Providence of God

You can call me superstitious but I felt like I needed to rethink my post that is still lost. Maybe, it was not supposed to be published... Perhaps, I should have included more pictures. Perhaps, I should have made it brief. Perhaps, I should not have separated the story to a "Part 1", "Part 2",... etc.

Perhaps.

While thinking it through, I thought through the progresses in my home and Providence of God just came to my mind...

A lot has happened since February when I started this blog. I wanted to get my home in shape, as I did every year before this. It has been my yearly New Year Resolution. But this year, I have a few more external motivation. My trip with the kids out of the country in June, leaving my husband in this home alone for about 3 weeks; my desire to serve as a Bible study leader at our fellowship; my youngest one may start going to a little bit of preschool; and the possibility of me returning to work; etc. With all these reasons, and some sort of a time-constraint, I feel like God is putting together something and I imagined that my house would look different before school year end.

Before

After

But it did not happen the way I envisioned. Even though I knew that I, or my habits, could not be changed overnight, I still think that I would be making most of the initiatives and doing most of the work. The truth is, I simply cannot do it by myself.

As a life-long procrastinator, even with the time-constraint, I stopped making progress whenever there was a lack of immediate deadline. There are always some other things to do. Thanks to Project Simplified, I had mini deadlines every week for the month of March and first week of April. Then, I found myself struggling with laundry alone. Just when things come to a standstill, my husband reminded me of my sister-in-law's visit in the beginning of May.

Because of the visit, my husband actually asked me to hire house cleaning. But I was, honestly, really afraid of doing that... They need to find the floor before they clean it, right? But my kitchen floor was a disastrous zone. For this most overwhelming job, I got unexpected help. The mom of my son's best friend and I have only chatted during pickup or drop-off a few times but she offered to help!

All of these work together and I have not even mentioned how many other moms have helped me babysit my toddler so I could get some things done. Now, I can see the floor around my desk and most surfaces in my home are very much cleared. Just like the other mom said, all these things I saw everywhere also cluttered my mind, made me feel overwhelmed. Now that the surfaces are mostly cleared, keeping up is truly easier. True, I still struggle with procrastination and lack of motivation to do housework. But it did not feel like a huge load of weigh on me any more. It was lightening.

Suddenly, I am not so afraid of unexpected visitors (Well, there will still be toys on the floor, but let's be real, kids need to play) All of these progress in my home was not because God has changed me to have better organization skills or ability to work faster (or sleep less!), but because He has provided me with help from people around me, encouragement from friends including those met on the internet and guidance from many wise voices. 

Those were Providence from God.

Blogger Buzz: Blogger is back

Blogger had a technical problem yesterday. Users cannot write, edit or post. They have rolled back to a version on May 11 according to Blogger Buzz: Blogger is back Unfortunately, my most recent post on May 12 is "in the progress of restoring" :(

[ETA: BTW, do you back up your own posts? I haven't, so, I should either rewrite it or wait for it to be restored, which I kind of afraid wouldn't happen... ]


[Added 5/16/11: My lost post is... still missing. On top of that, I cannot reply to comment on this post, very weird! For those who by now wanted to keep a backup of their own blog, I found a smart solution on the forum - you simply subscribe to your own blog and you automatic get an email back up, how simple!]

Laundry: What I Learned...

It has been more than a week after I posted my first goal. And the laundry baskets are not emptied. However, I finally come to realize that I should not feel guilty or defeated. Here is what I learned, so far:


Have Realistic Expectation
Laundry really won't end. I mean what was I thinking that I could empty laundry baskets on a specific date? New things get put in every day, at different time. Unless I do my math so accurate that I could finish the last load while my toddler is napping and my boys are still in school with my husband at work; or, at night after everyone else went to bed; I cannot guarantee that no one put something inside while I'm at it. Besides, I always wait for a full load.


This is probably one of the major reasons that laundry is difficult for me. I like to put "finished" to laundry. So, I set myself up for disappointment and frustration. And this leads to my next point.


Celebrate

I need to celebrate what I already did! Well, maybe not rewards because I tend to forget there is more to be done after rewarding myself. But shouldn't I be glad (and upbeat, and encouraged) that I actually did 5 loads of laundry within those 2 days. I was only 2 more loads away from my goal on Sunday night. I should be happy instead of feeling failed (and discouraged, depressed!) Negative feelings does not help me with getting any more thing done. I need to savor the positive and move on.

Allow Time for "Other"
Things were going well when I posted the before pictures. I thought I could get the same amount done the following days. As it turns out, there were other things I needed to do (Hmm, I guess I am a one-thing-at-a-time kind of person, after all) Then, I was too exhausted to stay up late to do another load. In the following days, my toddler did not nap quite as well. And there were unexpected visit from out of town friends... etc etc etc. My point is, I need to learn to space out laundry to allow for other things to happen.


Still a Battle
At the end of the day, I need to admit: I procrastinated, I got distracted, I spent more time online than I should have and I allow myself to think "tomorrow, tomorrow I would do it" when I actually get a chance to do it today. 


Laundry or not, I still need to learn to work on things that does not have an imminent deadline, not to put it off until it is last minute, then ask why God does not help me when my toddler needs to be cuddled after nap-time and my son needs help with homework while I am not done preparing dinner.


Thank you


Thank you for those of you who came back and check if I posted even though you may not have commented. It must be hard to follow or care for a messy person who has problem getting things done and did not put a post up on days she said she would... Thank you for coming back after a week of silence. I do hope that this is just the beginning of my blogging life and you would witness transformation in progress.


Does anyone of you have a laundry routine that you could share? Comment away and help out a struggling woman.

Laundry Update

Thank you for stopping by and checked on me!


Apparently, I failed in fulfilling my first goal - it is passed mid-night after Sunday and my laundry is not done yet. And I am truly exhausted after today's events, let me stop for now and hopefully, I could update soon...

Laundry Before Scene

Now that the boys are still in school, my toddler is still napping, the breakfast dishes are done and the second load of laundry is in the wash (what a rare situation), I guess it is a good time to enjoy my secret cookie and post some Before pictures. It is not a pleasant scene, so, do not scroll down unless you are ready...

The Boys', mostly

The girl's

The Mountain
Let's just say: the basket is not empty...

On some random surface

The Finale
All together (minus the whites)
being sort by colors

Well, I told you, it would not be pretty. Let's come back and check my progress on Monday. 

BTW, any suggestion for what the rest of my "mission" should be called?

Laundry, Laundry, Laundry

Life is not as good without Project Simplify, at least, not for someone like me. I was certainly more tired, had more stress and was a bit overwhelmed during Project Simplify. But it felt so great to get something done and documented! Now that it is over, I am back to my normal self again - worrying about the mess on the top of the self, paperwork getting pile up again and the overflowing laundry basket.

I need to pick back up that momentum again. To help myself to restart, I should set up goals here and put up my progress by the end of the week. With the mountain of laundry that got piled up, I really think laundry should be my goal for this week. It may be a bit lame to set a goal to do something that many do every day or, at least, every week. But given that it is already Thursday night, it seems to be realistic and yet challenging for me. Remember, laundry has always been problematic for me. Conquering it would be like an alcoholic resisting the champagne at a wedding, right? It should be victorious, right?

So, here is my deadline: I would like to empty all the laundry baskets by Sunday. And next week, I should post up my next goal on Monday.

Now let's hope that no one pee or throw up in their beds Sunday night. It just seems to happen every time I empty those things!

Project Simplify Hot Spot#5

It is 2:30 am on the last day for Project Simplify results submission. I have finally had my tax return finished and could write down how we did on Hot Spot 5. 


During Hot Spot 3, I have already decided that I would work with my kids on their toys this week because this is their spring break. I was planning to do that plus the week 5 hot spot. I was thrilled to learn that we get to choose our own!


So, here it is.


It's a battle ground

It is a common scene - I started doing something in the kitchen and let my toddler roam free in the living room. Before that, her brothers left a few boxes of toys out:

Though messy, some of these toys are easy to put away: the marble race, the kitchen play things, the stuffies; you know, anything that you can put a name and group them all. It is the knick knacks kind of toys that bother me the most - never seem to find a place to hold them and they just end up on the kitchen counter, on the bookshelves, on top of a cabinet or under any furniture that has legs.


The Treasure Hunt

So, we started off on Tuesday and Wednesday with the "treasure hunt". The boys and I try at our best to dig out all those toys or missing parts from under the bed, the dresser, behind the books etc. And here is what we ended up with:

On Thursday, we went through all of these and I am proud that they are willing to gave up these:

It is not much comparing to what we kept. But, I am glad that most of the knick knack kind of toys are gone!


Here is what we kept in our living room now:

The toy rack from my toddler's room
which will soon become her dad's office

These also serve as temporary child-proof "structures"

The "sets" are those in clear boxes with closure:

From Top: Kitchen set, trains, blocks
with marble race next to them

dominos and race cars tracks

Hopefully, I could keep these boxes closed when not in use and only have one open at one time... 


Well, these are hardly all of their toys. They still have a box of legos, 2 boxes of stuff animals and another box of race car tracks under their bed! But I think it was a good start. I am especially proud of my oldest child. He got so emotional when I first talked to him about giving away toys. But in the end he was able to let go quite some of it. I hope this process will also help them (and ourselves too) to resist impulsively buying toys. The less we have the easier is the clean up!