This old mess

I love the idea of writing about your experience, @keobooks.

Coming Clean
My Path to Coming Clean
Clearing the Clutter
Cutting the Crap

@bkcunninhgam. Those are great!

On the way to Organized
Messy to Manageable
Managing the Mess
Chaos to Clean

This Mold(y) House.

I love @bkcunningham suggestions and I would definitely read your blog so please keep me posted?

“It’s a dirty job, but someone has to do it”

Home is where the fart is.

I love @bkcunningham ‘s Coming Clean. The only thing I can think of is Clutter Madness.

Unclutter.com
Declutter.com

My friend just suggested <name>‘s Tome of Order, because I’m a gaming geek and Raal’s Tome of Destruction is a mythical spellbook in one of our gaming world. I like it. Now I think I may come up with something cutesy other than my own name for the “spellbook” blog.

Mi Casa Es Zoo Casa

Neatness Countess

NotInMyHouse

HomeSurvivalTraining

HomeFailedAdvantage

I’m trying to come up with something using the gamer lingo…how about:

Order of the Organizing Noob

That’s the best I can do. I have a feeling your professional organizer is going to suggest less gaming and blogging throughout the next year. Good luck, @keobooks. Please, link your blog. I am excited for you.

Most of the ones I like posted here and on FB have been taken. Rats. Is it possible to re-name a blog after you start it?

What about.. declutterfly?

From Slob to Just the Job.

or

From Scruff to Not so Rough.

I like these suggestions. I made the blog and I may change it in the future. This is the first post.

Cleanliness is next to impossible.

You Can’t Even Imagine

Piles of Love

Expelamess! (House cleaning is magic to me)

Fantastic. I love your writing. The imagery is really good. I can see you following behind your daughter and closing the cabinet fast to keep everything from tumbling out. Of course, in my mind, I picture Marcie. I hope you post before and after photos to go with your words. I’m am seriously interested to see what techniques you learn to help you get and stay organized. Good luck on the journey! B.K. Cunningham

I love declutterfly! I hope to watch your story evolve!

Following with interest!

I love it! I hired an organizer a few times, it was very helpful. I just need to be better at keeping up with everything. My aunt once said that if I just spent 30 minutes a day organizing everything would stay neat. She might be right. That isn’t including cleaning, like cleaning the kitchen, she just meant paperwork, putting things in their place, laundry away, hair dryer away, things like that I am just so bad.

Method In My Madness.

Love the name you chose, and your first post. Please post here each time you add a new entry!

JLeslie – My organizer says that you shouldn’t have to spend 30 minutes a day organizing. Most of your housework should just be fixing up the system that’s already in place. If you have to spend time doing drudge work, it’s because your system isn’t suited to you. We’ll see.

I spend an hour a day on just the kitchen right now. And I let the rest of the house rot. So I don’t really have any clue.

@keobooks I know what you mean. Cooking and cleaning the kitchen takes up so much time I don’t want to do anything else after that. I tend to clean not put away and organize. Once a week I’ll clean the bathrooms for instance, but let my office pile up with papers for weeks.

Just last week a girlfriend and I agreed to go to each others houses and talk talk talk, which we are good at, while the other cleans up their offices and junk drawers. That’s the worst part for me, doing it alone.

You have inspired me to try and stay organized and try this 30 minutes a day rule, and hope it is actually less as your professional organizer implied. What I wonder is if people who like organizing are actually counting the same things as organizing? Since they like it, or are compulsive about it (well, maybe not compulsive, but I kind of think so) they may view it very differently. For instance, they may count going through mail as part of organizing and staying neat, but not putting your shoes in their proper spot. For me, all of it counts.

5 yes to 5S(methodology)
How to’s on cleaning
A clean sweep
Clean Queen

@keobooks

Oh. ....
So you were’nt really asking then?
And I spent all that time thinking!

I was really asking. I just wanted to get started rather than waiting a few days and procrastinating. I said that I’d likely change the name later. Sorry I didn’t wait for you personally. I will be sure to coordinate my life a bit better to match your schedule.

@keobooks Please let us know what you decide and how to find it. I’d love to read it.
(I’d also like to know about your dressing progress. I think of you often.)

How about: “Ctrl Alt Del”? Control our clutter, Alter your habits, and Delete the junk. It’s also how you restart your PC when it is hung up and going nowhere. I think of it as a fresh start. Just what you need.
I wish you well!!!

OMG Luckyguy that is so awesome. I bet you anything someone else already has that blog name, but I LOVE IT!!! The blog is already up. I found out the name I picked is in use by a couple of professional organizers trying to cash in on FlyLady’s popularity, so I will DEFINITELY need to change it soonish.

Here is my new blog entry. I’m still taking name suggestions as I did a google search with the word I thought was OH so original and got tons and tons of hits from other folk who thought the name was just as original.

Very easy and interesting read, @keobooks.

When you were growing up, did you have to participate in the cleaning duties of your household?

Actually, no I didn’t. That’s for a future post. I hope to cure myself of being a TLDR, btw. SO thanks for reading through my great wall of text.

It is enjoyable. I’m looking forward to being able to go along on your journey, in a sense, through your words. What is TLDR?

“Too Long. Didn’t Read”

New Entry. Still haven’t come up with a name!
http://declutterfly.wordpress.com/

@keobooks You are doing a great job, both with the organizing and the writing. Keep it up!

Thanks! That means a lot to me. When I tried to start blogs before, I had a hard time coming up with things to write. I already have a good sized backlog of things I want/need to write about.

Thanks for the tips on the blog site. Some of them I already knew and a few I didn’t. I love the look of the site and I love your writing.

That shiny dishwasher is amazing!

I’ve updated again. I feel silly posting every time I update. Does anyone really need me to keep doing this? I mean I can and will, but I feel a bit weird bumping my own thread.

That shiny dishwasher is a stock photo! HAHAHA!

I felt silly asking you if you would post here whenever you made a new post. Yes, please. I would appreciate you posting here whenever you update. Bump away.

@keobooks Are you buying new bins and containers to make your closets and cabinets look pretty as you organize things? Matchy matchy? One thing I realized was my organizer didn’t care if I used an old box or whatever, where I had felt I needed to buy the just perfect thing. I worried about how things looked and it was sort of paralyzing, and there was this very neat organized person who didn’t worry about it, she just cared if it was organized. I found it interesting.

The worst thing about me is creating a place for something. The saying a place for everything and everything in its place is so true. I don’t put things away primarily because I don’t have a real designated space for them. The second reason is not feeling like doing the work.

I feel like an idiot for saying this, but… I can’t figure out how to “follow” a blog, so I really appreciate you posting here when you have a new entry. :)

@bkcunningham thanks. I just realized that this will only bump for people following it. It won’t constantly bump to the top of Fluther. So now I don’t mind.

@JLeslie No, I am not letting matchy matchy get to me. My organizer doesn’t care either. In fact, that’s how my mom weeded out crappy ones (we were both going through people) If they proudly showed pics of matchy sets, she thought they were more into neat and tidy rather than organized.

@augustlan no problem. I can’t either. I just make bookmarks and check a lot.

@keobooks Interesting how your mom thought/knew that. I would not have realized it initially when I was trying to first get more organized years ago.

My mom has her faults, but one of her strengths is that she is an obsessive reference librarian at heart. So she almost instinctively knows what to look for when she’s looking. But another thing – when she talked to a few of the women who had the “neat” pictures, she would discover that they were almost always affiliated with a product – and they were getting commission or paid for endorsing that product.

Oh yeah and new post—State of the Kitchen

@keobooks, did your Fairy Godmother, aka The Organizer, give you homework? I’m guessing it is to practice on the zones and to get your floor clean.

OMFG, Organizing with My Fairy Godmother. tee her I just thought of that and thought it was worth sharing.

Anyway, how often does this angel of mercy come to your house?

If I didn’t think Leslie would clobber me for that, it would be an awesome blog title. But seriously, if you met her once, you’d never call her a fairy godmother. I don’t know her well enough to know if she’d have a sense of humor that would crack up at that. She’s just kinda tom-boyish.

Yes I have homework. I was going to share it at a later time. But I’ll show it to you now.

1. Create zones for weekly followup and mark on calendar (hey cool! I just saw she didn’t actually say to work in those zones! Ha!)

2. Continue purging items not needed in kitchen. (This one is hard. I use a lot less stuff now, but I still feel that I need 3 sets of measuring spoons because I used to lose them all the time. Even though I only need one, I feel vulnerable with only one)

3. Work on cleaning up spills immediately (done)

4. Clean stove inside and out (will do when I don’t have my boo at my side)

5. Clean sink and sink area (done)

6. Create calendar with specific items for zones (basically a cleaning list) before next session—ooooop.. nope

—
Oh and she came this week and will come next week. After that, my mother, grandmother and I need to get together and figure out the finances of the deal.

Would you be okay if you just kept 2 sets of measuring spoons? Honestly, I have two of those and two sets of measuring cups, just because a recipe often calls for the same size measure in different ingredients (wet or sticky vs dry), and I don’t want to wash things in the middle of measuring. Getting rid of one set might feel like a win, and you’ll still have a fall back.

I keep two sets of measuring spoons also. And, I have two Pirex measuring cups, plus I have a set of collapsible measure cups for dry ingredients that you can level off. I love love the collapsible; so great for storing since they store flat. I gaze at the collapsible collanders at the store, but feel badly about spending the money when I have regular ones that are still good at home.

@JLeslie I really want those collapsible colanders, measuring cups, and mixing bowls. Genius! I can’t justify the expense, either.

Hey just curious, do sites do less traffic on the weekends? I went from 60 readers a day to less than 20 literally overnight. I didn’t think my last post sucked that badly..

@keobooks Do you have a tip about jewlery boxes and containers that don’t look like jewlery boxes?

I don’t know about site traffic, auggie probably does.

I don’t. I may look for something online for you, but I am beat Youll see why when you read my newest post.

http://declutterfly.wordpress.com

Okay, listen. You are making me laugh and then cry. You are wasting your talents cleaning stoves young lady. You have so much talent writing. Perhaps, your mom and grandmother would be willing to hire an editor to mentor you forgo the organizer.

I wish I was there to help. I know many people are opposed to chemical cleaners, but please give Easy-Off Oven Cleaner at try. Have lots of paper towels and a trashcan near.

Haha, excellent post! Well done, @keobooks. Never cooking again seems like a perfectly viable option to me. ;)

And yes, site traffic does go down on weekends. I hope you’re posting on Facebook every time you make a new entry to the blog, too.

New Blog Entry: Also pened up comments to anyone without my having to approve them (Just figured out how to do that) Could you guys please comment on the board so it looks like people are reading? I don’t mind commenting here, but I’d like more action on the page.

@keobooks I have a suggestion. Once you tidy up within reason, I say splurge for a deep clean, and pay for a cleaning service to come in to do the bathrooms, mop the floors, dust where you usually don’t bother, and clean the oven. Tell them up front about the oven and things like baseboards, because it might not be an automatic to do thing for them. In my experience cleaning services are much less expensive than organizing services.

I just started having someone come to clean my house, after not doing it for many many years with any regularity. She comes about once a month, and it pushes me to stay better on top of my organizing actually. She only does the first floor (I have a two story house) so it costs less, and once every six months I have her do upstairs and skip everything downstairs expect the kitchen and masterbath on that visit.

I like the blog very much. Please keep letting us know when you update it.

new update. I will answer everything asked here a bit later. I have a toddler demanding attention.