20 days–week 2

And here we are at the end of week 2. I am feeling so much more organised and the house is actually managing to stay clean!
We’re still nutting out our morning and evening routine but we’re slowly finding what work and what doesn’t.

Day 6 was the bathroom. Now I hate my bathroom, with a serious passion. I don’t mind that it’s small and I do like the fact the toilet is a separate room, it’s the fact that it’s wood panelled – the whole room! It’s vile. It’s starting to rot around the bath. Yuck. and probably a health hazard too. Can you guess which room we’re renovating next.

Before
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After
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Day 7 I cleaned and reorganised our fridge.

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I’m surprised at how much stuff was out of date. I loved the idea of pre-cutting all our veg (you’ll have to scroll down the page a bit) so I’m going to invest in some new containers so we can do that here.

Day 8 was the spare room so I cleaned our sunroom. It houses our drier (until we finish doing up the laundry) and some of Miss K’s toys and her little table and chairs. I also decluttered all of Miss K’s toys. Some are being stored and others we’ll be giving away.

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Day 9 – cleaning fans. Easy – don’t have any. We had the reverse cycle put in today so checking the filters will be a new monthly job. I decluttered our junk drawer into a box. I sat down Saturday and sorted it, threw away and put things in better places. Junk drawer organised.

Also organised my dairy for the rest of 2012. I’ve added all the birthdays, public holidays and events I know about now.

Day 10 was cleaning the oven, not one of my favourite jobs. Thanks to this challenge I’ve now found a super easy way to clean my oven. Love it!

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Looking forward to starting week 3. I can’t believe we’re half way through.

20 days to organise?

Can it be done? The Organised Housewife thinks so and during September is challenging us to follow along with the daily prompts and challenges to make our lives more organised. I’ve been reading The Organised Housewife blog for some time now and thought, Why not? And on the upside the site is Australian Winking smile

Anywho, 20 days started on Monday…. well actually it started last week with 5 pre-challenge tasks.

We created a folder to keep all our notes, printables and checklists in one place, created a cleaning kit, created a morning & evening routine and set some goals. All ready to go we started Monday in the kitchen. I have to admit, the kitchen is one area I really struggle to keep clean.
My before and after

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So loving having a clean kitchen AND for the first time in ages I’m actually making an effort to keep it clean. Trying to convince hubby to help keep it clean is another matter though.

I missed doing day 2 & 3 cause I wasn’t home so day 4 was three days rolled into one.
We did the Bedroom on day 2
Before & after

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The bedroom still isn’t 100% clean. My scrap stuff I’m keeping here is still unorganised but I do have a plan for that.

Day 3 – laundry
Before & after

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Another room that still needs work. As soon as the plumber comes and fixes the plumbing we can add the laminex behind everything, put in the new sink, add some new shelving and give it the walls a coat of paint.

Day 4 – Lounge room
Before and After

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Day 5 was cleaning floors. We vacuumed and mopped so the floors now look reasonable again. No photos cause I couldn’t b bothered LOL

Another upside to this challenge – I’m more motivated to start my household folder (control journal or whatever you call it). I’ve started a list of all the projects I want to get done room by room. Inspiration from Pinterest. Routines. Important numbers. That sort of thing.

Weekend update – The kitchen is still clean! This is it Sunday evening. We’d had guests for tea but the kitchen is still reasonable not like it would have been before – stuff everywhere

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The bedroom seems to be less of a dumping ground AND I’m folding washing and putting it away when it’s dry (instead of dumping it on the bed, then back into the basket or just leaving it in the basket). Laundry is still clean. Lounge room looks like we have a toddler as Miss K loves leaving her toys everywhere but much more manageable now.

Bring on Week 2. I’m loving having a cleaner house and actually managing to keep it slightly more clean and organised.

It’s not too late to join in the 20 day challenge, you can still subscribe

The Organised Housewife

Ooh, That’s Pinteresting!–the home edition

Joining in with Tina for Ooh, That’s Pinteresting this week (first time I’ve played along)

Tina Gray {dot} Me

Tomorrow we’re getting the house we’re in valued so we can go for a bank loan. Fingers crossed we’ll be home owners by the end of the year. Which means we can do more stuff around the house.

I would love to do this for the planned BBQ area in the back yard.

Source: google.com via Caroline on Pinterest

 

and this would look awesome as edging on the paths and maybe even the driveway

 

and this inside the door to look after my keys

 

This is what I want the laundry to look like

 

then in the pantry I will have this

 

and I’d love this for beside the fridge (except there is no room after buying a new fridge/freezer)

 

All these images (& many, many more) can be found on my pinterest. If you’d like an invite, let me know Smile

What I’ve been up to

I’ve been taking a bit of a break from the online world (well apart from checking out twitter on my phone & checking my email only twice a day.) Where have I been I hear you ask? Well I’m glad you did.

It’s been glorious weather here for the last few days so Miss K & I have been out gardening (while hubby & the FIL have been building us a new gate)

We started off with with the garden near the mailbox.

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This is what it looked like just after we moved in and we weeded and redid the whole garden. Then it kinda got left and got overtaken with weeds *sigh* This is what it looks like now (I’ve added another 2 plants since this was taken)

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Then there is the little side garden which was going to be a rose garden but I decided the other day to turn it into a succulent garden for all my little cacti that needed repotting.

The before: The after:
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and I also ended up doing the garden beside the driveway. So I’ve been a busy little garden bug.

And then yesterday it poured!

Hopefully this weekend it will be nice again so I can do a bit more. Gotta love the warmer weather, so you can get outside and do things. Miss K is loving it!

Well my lovelies

went to the doc today and our family is to be plus one in 7 months (all going well)

Very excited. on the downside – I have morning sickness 🙁 just waiting for my first ob appointment. kinda hanging out for the first scan lol

grinning like a loon one minute then crying the next, all good 😉

birthday goodness

Couple of days late but u get that 😉

Just thought I’d share some of the goodies I got 4 my bday on Wednesday.

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Flowers from Mum & Dad

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My Slice bag

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Red Kelly sauces & dressings (yummo)

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a shirt

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another shirt

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A Dymo labler

plus a tatts ticket (so I could b rich – haven’t checked it yet lol) & I have 2 more coming (but there were bought OS apparently)

Well that’s all from me today. I’m off to veg in front of a fan until the Roll 2 Create cyber crop tonight. hope to see u there 🙂

The one where I got a bit red

yup I’m a little sunburnt. fortunately just on the arms. spent the day gardening today. the front yard is starting to look really good. put in two of the new plants we got for Christmas from the in-laws. Removed a tree or two & added a new garden bed for the roses I’ve got in pots. Gotta remember I don’t need to plant everything in pots now – we’re not moving. 🙂

So here’s my pics for today – getting the last of the tree root out

005and what it looks like after planting some new plants006 Still no scrapping yet. Might try & do some 2morrow.

Okies off to do something relaxing. might play the sims 2 for a bit & then get an early night.