A little housekeeping

(Blog housekeeping and house housekeeping!)

Wow. Today is just going so well. I have this ideal in my head of how the day should go, and today is actually living up to that.

To begin with, Troy got up with Max for the big stretch last night, so I logged seven hours of z's with only one shortish sleep interruption, and I actually feel awake and ready to go. Unlike how nights have been going lately, with two or more long awake interruptions with Max, and the odd Claire wake up. I think I didn't mention Claire had chickenpox while Max was in the hospital. That's how minor it was (or how distracted we were), but she was awake with some itchies a bit over the last week. Oh yes, and she fell out of bed twice. Yes. Ahem. Bed rail is now installed. Something as little as bringing it up from the basement and dusting it off can get in my way sometimes.

Then I had a coffee while hanging out in the playroom with happy Max and Claire, and doodled some house plans. (Yes! I'm back on the caffeine train. I've quit quitting coffee. After a month of dragging myself around uncaffeinated and exhausted I've decided whatever is up with Max's skin has nothing to do with the coffee I thought might be bothering him. So I'm going to at least pair my sleep deprivation with my favorite little black bean and gain some sort of alertness. Although at least now, having actually quit for a while, I can say I'm pretty confident there was no correlation between my vice and his eczema.) Watching them play together is so sweet. I love watching the sibling relationships blossom as baby gets old enough to really interact. The big kids are always so surprised and excited that the baby (who was cute but seemed quite useless to them before) is now also fun to play with!

Next up was a nap for Max and some housecleaning for me, Claire puttering around with me being a big helper. It never ceases to amaze me how baby's sleep (lack of or lots of) rules the day. I even managed to dust off my Flylady routine's that haven't seen much action in the last month. Get dressed (believe it or not that's a biggie for me), make the bed, reboot the laundry, feed the cat and empty the litterbox, unload the dishwasher, tidy up the kitchen, swish and swipe the bathrooms, and figure out what's for supper. I even decluttered the laundry room, finally taking the kitty litterbox to the basement and her food to the kitchen like I've been intending to, letting the laundry room feel clean enough to clean clothes in.



My house 'blessings' (aka house cleaning) plan, inspired by Flylady.

Notice all the checks today?! And the scribbly part is the supper plan, broccoli and fish, that's as close and I seem to be able to get to meal planning. My favorite part of my day plan, is the big square in the middle, a little list of things reminding me to get down on Claire and Max's level with them. Which is so much more important to me than housecleaning.

I even made one with the kids, with pictures for the non-readers, helping them with their routines. Even though we only use these occasionally, it works way better than any other chores chart we've tried. And they like checking off their accomplishments too!

I know it sounds like I let our lives be governed by lists and charts, but believe me it's not. They're more often ignored and not followed, but I learned a long time ago that 'ideal days' (like today!) don't happen if you haven't figured out what the ideal is, made a plan and goals. And making it visual is huge for me. So I have my little lists slid inside clear protectors - one of my favorite tricks, so I can check off items (or write down the supper plan, etc.) with dry erase markers, to be used again another day - and then taped on the inside of cupboard doors, so they're there if I want to look at them or absent if I don't want to look at them. I've done this with my list of vitamins to take, and the kids too, making one less thing to have to remember.

I was terrible at taking my vitamins, this has actually really helped.

Now, after our lunch, Claire and I are enjoying a little downtime. Her with Cat in the Hat and a pile of hair accessories she scrounged up somewhere, and I with you!

Oh yes, and the blog 'housekeeping' I was telling you about. Have you noticed the little word 'Home' sitting at the top left of my blog lately? All by it's lonesome? I've been meaning to figure out how to add more pages and just took a long time getting there. But now I've added a page for a list of my favorite blogs (it was getting too long for the side of my page) and plan to add a few other pages soon. Stay tuned, I have a few cool ideas I'm excited to add.

Next up, outdoors to enjoy this beautiful winter sun!