Housekeeping diary - 7/16/18

At the beginning of the summer I was going to go Konmari on my house.  Well, that never even took off.  BUT, then my amazing husband, for some reason, decided to clean out our study a couple weekends ago.  I helped!  But he did the bulk.  Now there is still some stuff tucked in corners that I need to deal with but it is just so much better now.  It makes me happy.  I am not ashamed to have the study door open now.  This has inspired me.

Poor S got laid off from work a couple weeks ago.  He had an unfortunate incident with driving the golf cart with trailer attached and scraping the side of a client's truck in the parking lot.  He's been very bummed.  Poor guy. He is so lonely and so low in self-confidence.  But it took this incident to get him to finally go to the guidance counselor at the CC and find out just what he needs to do to transfer to GMU.  I have been nagging him for months now.  He needs 3 more semesters and a summer course in language.  That's because he has been going so slowly and never taking a full load, up until this coming fall semester.  This fall, he's taking French 101 (4 credits), Environmental Science w/ lab (4 cr), Introduction to Communication (3 cr), College Success Skills (1 credit required) and flute (1 cr. I think; could be 2) again.  He also really wanted to take piano again, so I said if you stick with flute, you can also take piano.  He's so talented with no discipline so he flits from instrument to instrument.  I said nope you are going to become a fantastic, trained flute player.  I am forcing him to stick with the flute, because if he had gone to Berklee that was his instrument of choice.  If he was prepared to spend 4 intense years becoming a jazz flute player that means he can commit to the instrument.  Though secretly I wish he would study the organ.  He is fantastic on the organ!  I so didn't want my mil's organ but now that we have it, I love it.  Just goes to show!

Anyway, the point of this post is to journal my housekeeping:

Monday - 10 minutes dejunking one corner of my bedroom. It's amazing how much one can get done is 10 intense minutes.  I also cleaned the sink area, scrubbed the shower and toilet.

Helped S dejunk his desk and dust it. Right after he got fired, I forced him to clean up his room.  It's better but still needs dejunking.  He so needs order in his life, but he simply can't produce it himself.  And I am not good at producing it either.  He loved getting up and having to go to work.  He needs external structure.  I was hoping school would provide it, but most of the classes he wanted to take are at night, so I can see problems there.  Somehow he will have to get up at the same time each morning and prep for his afternoon and evening classes.  Oops,  I got derailed again by worrying about S!  Back to housekeeping!

As you can see, J (3rd slot in from left) is the only one that actually collects his mail.

Also a couple weeks ago I established a new mail system.  I found an old metal file holder with lots of slots.  It's ugly but I put it in our front hall.  First slot (from left to right) is for me and R's mail.  Second slot is for V.  Third slot is for J, 4th is for S, last is for B.  Any mail we still get for W or H, we put in a pile on top of the marble top dresser (it was my grandmother's).

I didn't do this, but B cleaned up her own room and bathroom.  That's kind of her regular pattern.  Her room will get so awful and then she'll get in this deep cleaning mood where she spends an entire day just blitzing through it. 

Last night, I also somewhat cleaned up the kitchen.  V was nice and cleaned it mid-day.  I didn't quite get all the cups and plates washed but I did get most and all the pots and pans.  Goal for this week is to get the kitchen cleaned each night.