I need a House and Home "mentor"!! Anybody interested??

OK. Tiffany, after your post the other day about "thanks to FlyLady my house is clean," I decided to go back and rejoin. I think when I got th emails, they kept me more on track. So I signed up to get them in digest form, and this week I am going to go back through my control journal and re-do my routines so they are more up to date. Thanks for the inspiration!

 

I have not read all of the other posters. Sorry for redundancy. I might catch up on reading tonight.

We are making the same transition, I might be a bit ahead, I will share comments from my experience so far.

I recommend the New Square Foot gardening Book. It gives you a simple and expandable way to start gardening based on years of research by an engineer and the movement he started.

As far the natural/scratch cooking. Its all about compromise at first. Mix and match and introduce new menu items gradually replacing old/undesireable ones as you do.

It can be costly at first to change over to fresher stuff, but replacing convience items can compensate. At the same time it is not wise to be without canned and dried goods on hand. Just change over to more basic staples and mix and match them with the fresh. I find that keeping fewer basics on hand allows me to keep stuff rotated more easily.

I avoid new cleaning products, and new condiments, and convenience foods, therefore coupon clipping does not work for us. I seldom see shreaded wheat bicuits, or cornflakes with a coupon. Ditto, fresh foods, or produce and staples like rice, flour or salt.

You do not have to garden to can. Buy a canner then get your produce from supply houses or a farmers market. Your local agricultural ext. office can help you with learning to can if you need help. Ditto gardening and growing fruits, nuts etc.

Just keep in mind that you can simplify where you want and stay modern where you want. You do not have to become Amish to have a less hectic life.

 

I have not read all of the other posters. Sorry for redundancy. I might catch up on reading tonight.

We are making the same transition, I might be a bit ahead, I will share comments from my experience so far.

I recommend the New Square Foot gardening Book. It gives you a simple and expandable way to start gardening based on years of research by an engineer and the movement he started.

As far the natural/scratch cooking. Its all about compromise at first. Mix and match and introduce new menu items gradually replacing old/undesireable ones as you do.

It can be costly at first to change over to fresher stuff, but replacing convience items can compensate. At the same time it is not wise to be without canned and dried goods on hand. Just change over to more basic staples and mix and match them with the fresh. I find that keeping fewer basics on hand allows me to keep stuff rotated more easily.

I avoid new cleaning products, and new condiments, and convenience foods, therefore coupon clipping does not work for us. I seldom see shreaded wheat bicuits, or cornflakes with a coupon. Ditto, fresh foods, or produce and staples like rice, flour or salt.

You do not have to garden to can. Buy a canner then get your produce from supply houses or a farmers market. Your local agricultural ext. office can help you with learning to can if you need help. Ditto gardening and growing fruits, nuts etc.

Just keep in mind that you can simplify where you want and stay modern where you want. You do not have to become Amish to have a less hectic life.

 

I'm glad I could be of help Sooner Mama! I have been loving flylady. I have my control journal and I even printed one for Samantha but tweaked it a bit. She is swishing and swiping everyday and actually thinks it is neat. She doesnt' know I made her a control journal. I am going to give it to her next week when we start school.

So let me give an update on how I am doing with all this:

It has been almost two months since I stopped smoking. Dh and I are both doing well with that.

I talked to dh about doing a bigger garden when we take the swing set out but he isn't really going for that because of our dog. There are ways to make it work of course and I have time to work on him. I am going to be planting herbs though.

My cooking from scratch is going great! I found that when I take the time I am really a great cook! I have been buying fresh, planning meals, and I haven't eaten vegetables from a can in a month. Dh is loving it but he thinks I'm trying to make him fat. So I bought reduced fat milk and he just laughed. Now I need Jennifererix to come teach me how to make my own bread!

I still can't sew and have no one to show me how. Well I do have a friend that sews wonderfully but she works full time and has three kids. She has no time to teach me. But she has made Samantha curtains for her birthday and she is going to make curtains for Grace's room and the guest room.

My house is extremely clean. I took all the stuff from my junk room and donated it. I set up the bed, cleaned out the closet and now all I have to do is paint and I will have a new guest room. I plan on painting that room and Grace's room in the next few weeks. I have a cleaning schedule and so far have stuck to it.

I have a big project I am going to tackle at some point. I want to tear up the floor in the entry, office and kitchen and replace it with either tile or peal and stick wood looking laminate. My kitchen floor looks so crappy! It is white linoleum that is really scratched up and dirty looking no matter how much I clean it. I also have a black dog who sheds like crazy all over my white floor!

So anyway that is pretty much it! My house is clean and uncluttered. My family is well feed. I am so ready to start the school year. I need to thank all of you over and over again!! You guys have been my inspiration! Ya know I don't need to join a hs group - I consider you guys my hs, family, childrearing, cooking, cleaning support group!!! Thank you so much!!

 

That sounds like you are doing GREAT!!!! Hopefully I will get back into the swing of things, too.

 

Wow Tiffany! I'm impressed, and very proud of you!!!

YOU GO GIRL!!!

Now I feel guilty cuz I haven't gotten going with this stuff yet, and I so NEED to! Now Tifany, you are inspiring others!!! Way to go!

HEY, CONGRATULATIONS on almost two months of not smoking!!! That is sooooo great! WooHoo! Keep up the good/GREAT work!!!

 

Thanks everyone!

Deena I feel so much better since I quit smoking I just can't believe it. I don't cough anymore and my singing voice is back!!!! I love to sing but smoking kind of killed that. I'm so glad dh quit too.

 

Way to go Tiffany, keep up the good work. You sound like you feel so much better!!!

 

Wow, Tiffany! I'm just back from being away on a volunteer assignment with dd for awhile and, after checking progress on prayer requests, I came here to see how people are doing on their houses. I can hardly believe your fantanstic progress! I've got to unpack from our trip and get into teaching our hs highschool, but I'm determined to improve in similar ways to how you have.

Could you share with the rest of us what the most helpful things are that you learned and have put into practice?

 

Prairie Home I'm so glad your back!!!! Did you enjoy camp? I'm sure Colorado was to die for!

My big test will be to see how well I can keep this up now that we started school. We just started today.

I suppose the most helpful things were keeping my sink clean as suggested on flylady. It may sound silly but when my kitchen is clean I feel more motivated to do more. Also the zone cleaning recommended on the site really helped so much. I do my weekly "home blessing" on Monday which Samanthat helps with and then do small areas of the zone cleaning throughout the week which she also helps with. She cleans her bathroom every morning too. It helps to know that each area of the home will be cleaned every month and certain things done once a week. I've also been drinking more water and the fact that I don't have that nasty nicotine in my system is fantastic!

My main suggestions for anyone is to have a schedule for cleaning and flylady's works for me.

 

Thanks for the inspiriation and the welcome back! Yes, Colo was gorgeous! But now I'm facing a house in disarray, an over-load of laundry, a stack of mail and bills... the need to jump-start our school year, and a noticeable lack of energy. But I am glad to be home, and I'm excited about your report. It makes me think that I, too, can do this!

 

OK, four days later and I'm more in my right mind, enjoying Kansas' cooler late-summer weather, getting caught up on things, more rested, the flower garden partially weeded, a great start in the twins' junior year of homeschooling, and the house more organized. Now, if I could just stay away from this Spot long enough to wash the windows...

 

I wish we had cooler weather to enjoy! Still in the 90's with 90% humidity here. We aer supposed to get a cool front next week that will drop the temps all the way to teh upper 80's! (can you hear the sarcasm???)

Well it sounds like you have accomplished quite a bit since being back. I really need to wash my windows!

 

'Got the worst one washed! It's the one above the kitchen sink. I was shocked when I opened it up and saw a layer of dead June bugs on the inner sill! It's so clear now, that I feel like I could fall through it when I'm washing my dishes! *Happy me!*