Full of the joys of spring!!

The weather's been glorious here - I've had FOUR loads of washing out today!! 

It's inspired me to start sorting out the back bit of the garden (which was clearly used as a dumping ground by previous occupants but we finally got the council to come & clear the majority of the junk...).  It's going to need a lot of work doing to it, but a little every (dry) day should hopefully soon see it right for at least planting some annual flowers in...

I've also just about finished the big boys' bedroom - I promise I'll put some pics up just as soon as I've got the coving put up!

And being full of the joys of spring, I'm ready to crack on with my habithacking....
I looked at my spreadsheet just now to see where I'm up to & coincidentally, the next step is to start customising the routines - which is just what I figured I'd blog about today anyway!!  Seeing as how 2 steps ago was to add in a half-assed housecleaning hour (or half-hour as I'm hoping to make it!) & the habithacker does hers on a Monday...  Now that doesn't work for me for a variety of reasons.  So I thought that I'd do it on a Wednesday, as I've got to get rid of all the rubbish on a Wednesday anyway to put out for the binmen on a Thursday.  Then I realised that I just don't have the time on a Wednesday...  Plus I like to change the bedding at the weekend...
So I finally figured, the best thing for me is to split it up - so now I'm doing some on Wednesday, some at the weekend but most of it on a Thursday (when I have the most time).  And that's going to work best for me, so I should actually DO it - which is the important bit about this whole getting organised malarky - making things work for YOU, not just doing what some book or website tells you to do....

Onwards & upwards!

I am my only octopuss....

Hello lovely readers.  It's been a while due to my extremely bad habit of procastinating....

Anyway, as some of you might know, I do the odd bit of pole-dancing (& by odd, I mean odd!!!  My lovely teacher Jamie shows myself & my classmate moves, & we do them COMPLETELY differently to her!!! )

So Rhi & I went to watch Jamie & one of her other students perform last week.  And they were fantastic...  Nicola was totally inspiring & motivating, she was so good & if I'm going to get anywhere near that standard I really REALLY need to practice more.... (I've been good tonight & had a bit of a session but by bit, I mean 1 song... oops!  It is the song I'll be performing to at the showcase next month so not too bad I guess..)

Anyway, we were talking to Nic afterwards & other than nagging us about practicing more often, she showed us a tattoo she's had done to motivate herself.  "I am my only obstacle"  So true, so very true.  The only person stopping me being as good as her is me.

So I really, honestly will be practicing a whole lot more often.  I don't want to be my only octopuss....

Children are strange

now while I'm pretty sure there are stranger out there than mine, (please tell me there are!!) on the weird front mine are up there with the best of them.

Take today for example...  My delightful darlings are playing at being waiters and DS1 had taken an order for roast octopus from me (ok, that might be a little hint at where they get their strangeness from!)
DS2 piped up that he wanted a roast octopus & salad sandwich....  All good, right? 

Cue a couple of minutes later when DS2 is sobbing uncontrollably...  I ask him what's wrong, only to find out he's this upset because DS1 didn't put octopus in his sandwich......  How he can tell these things from an imaginary plate, I have absolutely no idea, but DS1 had to correct the error!!!

They get nuttier!!!

Penny Pinching Mama

Well, as you know, I'm attempting to organise my life.  And that includes my finances.  Which aren't in the best shape in the world.  They could be worse but they could also be a lot better.
Now, according to www.creditexpert.co.uk my credit rating is "fair" but I'd love for it to be "good".  Which means getting rid of the debt.

So in a moment of serendipity, I came across the Penny Pinching Mama.  This lady has some fab tips for cutting costs, living on a budget & shifting the debt. 

And for the next couple of hours she's running a competition to win a copy of her book "how to save money & get rid of debt"  simply by going to her blog post here

All you need to do is comment on the blog post by the end of 28th February & you've got a chance of winning!

Good luck guys!

Unclean, Unclean.....

Beware, for I have man-flu!!  Which is typical (& more than a tad annoying) seeing as how I'm off work this week....

Littlest son has also been ill - horrid hacking/barking cough, listless & totally not himself...  Last time he was like this, I ended up feeling like I do now - horrid cough, sneezing constantly, sore eyes, aching all over, freezing cold & absolutely no energy....  the rest of the house remained perfectly healthy.....  hmmmm!!

Anyway, illness aside, we've been decorating this week.  The biggest 2 boys bedroom to be precise.  So far, we've only managed to strip the walls & fill in the holes but it's a start. And not bad when you consider we've been up to see family & also spent the day in Swansea yesterday, so we've really only had 2 days....

The house is a goddamn tip again tho....  (not that it was actually tidy but at least 2 of the downstairs rooms looked reasonable.)  I have managed to keep polishing my original place (living room floor) but that's a tad difficult as we have no vacuum cleaner at the moment.  The shit spots have regathered shit and the dining room table (which had become an extension of the place polishing) is also covered in crap....  I blame having everyone round...  honestly, it's nothing to do with my own laziness...

I'll kick-start it all again in a minute and in the meantime, in case you were interested in where I'd got up to on the Habithacking steps (before it all went pear-shaped), I've now begun my Brain On Paper (BOP); added to it and learnt about the importance of using a timer.

Next week, once the kids are back at school (& I'm back at work, boo)  I'll start on the D-Day Delve  And boy does this place need it!!!

Hope you've all been enjoying half-term - see you next time!

At last, at long last!!

I have been scouring Ebay/the local car dealers/free papers for a good couple of years, looking for a Volkswagon Caravelle....

I've wanted one for years...  Firstly, so I could go to gigs knowing that all I had to do was chuck a mattress in the back on top of the seats & voila, a handy place to sleep (mind you, the fact that when I was going to all these gigs, I couldn't actually drive was just a small sticking point)

Secondly (& probably more importantly) I seem to have a miniature tribe of small boys....  I'm still not entirely sure where they actually came from....  Anyway, said small boys were getting a tad cramped in the back of the Zafira that we were transporting them in....  and there's nowhere to put the vast quantities of food needed to feed a small tribe in a Zafira once all the seats are up....  ignore the adverts - they lie I tell you....

Anyway, we've finally got one!!!  I am so chuffed.  Yes it's old but it's got virtually no mileage (unlike vans that were a good 10 years younger than ours with 200K + more mileage.....) and it's in really really good condition.

And the boot space!!!  My good grief!  We could do our shopping for several months & still have space to spare!  And if we suddenly decide to move house (not that that's likely to happen, barring a lottery win) we could just take the back seats out & put stuff in the back - ok, it would take several runs but we wouldn't need to hire a van!

On the downside of course (there always is one, isn't there) I think it's going to cost us a bomb in fuel..... 

But do I care at the moment?  Nope!

Habithacking....

Well, I promised that I'd get round to telling you about habithacker.com

I came across this lovely lady's site a couple of months ago & I have to tell you, I way prefer it to Flylady - only one email a day & she tells it like it is - a shitspot is a shitspot not a "hotspot"!!

And she's transforming me!  You should see my living room - it only takes me 5 minutes these days to whizz round my living room, including vacuuming!! I'm not saying that it's immaculate, cos it's not, but I'm not going to be apologising for the state of it if someone calls unannounced!!

I will admit to you now, even though I've been subscribed for a couple of months (71 days to be precise) I'm actually only up to Day 7.  This is because of the way my inner rebellious teenager works...
I really really was trying to add a step a day, but then earlier things weren't getting done...

So I decided to start again at the beginning & add a new step only when I was into the habit of the earlier steps....  And that is working much better for me...  I may not be doing everything every day, but step 1 ("Polishing my place") is definitely ingrained now...  In fact, I do that several times a day!!  Even the monsters are getting pretty good at tidying the living room!! (My "place" if you're wondering is my living room floor...)

I also finally got round to putting the key rack up that I bought months back cos of this (day 3)
And I'm getting pretty good at shovelling the shit (day 5)


BUUUT, I'm stuck on step 7 - putting clothes out for the next day before I go to bed....  I really want to move on, so my goal for this next week is to do this EVERY night....  including the boys (although uniform's not challenging to think about so no excuse there!)

Anyway, in case any of you want to follow along with me, here's the links to the steps so far...

Step 2 Do your do

Step 3 Stash that key

Step 4 Polish twice

Step 5 Take a break

Step 6 Shovel the shit

Step 7 What to wear?


And yes, I know, you can always sign up to get the emails yourself but if we can cheer each other on, then maybe we can finally get organised (ok, you're probably already living in a tidy haven, so maybe I can finally get organised!)

And if you did want to do the steps alongside me, then honestly, these first 7 steps are easy to do a step a day, so this time next week, you can be at the same stage as me....  (if you really want to be!)

And maybe I can put some pics up as well as we go along!  *wonders if there's a way that you can share pics with me???*

Have fun everyone!