Tidying up

And I will have to sort the freezer and fridge tomorrow or the online grocery delivery will have nowhere to go!

It peeves me that when I do get around to cleaning up, and the house looks really nice, I`m left to admire it on my own, but on the days that I just can`t be bothered, I get visitors, and always the sort who are very particular!

Since moving into this house five months ago, I am trying to get new systems to work. It seems like I am on my own though as my DS has trouble emptying a cereal box and then finding a new recycle bin behind him to put it in! He even had trouble flushing the toilet yesterday morning when I got up! Please, some girl come along and take him off my hands! I have tried to get him beyond the Neanderthal stage but it doesn't seem to be working. I am sure I would be a tidy person if I was on my own, as it is I still spend most of my time shifting after the lazy little blighter. (6ft 2" and nearly 18!)

I wish I could have a little bit of the untidy gene. I wish I could ignore a dusty surface when the sun comes round and shines on it.

petra - do you sort things out immediately, for yourself, or for someone else, or for visitors?

rubylady - you may have to wait. Sorry!

I have found that the tidying of a whole house process a slow one. But progress is made and that is all I really care about.
I dont have anywhere near the amount of music that you have Mishap.
Perhaps a couple of box files near the paino for sheet music would help. With the rest on the shelves?

I dont aim for perfection.

Definitely a tidy person - unfortunately OH is decorating at present so the clutter seems to be everywhere. I am trying to close my eyes to it.

number I know, it's always like that for me, too. For several years I left the vacuum cleaner out in the hall permanently, plugged in too. That way the numerous visitors I had at that time would think that I had been just about to vacuum. Then I told myself how silly I was to care what they thought.

My house, my mess I suppose. Now it's only when I can't stand it anymore that it gets tidied up. Or when I can't find something.

I can't stand untidiness or clutter. I said I could never marry a man who was untidy or smoked. Well, DH doesn't smoke.

I often wonder how much of my life has been spent picking things up and putting them away and what I could have done in that time. Why then do I do it? because I cannot function if my environment is untidy so would do even less if I didn't tidy.

Soontobe. All of it is automatic to me. When I'm putting laundry away it's just automatic to throw anything out that doesn't look good. I'm the same in the kitchen and bathroom. I'd love to get my hands on some friends houses. I hate clutter ornaments. I know if I'm never going to read a book again so it's down the charity shop.
We too are decorating at the moment and two ceiling lights are being changed. They went straight into the porch ( for the charity shop)

Mishap and others just wondering how many rooms you have to tidy up - a music room sounds very posh (do you live in mansions?)

When you have musicians in the family, it becomes a necessity. You buy houses you may not even like just because they have more room. How else can anyone survive the nightly onslaught of piano, flute, guitar, singing, clarinet and keyboard? Also, at one point DBH taught singing at weekends to bring in extra money. DS aged 6 months deeply resented the singers interrupting his teatime, showed us the power of his own voice and very successfully drowned those of the poor pupils!

Our current music room is 'outside'. It's a long row of outhouses, housing DBH's study, the musicroom which is large and also houses DS's computer and a bed for him for when the GCs are sleeping in his room, a small utility area housing several freezers and my lean-to greenhouse/pottingshed. Which contains my tumble-dryer. The house isn't large, those extra rooms out there make all the difference when DD and family come to stay for the week. The music room becomes an extra playroom.

Yes, we did have a musician in the family, well we still do but she has moved out.
Piano was in the study (gone now that DD has left home), her bedroom and DS's vacated bedroom had to make do as her music rooms.
Our house isn't that big and we only have a garage and a shed outside.

However, DD's partner is a musician too so they have a basement in their house for all the kit - and their visiting musical friends!

I have an occasional musician (cello & flute), don't mind the latter but keep tripping over the cello...... House not big enough sometimes!

I cannot bear clutter and mess! A peaceful room is a tidy, clean room - but not tidied within an inch of its life. My office had to be straight before I left work, and if I had gone out my PA would tidy it up to save my sanity at 6.30 the next morning..

Tidying is, however, a great displacement activity; if you are tidying you are doing something useful which means you don't have to do what really needs doing but is boring..

We have the piano in the ballroom and the lead piping and rope in the study!

For me it's literally a 'displacement activity' I displace the clutter to somewhere less visible. And then I can't find what I'm looking for.

rubylady
Really?
We keep the lead piping and rope in the billiard room!
The candlestick is in the library.

Ariadne I would like to have a PA - but then I might not be able to find anything if he/she tidied too much!

I tend to shove everything into different drawers, wherever there is a space. I can generally remember which drawer the things went into, but occasionally I forget completely. Then it is a case of going through all my drawers, emptying them, and restocking them with the same stuff. Honestly, most of the stuff I put back could really go in the bin. I do need to have a good sort out. It's just getting round to it!!!

that roundtuit again!

I am not noticeably enthusiastic about general cleaning – dusting, vacuuming, washing floors, etc – so I have absolutely no desire to add tidying to my list of things to do. Consequently, I tend to put things away as I finish with them – read the book, put it back on the shelf, stirred in the spice, pout the jar back in the cupboard. I have certainly never understood the concept of "tidying the knicker drawer" which had a thread all of its own on here and has featured as a displacement activity in a number of detective stories (believe it or not). I sort the clean laundry and put it away; in the case of knickers, sort into colours and put them in piles in their drawer so there's no reason for it to get untidy.

Aha Absent ! That confirms something I read about keeping things tidy: that you should always put things in their final resting place. It is great advice that I do try to follow, mostly.

I've actually enjoyed sorting out bedroom drawers, airing cupboard and wardrobe and having everything neat and tidy.
It's sort of an 'about time too' activity as I suspected that I was buying stuff rather than checking what I already had. I also braved hoicking everything out from under the bed and putting it in proper storage boxes rather than miscellaneous bags etc. I have enough bath preparations, deodorants, skin care stuff etc to last at least 12 months
I'm not admitting to how many bras and pants I have.......No longer have an excuse for buying much now

It's not a big posh house - it is in fact two small old cottages joined by a covered hallway. One cottage has been extended to create a 3-bedroomed house; and the other is just one room - which we use as a music room, because there is a hallway between it and the rest of the house and any noise is contained beyond earshot!

Oh - and we are now about half way through the tidying and music filing - a miracle!!

My clean laundry sits for hours on the end of the dining room table. In fact until it's a huge pile I can hardly see over the top to carry up the stairs.