapy appt Thurs.
Doctor’s appt for me on Friday
Goodwill run Saturday morning to drop stuff off and to find myself non-embarrassing clothing, ’cause I deserve some non-stained clothing, darnit! 
(A brown crayon made its way through the wash, and of course, most of the clothing that it stained was mine. Grrr. )
Wrangle the kids by myself all weekend due to M needing to work so much on fixing up the house in preparation for our appraisal.
Print off and send one month of paystubs to mortgage dude.
Write M a check to help him pay off the groceries that he put on his credit card all spring.
Oh, right, and pay off the one thing that I put on my own credit card the other day (supposedly it helps your credit score if you don’t let your credit card sit unused the way I have done since getting into the Dave Ramsey thing)
Make sure M’s workplace can still get small business health insurance if he goes onto my workplace’s plan.
Fill out insurance paperwork and turn it in next week at work.
Accountability
05 May 2011 Leave a Comment
in organization
My little man just turned two. How is that even possible? We went to the zoo yesterday. The big kids had a blast; the birthday boy pretty much hated it except for the underwater dolphin viewing station and the tropical fish. But the birthday boy did get fries and playtime at the park on the way home, so all was not lost.
Anyway, in celebration, we will have approximately 30 people over to our house 48 hours from now. My house is trashed. Not CPS level trashed, but definitely embarrassing. Clean clothing strewn about all over one room (darn laundry-basket-emptying toddler!), dirty dishes piled in the sink, floors desperately needing mopping and vacuuming, porch with thorns growing through the cracks. Oh, and also a laundry room with dirty laundry piled to my knees. Which wouldn’t be a big deal, except that our house setup has the laundry room as the first room people enter. Oh, and also we desperately need a mega grocery trip, which I cannot do until tonight since the toddler is not grocery-able, due to his general screaminess when not allowed to move about freely.
So, I need a list so that I can have the satisfaction of crossing everything off.
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call doctor’s office to ask why I received a message about a non-existent appointment
call MY doctor to reschedule, since I was lazy and didn’t make the records transfer request in time
pay for homeschool ebay stuff
order Sonlight homeschool stuff
mega grocery trip
put away all clean clothing
declutter white table
take out trash
de-thorn and de-trash front porch
vacuum living and dining areas
sweep kitchen
mop kitchen
wash dishes
wash dirty laundry
change sheets on all beds
move desk and craft drawers from kitchen to J’s room
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Tomorrow:
make cupcakes
decorate house
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I think that about covers it all….
To-do list
18 Apr 2011 Leave a Comment
in organization
Write out bday invites.
Send bday invites.
Send bereavement cards. 
Take carload of excess stuff to thrift store.
Re-upholster remaining 4 kitchen chairs.
In preparation for home visit next week:
Clean dining room.
Clean living room.
Clean kitchen.
22 Mar 2011 Leave a Comment
in organization
To do this week:
Order cards/wallets for Little Guy’s bday.
Take kids to library Thurs to meet EI chick.
Keep the house reasonable livable and the kids fed while M is gone.
Work Thurs and Fri.
Survive.
Next week:
Somehow get my med records from the birth center, even though they never answer the phone on the days I’m available to go up there. Grrr.
August to-do list
18 Aug 2010 Leave a Comment
in organization
- Freeze or can the gazillion tomatoes in and around my house
- Go through all kids’ stuff and sort out excess stuff for September garage sale
- Go through my stuff and do same
- Price giveaway books on cash4books
- Take other books to half price books
- Give remaining to Goodwill or library
- Call credit union regarding health savings account
- Call regarding redoing our mortgage (ie do they even do loans on modulars or do we need to look elsewhere)
- Take kids to zoo
- Take kids back to library
To do list, meet reality
10 Jun 2010 Leave a Comment
-Finish Eli’s baby book (just now getting this done, now that he’s over a year old)
-Wrap baby shower gift
-Mulch and weed garden
-Yard sales and library on Friday
And that’s it for my list! I woke up Monday morning, knowing that I have a full week at home, and my first thought was, I need to clean this house top to bottom this week, and get rid of all the clutter, and get the garden in shape while I’m at it. Then, throughout the course of the day, reality hit me and I remembered that keeping the kids fed and reasonably happy occupies 95% of my time when I’m home with them during the day. Tuesday I spent feeling discouraged about the fact that I can’t seem to get beyond laundry and dishes without someone else here to entertain the kiddos. Wednesday, yesterday, I finally chose to inhabit reality, choosing to just go with it and enjoy the kids and remember that they won’t always be this time-consuming, and that someday they won’t even want my attention (or won’t admit to it, anyway).
Eli helped me with my return to reality, by spending the last three days feverish and miserable from teething on both top and bottom gums. He has refused most all foods, and mostly just wants to nurse and be held and rocked non-stop. Times like this, I’m glad he still nurses, since he won’t even take water from a cup when his gums are hurting. At least he stays hydrated this way. I’m not huge on taking temps, but he definitely feels like he’s in the 100-101 range. Poor baby.
I don’t know why I do this to myself every few months- thinking that I should be able to be superwoman and accomplish all kinds of amazing feats, and then getting mad at myself for being unable to measure up to an impossible standard. I know I’ve done this before, because there is record of the entire cycle in my journal! Raising kids and keeping their needs met is a full-time job. Especially when one of them is sick and wants to be held all day!
So I revised my to do list, to include reasonable tasks like finishing the baby book, just so I can feel like I’m actually finishing something. All the bigger tasks can wait!
List-y goodness
04 Mar 2010 Leave a Comment
in family, organization
Things to do today and tomorrow:
1. Clean up my stinky, messy kitchen. We eat all of our meals at home these days, and with my husband getting really into baking lately, it’s amazing how fast the dishes and cookware build up. All it takes is one day of my being at work, and poof! Nasty kitchen again.
2. Shower. Yes, I’m gross like that. It’s 11 am, my baby boy is taking his morning nap, and I’m not about to wake him up early just so I can stop feeling gross.
3. Vacuum.
4. Put away the clean laundry in the 3 overflowing clothes baskets.
*********************************************************************************************
Things to do for March:
1. Declutter my clothing and my daughter’s clothing.
2. Plan garden.
3. Paint porch swing.
**********************************************************************************************
Things to do for 2010
1. Finish typing up my great-great grandmother’s diary from 1890. Seriously, I have started doing this twice in the past 10 years, and got side-tracked both times. There’s no reason not to finish this!
2. Make homemade gifts:
-Finish my daughter’s baby blanket! Seriously, I only need like 10 more rows to be finished!
-Baby hat for family #1
-Baby hat for family #2
- Toddler hat for family #3
-Beanbags for passel of boy cousins and my daughter for Christmas (5 per kid x 5 kids = 25 bean bags)
3. Buy awesome birthday gift for my sister before I forget where to buy it!
4. Stop working in peds altogether by this fall.
5. Go camping this summer!
Downsizing
09 Feb 2010 Leave a Comment
in organization
I need to declutter my house. Seriously. I was off to a great start in January and got rid of 200+ items (my goal is 2010 in 2010), but then I fell into a slump and stopped.
Need to get rid of:
-my wedding dress (need to consign this now, as this is prom season and my wedding dress is really a white prom dress)
-random plastic toys on my porch
-all the excess baby and child clothing, much more in each size than is needed
-lots of college textbooks that I don’t need
-and of course, need to attack my own closet with a vengeance.
