A good few months ago I started looking at the FlyLady routines and beginning to follow her baby steps towards getting a tidier and organised house. When my depression took hold it all fell by the wayside. I’ve now decided that I need some help to get my housework and general organisation back under control. So I’m turning back to FlyLady.
I know the system has worked well for the wife of one of Mr H’s college friends, someone who’s a bit like me in some ways. So I’m going to give it a really good go this time and keep at it, I didn’t even manage to finish working through the baby steps last time!
The first thing we ‘FlyBabies’ are asked to do is to shine our kitchen sink every day. It’s a great start for me it’s a challenge….when we moved into our house we inherited a fairly nice kitchen, reasonably well installed with nice enough units and tiles but with a horrendous cream plastic sink. Now, if anyone knows a way of making a cream plastic sink shine I’d love to know….. I give it a good scrub (a pan only has to touch the sink for it to get black marks and ’scratches’ on it), but there’s no way to get it properly clean.
Mr H and I have talked about getting a new steel sink, it’s the only thing we want to do to the kitchen. I think I’m just going to have to work on him a bit more….he really likes it when I’ve got the housework well under control as there’s less for him to do when he gets in from work in an evening…..a sink I could actually shine would help me stay more motivated to keep going with the whole FlyLady thing. I think it’s just the expense that’s bothering him at the moment, a new sink isn’t cheap, plus we’d need to buy new taps as well. Mr H would definitely be able to install it himself though. I let you know if I manage to persuade Mr H to let me get a new sink.
Are there any other FlyBabies reading this? How do you find the system works for you?
June 8, 2007 at 3:12 pm
I looked at her site and was overwhelmed. I think the thought of shining my sink, every day, alone would drive me batty!
June 8, 2007 at 8:14 pm
I started it and still get the emails but I’m not very good. However, my overall house is tidier and I cleared out the area next to my bed and my bedside tables and we have managed to keep them that way. That’s a massive achievement as far as I’m concerned. I really like the 15minute theory.
June 9, 2007 at 12:29 am
I noticed you were doing this on that other site and I was going to join that group too. I signed up for this about 2 weeks ago and right now I am sort of overwhelmed with the emails. I’m pretty much picking and choosing what I feel like doing when I should be following it totally. I am drinking my water and my sink gets a swish every night. I do think that those Riley challenges are fantstic…my oldest cleared out a bunch of books.
June 9, 2007 at 9:01 am
Emma, have you tried following the babysteps first? That’s all I’m starting with and gradually building it up. I look at the emails, but don’t worry too much about them at the moment. The kitchen’s definitely looking better than it has don in ages already. I hadn’t seen the Riley challenges…..they may prove useful when the munchkin gets older.
June 10, 2007 at 5:44 am
I haven’t even figured out what the baby steps are! Is that just the clearing hot spots and whatnot? Oddly enough, I find that the site is too disorganized for me to follow!
June 10, 2007 at 1:23 pm
It really starts right at the basics….putting shoes on when you first get dressed is the step to add one day, shining sink is added another. It just slowly builds up your routine…..so far so good with me, but I’m only on day 8 of them. Clearing a hotspot was one I had at the end of last week to add in. You’ve just reminded me to check what today’s step is…..
June 12, 2007 at 7:48 pm
I got a little overwhelmed with all of the routines. I am such a SHE!! I love all of the FlyLady consepts – I’m just not that great at implementing them.
Shining the sink is key to keeping the kitchen clean. Actually. Now that I think about it – it seems in our kitchen the cleanliness revolves around the dishwasher. If it’s full of clean dishes, the dirty ones pile up around it. But when it’s ready to be filled the kitchen stays pretty clean.