Wednesday, June 11, 2008

Spring...Er, Summer Cleaning

Six sticky notes hang on my kitchen wall. Each one has a heading: bathroom, kitchen, basement, fix, replace, paint. And under each heading is a list of chores to do.

I'm in the spring cleaning mood, but since it feels like summer around here, we'll just call it summer cleaning.

It's the chores that have been neglected for too long - washing the window sills, washing curtains, washing the baseboards in the bathroom, fixing the broken kitchen cabinet, cleaning cobwebs in the basement, replacing the blinds in my kids' windows, and on and on and on.

After I made the list, I no longer felt so overwhelmed. It was the first step toward tackling a very difficult and time-consuming task. Lots of difficult and time-consuming tasks.

Hubby jumped right on things when he got home from work, bless him, and I started on cleaning the windows in the kitchen. I'm also in the de-cluttering mood, and I'm sick of having a bunch of "stuff" around that I never use and don't need. I have no doubt that I'll be donating stuff to Goodwill or my local FreeCycle group.

I think if I pace myself, and keep looking at my lists, I'll be ok. And when I put a check mark next to the chores done, the sense of accomplishment will keep me going!

I've also done a bit of "summer cleaning" with my writing. I had a few short stories that I've wanted to submit for awhile now, so I got them out, "dusted" them off, and finally got the motivation to send them this week.

And even though this has nothing to do with spring cleaning, I couldn't resist sharing my other bit of good news. I won Christine Fletcher's new book, Ten Cents a Dance. It takes place during World War II in Chicago. I've been looking in the bookstores for it and couldn't find it, so was just about to order if off Amazon.com. But no longer! And of course, I can't wait to read it.

So. Spring cleaning. Do or don't?

7 comments:

  1. I have a list like that. I should put them on post it notes though and stick it somewhere I see it. Maybe then I'd get them done. Or maybe I just need more hours in the day...

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  2. Congrats on winning the book!

    And yeah, we kinda do spring cleaning. Sean did the windows recently and I cleaned out the fridge. And we have to do the window sills every couple of weeks to keep them clear of cat paw prints *g*.

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  3. Kelly - I need more hours in the day, too. Never enough time.

    Tess - Our kitties have been quite naughty and the wood trim around our kitchen window is going to have to be replaced. They've scratched it up too badly.

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  4. I shun cleaning regardless of the season. But my wife cracks the whip and somehow I get involved in major project every spring.

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  5. Yes! Actually a confession -- I had someone coming in every other week to clean. I tried a couple of different people, but I was never very happy with what they did. When I was working nearly 80 hours a week a few years back and in a different house, I started with a cleaner and she was fantastic. Not so much here and as time went by I kept noticing things that weren't getting done (light fixtures, the tops of doorways and baseboards weren't getting dusted, the outsides of cabinet doors, all the things that don't need doing all the time, but do now and then). I finally stopped having them come and it's kicked off a huge set of to-do lists for cleaning, cleaning out and reorganizing.

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  6. Anonymous7:35 AM

    Congrats on the cleaning -- especially getting the stories out! Let us know where they land.

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  7. Travis - I cracked the whip on my husband, that's for sure! ;-)

    Lisa - Y'know, I don't know if I could handle someone coming into my house and cleaning. While it would be nice, I think I would hover over them to make sure they did it to my standards. How sad is that?

    Devon - Thanks! Will let you all know if they find a home. :-)

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