High Ambitions: Speed Cleaning the Whole House

Normally I would want to tackle a big project starting on a Monday, but yesterday was pretty much a wash between MOPS in the morning, rushing through lunch and then 2 doctor appointments for the girls, followed by a trip to the shoe store for Susannah. It turned out that trip was only 2 shoe sizes looong over-due!! She now has sparkling new dress shoes and tennis shoes that aren't threatening to burst at the toes! 

Add in that due to not sleeping great for a few nights, I was completely exhausted by halfway through the day so I mustered through supper and an early bedtime for everyone (everyone was tired!), and fell into bed myself about 2 hours before I usually do. I slept great allll night long and have renewed spirit today. 

Thus my high ambitions to get the whole house surface cleaned between today and Thursday (we have a full weekend). While I ate breakfast, oversaw the start of school, drank a massive mug of coffee, changed a dirty diaper, kept Silas from playing in the office or pulling the plugs out of outlets {why that is one of his favorite bad things to do, I'll never know}, I made a list. Then I re-wrote it neatly on a clean page in a nearly-used note-book, because moms use notebooks until they die and a neatly written list on a clean sheet of paper is just more... tackle-able?

Here is what I want to accomplish this week. The reality will be how much I can actually do between school, mama-ing everyone, piano and swimming lessons, feeding my family, diapers, instructing, quality time, dicipline, encouraging, redirecting, laundry... and I could go on. If you have kids you know. 😉

The kitchen is my Big Deal space. If the kitchen is clean, I can deal with just about anything else. So it always comes first when it comes to cleaning. Honestly it has been a while (read: a week?) since I gave it a good, thorough surface cleaning and somehow it clutters back up before I can change a diaper or give a bath.

But here it is in it's current non-glorious state: dishes (mostly big stuff that piles up like elephants in a bathroom stall)...

...and then the counter that collects stuff. Stuff like bunny rabbits multiply. Stuff that gets dropped mid-whatever when I have to stop, drop, and roll... with whatever incident needs dealt with right. now.

My poor fridge. 😂 I don't think there are too many fossils in here, but it definitely needs some cleaning out and reorganizing. It is always like playing fridge-jenga after a Costco trip (which was last week). 

{See Silas? He is saying his famous line, "Eh! Eh! Eh!", telling me that he wants one of everything.}

So... this is my starting place! I will post back tonight with a progress report! If I aim high, hopefully I won't land too low!

Organizing and Purging

Several weeks ago I stumbled across a new blog, Organizing Homelife. I don't even remember now how I found it, but find it I did and wow! I didn't turn back. When I started reading the blog she was in the middle of her October series, 31 Days to Organize Your Kitchen Frugally. Since I was in the midst of a major bug-bite from the Purge The Kitchen bug, this was a fantastic find.

What I thought was going to be a week-long project of purging and organizing the kitchen has turned into a several-week-long project. Being pregnant (and feeling more pregnant every day it seems) and having 2 little girls to keep occupied or have as "helpers" means I don't have the energy or time to get things done as fast as I think I will sometimes. I have purged and purged. My yard-sale pile has grown. I threw out several plastic containers and a bazillion plastic lids that I no longer had containers for. Things that I didn't really want to store in my kitchen anyway went into a box until I figure out a new home for it. Just get it OUT of the kitchen so I can have less stuff and more space either for better storage of things I actually use or just to not have cupboards quite so crowded. Less is definitely more.

One of the cupboards that has been irking me has been my cookbook and stereo cupboard (the stereo in my kitchen was a Mother's Day gift 2 years ago). I gave my cookbooks a serious purging quite a while ago, but my CD storage has been a growing source of annoyance. On Monday I decided it was time to tackle this space.

Before. Wait, the cat's flea medicine doesn't need to be in here!

Another area of the cupboard I really wanted to improve was my magazine holder for a few loose recipes and a few Taste of Home magazines that I haven't clipped from yet. I have been using a cut-down box but it was gaping and just overall something I wanted to change.

Before, again.

Hello "I want to play the  CD in the middle" night-mare!

(The make-shift cereal box "magazine" holder is hiding on the left.) 

I have been thinking for a while about how to store my CDs more efficiently both space- and accessibility-wise. After rolling the idea of "something smaller" around in my head I realized that something like a CD wallet would be the perfect solution.  Yesterday morning we ran some errands and found what I hope is a great solution. It wasn't exactly what I had in mind (I was looking for something more like this), but I wanted it "now" and didn't want to go to several stores searching. What we did get were these 3-ring binder inserts. Since I don't keep a lot of CDs in that cabinet anyway, a slim 1" ring binder will work great and take up even less space than a CD wallet like I thought I originally wanted. I didn't even have to buy a ring binder because I already had one here at home waiting to be put to good use. Win-win! Over nap-time I worked on the change-over and I am really excited to have easier - and less hazardous - access to my CDs. Even more than that, I'm excited to have a less crowded cabinet! Less is more. :)

After. I removed the cat medicine and decided that appliance

manuals would be better stored in the file cabinet.

 

 To improve the make-shift magazine holder situation, I remembered that we had a real magazine holder that wasn't in current use. It helps the cupboard have a much neater look and I don't have to worry about the sides sagging open any more. When making this change-over I did purge some recipes that I realistically wasn't going to try and generally neatened up the space.

After, zoomed in.

On the left of the CD notebook are our church 

and Sunday School Directories,

my Thankful Journal, and my notebook for 

writing down ideas, lists, projects, and so on. 

 

 *****

The other great purchase we made yesterday that I hope will make my life easier and more clutter-free was a 13 pocket expanding file folder. I have come to realize that our file cabinet just doesn't work for me. Rather, I don't make it work for me because I don't want to. Obviously if I prefer to put the receipts and paid bills in a pile somewhere instead of filing them, the file cabinet is not the answer to my, er, problem. "Hi, my name is Miriam and I have a problem..."

My new "piling" system. :-)

Inspired by this post on Organizing Homelife I think I have a simple, easy-to-use, HANDY way to take care of bills, receipts, stubs and all that other "stuff" that usually goes into my pile-file. I am going to try sorting simply by month. All paperwork from each month will go into that month's pocket. At the end of the year I will empty it, probably into a manilla folder, and stick it in the attic with the other paperwork we keep. Rarely do I have to go back and find a bill or receipt so it think this will work fine. If I feel the file-by-month method is a little too unorganized I still think the expanding file will work well as a simplified categorical miniature filing system.

No "before" pictures but already I am finding this SO easy to use!

It has been fun sharing these ideas and improvements with you.  I hope you've enjoyed reading this post and perhaps even been inspired to create some organized space in your home. Have you had any great organizational or purging light-bulb moments lately? Did you actually do something about it? I'd love to hear about your experiences in the comments below.

~Miriam

Making Some Goals

Photo Source

I can be a list maker. I enjoy being able to draw a line through a task and see the progress I am making with what I need to do. This summer and fall lists fell by the wayside as I was busy with the garden, freezing produce and canning fruit.

Now that I think that is all behind me (finally, shew!) I need to start using lists again. They help me keep on track and overall, my days go better and I get more done when I use a list. (Staying focused and not getting distracted makes a big difference, too, huh? :P) I have my daily to-do lists pretty much memorized: laundry, kitchen, etc. I know what day of the week I do what laundry and basically what cleaning. I make those lists mostly for the enjoyment of crossing things off, and to help me stay focused and keep things prioritized if the day gets out of sorts.

Alicia recently posted about making lists of goals. I have a list of goals for this year, and I look over it from time to time and think "yikes, I need to get busy on ____!"... and then forget about it until I look at that list again (which hangs on the side of the frige). Anyway, Alicia's post made me think that I would probably benefit from making some weekly goals and writing them out... and actually try to accomplish them. I don't know that I would do this EVERY week, but since there are some things I really do need to do, and have just been putting off, it can't do any harm.

This evening marks the end of a vacation period for us. So, tomorrow starts a "new" week (on a Tuesday - that'll throw me off for several days!), one that I have some goals for. As soon as we were home and settled in a bit, I grabbed a sheet of paper and made a list. I wanted to make a long list of everything I need/want to do, but I made myself keep it reasonable. I hope. I should at least get SOMEthing done!

For fun and for accountability, here are my goals for this week:

*Go to bed between 10:30 and 10:45 each night. With the idea that I'll rest better, get more sleep and feel all energetic and bubbly and want to jump out of bed in the mornings :)
*Make an appointment to get the cat fixed. Yeah, major procrastination here. If it doesn't happen soon we'll end up with a winter litter of kittens!
*Organize freezers. Oh boy, are they ever out of sorts and full! To the point that I dread digging through the chest freezer for food that I know is in there but don't want to get out. This is my BIG goal for this week.
*Write 1 hand-written note. Because hand-written is nice, and I have some grandparents and great-aunts/uncles that would enjoy a note.
*Spend 1 hour on bookwork. Looooong overdue. Like, barely touched for... months.
*Spend 1 hour working on Susannah's baby book. I started it this spring, I fully plan to finish it (at least as much as possible since I think it goes on for a couple years) by the end of this year.
*Put away canned pears. Which really means, figure out where in the world I'm going to put them and put them there. They have been taking up a large section of counter-space ever since I canned them, and I just need to figure out where they are going to be stored.
*Blog. :) Something that I think about way more than I really do. So, once I hit "publish" I'll be able to cross this off my list! I do hope to get another post up this week, but if I don't I will still have blogged!

How I {don't} Do It All

Click on the picture to read the captions.

While I do try to keep up with the housework, continually staying on top of it and keeping everything cleaned up, washed up, folded up, put up... does not put food in our freezers, pantry or bellies. So, many times I turn my focus to the garden instead of the housework.

I do enough to squeak by, and some days I really DO housework and get an area cleaned up like it should be. But for the sake of keepin' it real, this is what my kitchen looks like today. And yesterday. And maybe the day before. Except for the banana peels - they weren't there Thursday.

I know many of you look at my garden pictures and say "I don't know how you do it all". Well, here ya go! My secret: I don't.

Now, I know some of you would never be able to stand the clutter. Sometimes I can't either. Today at lunch I was frustrated because I had to shove some stuff around to make a clear spot to put together a sandwich. That means it's time to get the kitchen cleaned up again :) And I won't work in the garden this afternoon (I hope to at least go pick squash and zucchini this evening), but nothing is super pressing out there today.

This is a season of my life. One where my time is cheaper than our money. It's easier for me to let the housework fall behind than to try and squeeze produce out of our grocery budget for another year. I would make it work if I needed to, but I don't need to. And I'm enjoying my garden :) And not minding the clutter. Too badly. Most of the time.

Just another Real Housewife Reveal :)

Real Housewife Reveal

After I wrote this post, and then read what Amy wrote on her blog, I thought it would be fun to once in a while post a "real" post.

Yesterday I:
Started a load of laundry.
Made a batch of bread.
Ground up already cooked roast beef, chicken and corn for baby food and froze it.
Made a strawberry roll (the cake part).
Made a batch of Monster Cookies (Arrrg!!!)
Picked peas.
Shelled peas with Susannah climbing all over me and "helping".
Picked up shelled peas that she dumped on the floor.
Read a couple books (to Susannah).
Fed Susannah meals x3.
Helped her get a drink countless times throughout the day.
Changed 6-ish diapers.
Did online stuff (mail, blog, blog reading, facebook).
Asked Daniel to bring home a free pizza for supper.
Gave Susannah a bath.
Watched the NCIS and NCIS L.A. Finales.
Asked Daniel to put the wet laundry in the dryer right before we went to bed.
Folded and put away the 1 load of clean laundry that was piled on the bed.

Yesterday I didn't:
Take a shower.
Wash any dishes.
Pick up or sweep any floors.
Do any cleaning, period (except for cleaning out a couple diapers).
Do any baking or cooking that was actually for a meal yesterday (breakfast was leftover pancakes, lunch was leftovers from Monday).
I did brush my hair yesterday morning, but after picking peas I looked like this:... and didn't brush my hair again until evening time shortly before Daniel got home.
I didn't exercise.
I didn't take a nap.

Today the kitchen is piled high with dirty dishes (mostly baking utensils, bowls and dirty sippy cups). The floors are in bad need of a picking up and vacuuming. The trash cans are overflowing and the slop is starting to smell. Laundry needs folded. Laundry needs washed - and then folded. And put away. I need a shower. I hope to get a little more on top of the inside housework, but there's much of the day left yet, we'll see what happens... there's always the chance that something will come up that changes the course!

I Figured It Out

I figured out how other people (moms) have so much time. Time to do all the things that I think "dude, hoooow do you do all that and still have a clean house, clean clothes, clean car, clean kids... and stay sane?"

They buy all or almost all of their food ready to use (canned or frozen).
They buy all of their bread.
They buy all of their sandwich meat already cooked and sliced.
They use the dryer.
They probably even have a clothes folder and just haven't told me about it...
Since they buy all of their food (including bread) they probably don't make the enormous messes in their kitchens like I do.
They probably put eeeeeeverything in their dishwasher. I'm picky.

Since they buy all of their food they can just come home from the store, put all the cans, boxes and bags in the cupboards, frige and freezer and VIOLA! A million hours already saved! No need to spend several hours in the garden planting, weeding or picking. No hours upon hours spent peeling, shelling, blanching, canning or freezing.

I bet if I logged every minute that I spend doing something that I could just "go buy" the finished product instead, I'd have more available time, too!

Please know that this isn't a rant or a rave or a "I'm better than you" or a "woe is me" or any such thing. I'm just thinkin' out loud. This is also very much my perspective from the outside :)

**I know this could generate alot of comments on how I am wrong - I'm open to friendly discussion, but please let's keep it fun and friendly! I'm not looking to start a war!**

P.S. After reading this, Amy wrote an amazing post over on her blog. You gotta go check it out.

Spring Cleaning: Kitchen Edition - After

Ahh... Friday afternoon I started Spring Cleaning the Kitchen. I had a long list (and a few "before" pictures) and my goal was to get it all accomplished in 2 days. I came very, very close. Susannah has not been feeling well this weekend, running low grade fevers now and again, so she and I stayed home from church this morning. While she napped I listened to last Sunday's message and finished cleaning.

And now, without further ado, here are my "After" pictures:

What is really on the counter between the stove and frige:

This is the first time I have completely gone through almost every inch of this kitchen since we moved into it. 3 bags of trash and 1 bag of stuff for Goodwill later, my cupboards are much more orderly. They weren't BAD, but they certainly needed a good going through. I threw away a bunch of "high sugar dog food" cereal I had gotten either free or very, very cheap that was outdated ... because we didn't like it enough to eat it. With each thing I handled, I thought "do I like it? do I want to eat/use it?" and if the answer was "no" it went into the trash.

This is my in-kitchen "pantry" cupboard
where alot of spare groceries (like... chocolate chips?) are kept.

This cabinet needed some serious reorganization.
I'm in it pretty much every day.

Now my cookie sprinkles are contained (top left),
granola is at an easier-to-reach level (mid-left),
and the bottom shelf isn't crammed with whatever.

And underneath the sink. Oh, how I wish I had a "Before" picture to show you! It was almost to the point of "throw the item in and slam the door quickly before it falls out."

There is no longer an out of control plastic bag collection,
my smaller cleaning supplies are all corralled in a nice basket,
and it's just way nicer all the way around.

Obviously I didn't take a picture of each cupboard, I didn't want to bore you to death. But believe me that each one is much cleaner and better now!

A few things I learned or realized through this:

• Very, very soon I am just going to go buy a new dish drainer and drainboard. My current set was retired from my MIL, I've repaired cracks, it's saggy and grows scum and mold where water doesn't drain from it completely, it drives me batty... and well, I'd say since I've had a new set on my Christmas list ever since we got married and I haven't gotten one yet, I'll just have to take the plunge and buy it myself.

• 2 full days is about all the willpower I have for sticking with one room before I start to burn out.

• I need to make more jello salads :P We have lots of jello that I bought (for next to nothing) for the purpose of making jello salads... I just need to remember to make them!
  

I hope to continue my Spring Cleaning this coming week. I'm not sure what room will be next, probably either the pantry or the bathroom & hall closet. Both places need a serious overhaul.

Spring Cleaning: Kitchen Edition

I am giving in to my deep desire to give the house a thorough Spring Cleaning, and am starting today, with the kitchen. I'm not sure how long or how far I'm going to get, but I'm starting out with great intentions and high expectations!

I took these pictures yesterday before I did any general, daily clean-up, so it doesn't look the same today (actually a little better!). Missing is also the wall where I was standing to take these pictures - which is what we call "The Island" that really isn't an island - it is the hot spot for collecting "stuff". If I make it far enough to take "after" pictures I'll be sure to include it :)




My list of what I want to get done between today and tomorrow:

Saturday noon-time update: Still going strong! I think I can finish up today :)

• Dishes: Wash, dry & put away
• Counters: Move and wipe off/under everything
• Wipe & dust trim and ceiling fan
• Wipe & dust cupboards (outsides)
• Clean off and wipe down refrigerator (outside)
• Clean out and wipe down inside of cupboards (upper)
• Clean out and wipe down inside of cupboards (lower)
• Clean microwave inside and out
• Clean oven/stove inside & out (including polishing the glass-top)
• Wash and disinfect trashcan
• Clean out, wipe out and organize under sink
• Wash and disinfect dish drainer/drainboard and sinks
• Clean out from under stove
• Pull out refrigerator and clean under/behind, sweep off coils (??)

Saturday night update: I only have the floor and windows to do, but for now I'm going to bed.

• Pick up, vacuum, wash floor and apply grout sealer
• Wash Windows (I can't believe I forgot this one...)
• Wash light fixtures
  

I'll be stopping back by occasionally to cross things off as I get them done. I have the list pretty much in execution order. It's a long list so I'd best get crackin'! Maybe I should put on some peppy music to clean by...

Do you spring clean? I have never officially done it - at least as the chief homemaker. Please share any tips, tricks or experiences you might have!

I Can't Lose

Ugh, some days I just want to bury my head in the sand. Or at least become a hermit and live in a cave where dishes and clothes wouldn't matter.

Since I can't do either of those (well, I guess I could do either one), I just have to tough it out.

If I am going to win the war against the dirty dishes, I must fight the battle and wash them.

If I am going to win the war against the mountain of clean clothes piled at the foot of my bed, I must fight the battle and fold them. AND put them away.

If I am going to win the war against the stuff that piles on the table and counters, I must fight the battle and keep the stuff put where it belongs. And "file it instead of pile it."

If I am going to win the war against not getting enough sleep, I must fight the urge to stay up late and just go to bed. And go to sleep instead of reading.

If I am going to win the battle and do my Bible Study Homework, I must fight and make it a priority and just. do. it.

*****

These are some things I have been struggling with a lot this year. I cannot use Susannah as an excuse. I cannot use being a mama as an excuse. I know this because looking through my lists LAST YEAR, when Susannah was only months old, I accomplished these things fairly regularly. I know I can do it again. I just have to be the boss of my "don't want to's" and tell myself that "oh, yes, I AM going to do those things!"

Just another post, keepin' it real here.

Plus, I can do ALL things through Christ, right (Philippians 4:13)? As Steve Green says, "not just some things, but ALL things."

While the Cat's Away...

The mice play. Or not.

Every year Daniel's dad and several of his dad's brothers and a nephew or two go on a "man-vacation" to a lake house owned by one of their buddies. This year Daniel really wanted to go and it suited for him to, so he took 2 days of vacation and went :)

While he was gone I decided to zoom in and focus on doing some much needed cleaning. I didn't get the whole house done like I would've liked to, but I knew that wasn't realistic thinking. Susannah had her 4 month checkup one morning, and after that we did our grocery run. That took a big chunk out of the day. Between that afternoon and the next morning I did give the kitchen a thorough cleaning - wiping down the cabinet fronts, the ceiling fan, and decluttering the major catch-all area of counterspace that had been too-long just shoved to the side. That evening I unearthed the dining room table. And instead of "piling it" I actually "filed it."

That was last weekend. This weekend he is at a men's retreat hosted by good friends of ours. He left late yesterday afternoon and I didn't get gobs done... kinda took a mini vacation myself (an excuse to be, uh, lazy :) ). The kitchen and dining room table need a quick clean-up, then we'll resume the deep cleaning, moving on to the china hutch (dude, you can pile a bunch of stuff on that flat surface!), the floor (don't look), and then the living room. And the bed is a growing Mt. Washmore of clean laundry that needs FAPA'd (folded and put away).

I hope to get the main gist of the house back to a state of orderliness so I can do maintenance cleaning instead of tripping over piles of baby stuff (not toy-stuff, other stuff that just needs a place to be stored).

Getting Into a Routine

It hardly seems like it was more than yesterday when I was still pregnant with Susannah. But instead it's been a whole 3 weeks, almost 4. As I told someone the other day, the days have been fast but the hours long. Thankfully the hours aren't seeming as "long" now that she is nursing faster and it doesn't take as much effort to wake her up and keep her awake to nurse - wooohooooo!!!!

I think we've settled into a pretty good routine with Susannah, and now that she's eating faster I get to sleep more :) And since I get to sleep more, I feel more human when I'm awake :) And since I feel more human it means I feel more like doing things around the house that Daniel's had to do the past month.

All that said, I hope to start working my way around the house again this week. Last week I did a couple things here and there, mostly unloading/loading the dishwasher a time or two. This week I hope to get back into the laundry routine (poor Daniel had to wear the saddest undershirt to church because it was the only clean one, and it was one that was on it's way to the trash!) and stay on top of the kitchen.

My sister made TEN loaves of bread for us, so I won't have to jump back onto the bread-making wagon as soon as I thought I was going to have to (and buying bread was starting to look good...).
The meals from our Sunday School class were great - they got us through a good 2 weeks, and yesterday we picked up several more meals from my MOPS group. They should get us through this week, but I may do a little cooking this week to ease myself back into cooking and stretch the MOPS meals out a little bit. Hmm, but that would mean I'd have to go grocery shopping, so we'll see :P

I still enjoy several naps each day, usually in the mornings and early afternoon. I hope to start going to bed earlier (a simple matter of DOING it!) so I can feel more awake in the mornings and then do my napping in the afternoons. We'll see. Right now I crash into bed about 5am (after the 4am feeding) and the alarm for Daniel goes off about 1 hour later. I'm so out of it that I haven't been getting up and making his breakfasts and lunches yet, and that's something I really want to get back to doing soon. It's a little way I can show my love for him, and it's important to me to do it, though I know he knows I still love him when I don't do it :)

Right now I need to go get dressed for the day (evening? it's 4:10pm) and figure out what we're gonna eat for supper. Then I may tackle the mish-mash of clean laundry that needs folded and put away before it consumes the laundry room.

Just Keeping Busy

Each day that goes by I know I have one less day to "do stuff" before the baby comes. I just keep piddling around getting a little more cleaning done each day. My house is not spotless yet. Far from it. The week or two where I couldn't do much left it's mark, then when I was able to move freely again I focused on getting the nursery set up. Now I'm getting around to the other parts of the house.

Today I did one more "this might be the last time in a while" cleaning of the kitchen. I haven't gotten to the floor yet but I hope to run over all the floors with the vacuum yet this evening. They haven't seen that machine in, well, too long.

I also did major laundry today. My clothes plus ALL the bed-clothes. The whole rigmarole. Sheets, mattress pad, blanket and bedspread. The bedspread gave up the ghost in the washing machine. It's been dying a little bit each time I wash it and today was it's final hoo-rah. The outsides are worn out and starting to tear at the seams, and this time when I washed it the stuffing/filling went all to pieces and is now in big wads throughout the inside. My mother-in-law has given us blankets/bedspreads through the 6 years we've been married and since we didn't need them we put them in the closet. I guess we'll break one out now!

My other accomplishment so far today has been to rediscover the dining room table. It had grown into an indistinguishable mound of stuff that just kept getting shoved around when we would sit down to eat. I can see the surface now. There's still some organized piles I need to deal with but that shouldn't take too long.

And I'd best get the table done so I can get the laundry dealt with and the few other things I need to finish before my energy level crashes for the day.

Goals for 2010

I am good at making lists and following lists, but I think this is perhaps the first year that I have actually thought about and written out a list of goals that I would like to accomplish throughout the year. I have been thinking about these things for the past several weeks, and reading other people's goals has given me ideas, and reminded me of things that I've thought about or wanted to do, but just never do them. Hopefully by having a written list, I'll do better at actually doing instead of just thinking. These are all subject to change. I have no idea what God has in store for us this year, but I can still at least make a plan and strive to do my best with whatever situation I'm in.

Personal
(Many of these Daniel and I have talked about, since several of them include not just myself, but the both of us.)
*Go to bed, at bedtime, together.
*Spend time together as a couple each day.
*Spend time together as a family each day.
*Regular date nights for just the two of us (monthly or bi-monthly)
*Daily personal quiet time with the Lord.
*Read at least 1 book a month - I love to read, but push it to the back burner so often.
*Exercise 3x a week or more.
*Lose baby weight and then some (after the baby's born, of course!)
*Choose and develop 1 or 2 new habits each month - I really enjoyed FishMama's "Get a Good Habit Going" challenge last year, I want to keep it up.
*Eat breakfast together more often - usually Daniel eats breakfast on the way to his work.
*Don't overschedule our calendar. Keep time free for "us" and know that it's ok to say "no."

Financial
*Cash only for groceries, entertainment/recreation. It is so easy to overspend in these areas, I want us to try the cash only system to keep us on-track.
*Stick to budget! Less impulse buying!
*Put SOME money into savings each week, plus any extra that is possible.

In the kitchen
*Menu plan each week 1 week ahead.
*Serve salads with meals 2x a week - we both like salads, but I don't often plan them into the menu.
*Find or create the happy medium for eating healthier without going overbudget.
*Update the freezer inventory quarterly (basically print off new sheets to correspond with my chicken scratches and changes on the existing one).
*Try new recipes more often.
*Use crockpot 1x a week.
*Reduce food waste - stay on top of leftovers and freezer inventory.

Household
*Donate or throw away more. DO NOT KEEP CLUTTER
*Complete To-Do lists daily.
*Stay on top of filing paperwork (aka - keep the desk clean!).
*Print off, write on and put photos in albums monthly.
*Maintain clean and welcoming bedrooms.
*Put curtains in kitchen windows.
*Continue with weekly or monthly "Monster Projects"

Miscellaneous
*Blog more regularly.
*Clean out coupon file quarterly.

Above all else
*Do all things in a manner that glorifies God and brings honor to my husband.
*Strive to be the best wife and mama I can be.
*Maintain a peaceful and welcoming atmosphere in our home.

Monster Project - Freezers

This was a cool project. Literally. I'm a week behind in posting my success in this department, but I didn't really get the project TOTALLY finished until just tonight - and that was only because I was in bed for 2 hrs, couldn't sleep a wink and decided to get up and finish it.

On Thanksgiving Day my goal was to clean out, sort and organize our 2 chest freezers. They are not the great big kind, but neither are they the tiny-winy little cube kind, either. The freezers themselves have been a blessing to us - they were both given to us within a year after we moved here. They are getting pretty old and we need to start thinking about replacing them with newer, more efficient models, and ones that aren't starting to rust and won't risk konking out from old age :)

Anyway, I was quite successful with this project, with the help of my amazing, stud-muffin husband who eagerly helped me with the hard parts. He lifted the coolers of food around so I didn't have to, he pulled the bottom layer of food out of the freezers so I wasn't standing on my head or squishing Baby George trying to do it myself, and he even volunteered to wipe them out once they were defrosted. The final surprise of all surprises! We had planned to move the meat freezer from the shed to the cellar, but after we (mostly "he") moved it, he said "we can move the vegetable freezer, too." I think I fell in love with him all over again! I knew moving one of them was going to be a big enough deal, I didn't expect him to move BOTH of them! I am SO in love with the fact that I no longer have to traipse over the river and through the woods, barefoot in knee-deep snow, up-hill both ways (ok, not really...) to get to the freezers. Instead, I can go out the back door, down the steps, make a U-turn, go down 3 more steps into the cellar and VOILA! there are my freezers!!

This evening I went through the refrigerator freezer and inventoried it. I found several things to move to the chest freezers, and then when I was typing up my inventory list, realized I could've put a few more things down there, but I didn't feel like making a trip in the middle of the night just to suit my organizational side. My menu planning is going to be so much easier now that I have these lists, and I really hope that I will keep them current, as well as use up some of the odds and ends that get put in the freezer and forgotten about.

One thing we found we have an abundance of would be Green Beans - we have 26 quarts (all from this year's garden)! If only my peas and corn would do so well! We also discovered enough cherries to feed an army, it was 31 quarts in all, both sweet and sour. I rediscovered our large stash of jellies - Strawberry, Grape and Peach. I forget it's in there and don't eat it. Guess what I've been eating on toast and biscuits this week :)

I'm glad this project is done. It was one I knew I wanted to do, and wanted to get done before I got much more pregnant, and definitely wanted to get done before the baby comes or who knows when it would happen after that? I am enjoying (do I sound crazy?) getting these monster projects accomplished. Not so much the doing part, but knowing that I have a week (that's my goal, anyway) to get X done, and just working on it and really enjoying the results.

I have started whittling away at this week's project. I really hope to have it completely finished by the end of this week, when I will blog about it for sure :P Hint: it involves our bedroom and the "exploded mountain of clothes," as Daniel called it the other day.

Cleaning the Lava Pit (AKA the Oven)

We all know how it goes. You bake a pie, a casserole, a cake that decides it doesn't want to stay in the pan... and they drip and drop "stuff" all over your oven floor. It smokes and stinks and eventually you forget about it. Until the next big holiday rolls around and you want to impress with your mad cookin' skillz... and sparkling clean oven. And you spend hours either running the oven's "self cleaning cycle" - which stinks to high heaven - and then more hours sweeping and wiping out the leftover residue, OR you spend hours on your hands and knees scrubbing your knuckles raw trying to scrape off the lava-rock-like substance that has become one with your oven floor.

"Here I am to save the day! Mickey Mouse is on his way!" or something like that. No, really, I want to offer you a last minute Thanksgiving Day Feast Preparation tip for keeping your oven lava-free until next year. This morning I decided it was a good time to clean our oven.

Exhibit A: My dirty oven.

Note my mistake in not covering the WHOLE floor of the oven!!

There is baked-on "goo" in the 2" open space on either side of the foil.

Also note that the majority of the "lava" is contained on the foil!

Under normal circumstances (meaning, no open cracks in the foil), I simply pull out the dirty foil, wad it up, toss it in the trash, and voila! a clean oven. Since I was in a hurry the last time I put down clean foil (obviously!) I did have to spend some time cleaning up the edges of the floor. When you're in a REAL hurry and don't put foil down at all... you end up with baked-on-for-life scars like you see in my freshly scrubbed clean oven.

Exhibit B: My clean oven.

Note the baked on stuff from a previous time with no foil.

(it looks much worse in the picture)

It's important to use foil.

Please ignore the runny-looking drips on the back wall.

There was no way I could reach them in my pregnant state.

Exhibit C: My newly foiled oven.

Nice, sparkly clean foil! Note that I've made SURE

to get it all the way to the edges of the floor and then some.

Exhibit D: My tools for the project.

Comet, a razor, a bucket of hot water and a dishrag.

That's all there is to it! The Comet is a fume-free, non-abrasive scrubbing powder so I can use it without fear of scratching the glass in the door or the enamel.

The razor blade... well, I'm sure it could do serious scratching damage, but I use it just like I do for my glass stove-top and it works wonders for removing what the dishrag can't scrub off. Seriously. I even attacked some of the old stuff again today and managed to get some more of it off.

(If you're lucky, your oven door is removable. Then you can practically climb inside the thing and scrub it with great ease. I thought ours came off, but it doesn't. All the more reason to keep the foil covering the entire bottom! Haha!)

After I do all the initial scrubbing, I do wipe it down good with clean water, and then heat it up good to get rid of any soap residue that might be left. This can emit somewhat of a faint odor, but really not much. After that, I put down the clean foil and call it a day.

*Disclaimer: There have been a handful of people that have told me that putting foil in the bottom of the oven like this will mess with the baking temperature, the way it bakes, the way the thermometer reads the oven temperature, so on and so forth. I keep using my oven like I always have, things bake like normal, and I can't tell a difference.