dang it!
I am a world class ass. I don’t know how to be “normal.” I know I know, what’s normal, but seriously I wish I was a little more normal than I am. I cannot for the life of me keep things straight. Do you watch Starting Over? I feel like Denise. Now I know she doesn’t have kids, and I do, but still, a lot of the junk around the house is mine. Somehow Jon and I found each other, two people who start projects and don’t finish them, who start projects and don’t straighten up after them (sorry for ratting you out babe.)
I just feel so unorganized and unable to get over it. The thing is that I’m obsessed with organization and organizational products, but somehow they don’t work for me. The kids do the same thing I do, they go from thing to thing leaving a trail of crap throughout the house. ACK! Its so frustrating. I blame the kids for my own mess too, b/c I am always having to go rescue them, punish them, split up fights, etc. in the middle of my projects, then I get involved in something else, and never get back to the original project.
We threw out so much stuff when we moved last, and some how, ITSSSSSSS BAAAAAAACK! I have to admit its not as bad as it used to be, but seriously, I just want to live in peace (I feel so much more at peace when things are straight.) The house was pretty much perfectly straight when my parents were here in May, and now, just a little over a month later, its fully trashed!!!!!!!!!!
I feel like I can either commit myself fully to cleaning and not do any of the things I WANT to do, or do what I want to do, and forget about cleaning. What to do? What to do? Just start a bon fire and watch it burn? I have lots of paper for kindling!
So I have to ask…… Before you go on vacation or leave for the day does the home have to be in order? Just incase someone has to come to your house to get something??? or when you get home – the home is “neat?” What about going to bed? I HAVE to have dishes done in the sink or put in the dishwasher, family room picked up and some semblance of order in my office/scrapbook room. Its quite annoying to say the least but I can’t seem to break the habit. Worse – I so totally see it evolving in my 7 year old. There are times when she has to be dragged out the door to school because things aren’t “just right” in her room…… I hate clutter, I hate mail that piles up on the desk because we haven’t had time to get to it…
But – I have to say – I have like three or four scrapping projects in the works in various areas of the home – because that’s how I am productive. MULTI TASKING. To a fault…….. : ) And I too threw A TON away when we moved – and find myself burried in “stuff” AGAIN! Let’s start a fire together… I just can’t use the “scrap book paper” or “scraps.” Never know what I might be able to do with it! : )
girl, I hear ya. ward and I are both collectors of JUNK (fun junk, but still, it’s junk) and so things get out of hand from time to time. I grew up with a dad who was always ALWAYS trying to keep things clean and so that has definitely rubbed off on me. I drive myself crazy trying to keep things straight. I can’t fully relax if the house is turned upside down and I sometimes feel like I’m a slave to this mentality… ava drives me BATTY with her messes… and I wish I could just let go of it sometimes… I am also gulity of starting projects and leaving them half-finished, moving onto the next until I have no idea where I am at or what I am doing… and no matter how hard I try to keep my workspace in order, it always seems to end up in a disastrous state. this frustrates me to no end! a friend of mine recently told me about a site called flylady.net… she said it has really helped integrate some order into her chaotic, messy life with four kids… I’ve only briefly checked it out, haven’t had a chance to really read about or try any of the ‘methods’, but it seemed kind of cool.
anyway, I feel you.
Yep I’m with you. My house is a mess 24/7. The only solution that I have that works is all the toys have to be off the floor when the kids go to bed. The floor stays clean until they wake up in the morning (that’s 12 hours of cleanliness!!) if my floors are clean (even if there’s junk all over every other surface) I can focus on a project. I don’t attempt projects during the day, because the kids are just too needy, the mess is destracting me… hopefully you can come up with a system that works for you! good luck woman!
hmmm, i too hate to clean, yet i find myself always cleaning. it never looks clean to me though. you know how many projects i’ve always got going too (and not finishing). there’s got to be a solution somewhere for all of us. mom’s or not.
I know i hate to wake up to a mess so i do pick up a lot after the kids go to bed. that seems to help my sanity a bit.
maybe you could just pick one day of the week and spend a couple hours to clean, then you don’t feel like you have to do it ALL week, and you’d still have time to do what you want.?
Project… what’s a project? Literally right now…. I moved into my house April 28th and I still have boxes everywhere! If I’m not doing something with Owen I’m mostly sleeping. I’m’ lucky right now if the dishes get done and one load of laundry happens
Now you… I can’t accept that you don’t finish projects. You post all these amazing projects online. Like that fathers day card. I would get as far as buying the supplies and that is it. I wish I had the attention span to sew and apron or organize pics… I rarely even develop my pics!!! IS THAT HORRIBLE! I keep telling myself that someday I will get it together and do these wonderful mom things. Oh well 
On orgnanizing I vote for the pick a day suggestion. That seems to work for a lot of my friends. Most of them choose Monday to recover from the weekend
You are wonderfully creative. I believe creativity come from all the randomness and chance connections in our lives…a great new idea is often combining two things that just haven’t been connected before. Along the idea that our greatest strengths are our greatest weaknesses, I think our creativity and flair DEPENDS on our random unorganized nature. Yes, I will always be plagued somewhat by my own mess, but I’d never give up the artist in me to gain the better housekeeper in me. I hope you feel the same.
Uhhh..my point is, don’t give up the fight against mess, but please don’t beat yourself up over it either. My impression is that it’s very easy for mothers to feel this way. (I can’t speak from my own experience, just from what my friends have said. ; )
My other thought is that in light of all this I’ve cut way back on stuff. My stuff just turns into messes so I try to manage to purge shamelessly a couple times a year. Whenever I’m tempted to buy things I force myself to think about what’s already at home, what I’ve purged lately, and I usually realize I really, really, don’t need it. It’s one of the big challenges of my life, but somehow more rewarding than trying to put all the bleepin’ stuff away all the time.
Okay, I’m off the soapbox now. Hope you’re feeling better than when you posted. : )
Me again! There’s a great song about the strength/weakness balance in our lives…slightly bazaar but I really connect with it on this issue and it’s helped me make peace with some of the things ways I frustrate myself.
Here’s a link to the lyrics. I highly recommend listening to the actual song if you ever get a chance. : ) I’m not sure how links work when commenting but hopfully you can make it work.
http://www.lyrics007.com/Joan%20Osborne%20Lyrics/Spider%20Web%20Lyrics.html
wow, I feel like i wrote that post, except my husband likes a tidy house (see Andrea’s post about a cleaning dad) and I just try to get thru the day! If i straighten at night I feel good, but sometimes I jsut dont want to!
Hi, just found you via Tie One On. I also feel like I could have written that post. I could be organized and miserable or messy and happy. I’ve chosen messy, but only after much angst. I do have certain routines that help me, but the rest of the time it’s mess, mess, mess, blitz cleaning, mess, mess, mess!
Hope you’re feeling better about your situation.