FlyLady is my hero
Do you know the last time I vacuumed the cobwebs off the tops of the doorways in my dining room? Hmmm. That would be the 15th of Never.
I'm not sure what the impetus was, but last week, I visited FlyLady.net to see what I could learn. I knew she was some sort of old-time, housecleaning, life-coach guru, and I'd had enough of feeling like I would never conquer my house and the helpless feeling that I felt every day of "this is so overwhelming, I'm not even going to start."
So often I would find myself standing in my kitchen thinking "what should I do now?" I have 20 minutes til the next thing, and I obviously can't start a project, or start cleaning anything, or sit down and read a book, because that's just not enough time. I hated that feeling. I knew I was wasting time but didn't know how to fix it.
FlyLady is a lot of things, but to break it down into its simplest form, it's a program for systematically decluttering and cleaning your home for only 15 minutes every day.
Each week, we focus on one Zone of the house. Each weekday, you declutter an area of that Zone (say, clear off the Master Bedroom dresser) for 15 minutes. When the timer beeps, you stop. Once the Zone is decluttered (it could be after a few days or a few months), you move on to the detailed cleaning list for that Zone and do it for 15 minutes. (I do the decluttering and detailed cleaning on alternating days, but you can structure it however you like.)
I started on the tail end of the Master Bedroom Zone last week and my room already looks spectacular. This week is the Dining Room/Front Entry Zone.
I love being able to just concentrate on one area at a time. It's so easy. The other day Jason said, "While you're doing cobwebs in the bedroom, you could hit the bathroom, too." I said, "Nope. That's not my Zone."
We all know that clean houses are easier to keep clean. When your dresser is already cleaned off, you think twice about putting something on it again. Jason says it's helping him not to let things pile up, too. I love, love, love this system. Even the kids are getting into it and I've used FlyLady's Riley Challenge to make up 5-minute cleaning drills for their rooms.
FlyLady has a couple of other things that she encourages you do to every day, like keeping your kitchen sink shiny and a quick 1-minute "swish and swipe" in the bathroom every morning. These might seem unnecessary at first, but I've been doing them and they really do help to give the whole house an overall "clean" feel.
I love FlyLady's mantra, "Your house didn't get dirty in a day, and it's not going to get clean in a day. You can do anything for 15 minutes."
Note: the only FlyLady thing that I don't do on principle is "dress to shoes". She believes that if you lace up your shoes each day, you'll feel more ready to tackle what's ahead. I believe that wearing constricting shoes is horrible for your feet and creates weak arches. If you want to know why, Jason would love to tell you about it :)
. . . .
I'm not sure what the impetus was, but last week, I visited FlyLady.net to see what I could learn. I knew she was some sort of old-time, housecleaning, life-coach guru, and I'd had enough of feeling like I would never conquer my house and the helpless feeling that I felt every day of "this is so overwhelming, I'm not even going to start."
So often I would find myself standing in my kitchen thinking "what should I do now?" I have 20 minutes til the next thing, and I obviously can't start a project, or start cleaning anything, or sit down and read a book, because that's just not enough time. I hated that feeling. I knew I was wasting time but didn't know how to fix it.
FlyLady is a lot of things, but to break it down into its simplest form, it's a program for systematically decluttering and cleaning your home for only 15 minutes every day.
Each week, we focus on one Zone of the house. Each weekday, you declutter an area of that Zone (say, clear off the Master Bedroom dresser) for 15 minutes. When the timer beeps, you stop. Once the Zone is decluttered (it could be after a few days or a few months), you move on to the detailed cleaning list for that Zone and do it for 15 minutes. (I do the decluttering and detailed cleaning on alternating days, but you can structure it however you like.)
I started on the tail end of the Master Bedroom Zone last week and my room already looks spectacular. This week is the Dining Room/Front Entry Zone.
I love being able to just concentrate on one area at a time. It's so easy. The other day Jason said, "While you're doing cobwebs in the bedroom, you could hit the bathroom, too." I said, "Nope. That's not my Zone."
We all know that clean houses are easier to keep clean. When your dresser is already cleaned off, you think twice about putting something on it again. Jason says it's helping him not to let things pile up, too. I love, love, love this system. Even the kids are getting into it and I've used FlyLady's Riley Challenge to make up 5-minute cleaning drills for their rooms.
FlyLady has a couple of other things that she encourages you do to every day, like keeping your kitchen sink shiny and a quick 1-minute "swish and swipe" in the bathroom every morning. These might seem unnecessary at first, but I've been doing them and they really do help to give the whole house an overall "clean" feel.
I love FlyLady's mantra, "Your house didn't get dirty in a day, and it's not going to get clean in a day. You can do anything for 15 minutes."
Note: the only FlyLady thing that I don't do on principle is "dress to shoes". She believes that if you lace up your shoes each day, you'll feel more ready to tackle what's ahead. I believe that wearing constricting shoes is horrible for your feet and creates weak arches. If you want to know why, Jason would love to tell you about it :)
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