Well, so much for that

Have you ever noticed, how once something is working for you, the second you mention it to other people, it all falss apart? It's happened that way when my son slept through the night, when he was momentarily potty-trained, when I was sure my morning sickness went away... and now it's happened with FLYLady.

I was doing so well. Past tense. I have managed to keep up with some of the simpler routines, but certianly nothing resembling decluttering this week. It's too bad, too, because I was really looking forward to this week, in the bedroom! It's just been a bad week. We did actually get other important things done instead, I guess. DH did mow the lawn yesterday. I did pruning outside on Wednesday. I've gotten to the store and made dinner. I'm kept up on laundry. I've even gotten to bed earlier, and gotten up earlier so I could have a little alone time in the morning. That's helped a lot, because I can get some nice work done at home in the morning when I'm at my most constructive.

We also have had The Boy out play play for over an hour every day, which he hasn't been getting a lot of before now, due to rain. But with all the being outside, it doesn't make it easier to clean inside! We also spent a fun time last night with the neighbors looking at stars. I guess we have gotten a lot done. Just different stuff, really. The living room isn't that far out of control, and the den is almost unchanged since it was cleaned, since The Boy hasn't really even been down there. I've kept up my swish & swipe in the bathrooms, too.

Okay, I guess I'm not doing too bad! Just missing out on my zone decluttering and my hotspots. I wish I laid out my clothes every day, but really it's not as big a deal when you have the laundry done and folded away, since it's so easy to find clothes!

Wow. I feel a lot better now. Thank you for listening, internet!

Trust

Now that I think of it, I think that was problem all along. I mean, I've been trying to follow FLYLady for what -- five years? Six years? How long has she been around?!

But I have a big ego, and tend to think most people are, uh, not so useful. Ben Franklin would yell at me for that, though he was exactly the same, now wasn't he? ;)

On top of that, there is the ever-present issue that if I try something, it means I could possibly fail. We perfectionists don't like that! So if I don't really try, then I can't really fail. But hey, you also can't really succeed, now can you? So I guess I sabotage myself before it even has a chance to work.

At the very beginning of the past 3-4 weeks of FLYing, after my first big day where I really noticed a change, it totally freaked me out. The living room was CLEAN. Vacuumed. No toys on the floor. Clean! It was wonderful. And moments after I realized that, I thought that now I was going to have to work to keep it that way. It made me happy, it made my son happy. And how could I deny my son happiness? But I doubted I could keep it up because, after all, I never had before. So that clean room managed to inexplicably make me feel like a failure and a bad mom! How crazy is that? But I do the same thing to myself all the time.

But I've gotten past that, at least for now. I managed to push through and get these routines more settled. The beginning must be the hardest. When you have no routine to build on, it's hard to get traction! But I finally did. I have routines! And they are already getting so much easier. I have laundry practically on autopilot now. The living room and den have been decluttered every night to make sure the floor is clear and toys are put away. It's so nice to get up to a cleaner house.

But the really hard part was the first leap of faith, to do the work and get to here. It's so, incredibly hard. I don't have enough trust to do it, usually. I think the only reason it worked this time is because I'm pregnant. What's that, you say? Pregnant? What does that have to do with it?? Well, basically, I'm in the second trimester. That means that we're past the first trimester exhaustion. We're past morning sickness. We're not quite to the point that you feel like a huge beached whale and that moving isn't possible, much less cleaning. And, to top it off, you have extra energy provided by the need to nest. It's like being possessed by some sort of cleaning demon! And that extra energy and drive and craziness gave me just enough oomph to finally get off my rear end and get some stuff done! Thank you pregnancy hormones!

Thank you FLYLady.

Progress report for march

Okay, okay, I haven't been keping this up to date at all! The good news
is that I have begun FLYing! Maybe that's why I haven't found time for
hwre yet.

I'm nowhere near "perfect". But I have been trying to follow my routines
in good faith for several weeks now. And you know what? I don't need
complicated progress reports to know I'm improving. I know because my
house is cleaner! (Duh!)

I've almost finished my first month, and its just making so much more
sense now. My problem was that I could never see how her way could
result in a cleaner house. It seemed like their weren't enough zones for
all my rooms, so I spent all my time trying to invent new zones, or
squishing more in. Crazy! Now I'm just happy because a few rooms are
clean, from zone decluttering. Ill get to the other rooms in time. I
know I will. I can't believe how well this works but I just never
manages to keep at it for a few weeks to find out!

And really, I still have very simple routines and sometimes even miss
things in my routine. Yesterday I didn't manage to do a 15 minute
decluttering. Mondays seem to be hard days for me. But my other rooms
still got picked up, and my.sink is shining. What a great feeling!