Tag: housework

Pre-Vacation Cranky

by eileentroemel, posted in Crochet and crafting, Life, Writing

Prevacation cranky has come over me.  Next week I’m off my day job and will be able to work on anything I want to.  If you’ve read my blog – you know I have a to do list.  Counting the weekends, I’m going to have nine days off!  I cannot wait.

I have writing and publishing goals.  I have household goals.  I have crochet goals.  Are there more goals than I can accomplish in nine days?  Probably, most definitely.

Writing has been stampeding me.  I’ve written four novels with a fifth nearly done.  I’ve submitted a bunch of my novels for contests.  I’ve submitted a story for a book.  I had a pattern accepted in a magazine, sent it off for photographing and got it back.  I sold it to a friend who liked it.  I’ve been editing where I can.  It’s been crazy busy.

During my lunch hour and when I watch training at work, I pick up my crocheting.  I’ve made pot holders and coasters.  I tried a new pattern which I’m going to have to tweak because it was poorly written.  However I like the idea so I’ll tweak it.  I’ve fulfilled one crochet order and gotten paid.

My house is a mess.  I can’t seem to keep up on it.  I’ll pick up as I’m able (which isn’t much) but I have piles of laundry in my bathroom and lots of stuff sitting around in my living room.  It’s starting to bug me so more effort…. unless I get too involved in writing my novel.

We painted boards for Vicki so Ken and her can build her bookshelves and a desk.  The shutters we wanted to replace the plastic ones on our house went on sale with a rebate.  We picked them up.  Next step is to paint them and put them up.  Hopefully sooner rather than later.

If things go well, I’ll have help a couple times this next week to work on more organizing, discarding, and cleaning of my house.  If schedules don’t mesh, I’ll work on other things.  I know my days off are going to fly by but I can’t wait to have the time to work on what I want and get stuff done and off that never ending to do list.

For next week, I’ve got specific days which I’m working with other people.  Other than that I’m hoping for quiet days at home so I can do what I want, when I want, and without a lot of fussing.  A lot of peace and quiet to help recharge my batteries.

Fun Versus Work

by eileentroemel, posted in Crochet and crafting, Life

I have the feeling I’m going to be struggling with balancing out the need to have down time while I also have a long long list of things to get done.

Things I want to get done include:

  • going through the garage and organizing all the things out there including bringing in the last of Vicki’s belongings 
  • going through the back porch and organizing all the things we are storing there for the sale
  • cleaning and organizing the craft room
  • finish setting up the closet type space in the family room so the coats, scarves, etc aren’t tossed on the couch
  • finish cleaning the office
  • publishing and writing tasks
  • cleaning the basement (i.e. arguing with my husband about not keeping everything)
  • getting ready for the rummage sale I want to have 
Now there is enough here to keep us busy for several weekends.  I’m aware of this but for some reason, I want to get all this stuff done so we should work on it all weekend.  Right?  Nope.  I know perfectly well I’ll be lucky to finish one of these tasks.  
It may be a three day weekend but it’s also a pay weekend which means there are all the errands which go along with getting paid.  I have stuff to go to the post office.  Grocery shopping and other errands need to be run.  We have a family wedding to attend.  Preparations have to be done for next week and all of us going to work.  
On the fun side, I’d love to go to a movie or spend a day crocheting and watching movies (or both).  I’m well aware all three of us work hard during the week and need to have some down time on the weekends to recharge our batteries.  
Realistically, I’m hoping to accomplish one or two things on my list.  With the extra day, we might be able to accomplish something in addition to the normal weekend tasks like laundry, grocery shopping, and errands.  I’m crossing my fingers and trying to not be cranky about it.  

Slippage

by eileentroemel, posted in Uncategorized

How is it possible for an entire week to slip by so quickly?  I can’t even say it slipped by unnoticed but it just whizzed right by and left me gasping and wondering why I didn’t get enough stuff done.

Work was good. I got almost all the things done I wanted to before I left for vacation.  I even got organizational stuff for my desk and got it reorganized.  I left a list for my student workers, changed the voice mail, out of office message and got the tasks done I needed to. 

Yesterday was supposed to be super productive.  We were supposed to get all these errands run – which we did – and the house completely cleaned and a whole list of other things.  My cleaning person got a good chunk of my house clean but still there is more to do.  Why is it housework is so time consuming?

This afternoon the girls fly in.  We have to pick them up.  Then from that point on we are booked.  It will be a very busy weekend and I’m stressing a little about how much is going on. 

Taking a step back from the chaos of the weekend, I cannot wait to see the girls.  It will be nice to have my whole family together.  I just hope we aren’t so busy doing that we actually have time together to laugh and just be. 

Tomorrow is the big party.  Normally big events with lots of people make me nervous but this one isn’t.  I’m just looking forward to being around the people who are important.  I am hoping for good weather so it can be more an outside event than an inside event. 

Ken has gotten so many projects done in the house.  They are bigger projects which we thought would take more time and money but they didn’t.  I really like the changes in the house.  It makes me feel like we are claiming more of the house. 

On one hand I’m really glad that the week has slipped away since I’ll get to see Virginia and Stephanie this afternoon.  On the other hand I’d like another day or two to get ready.  Isn’t that always the case?