The Problem With Housework

Housework can be boring and repetitive but the real problem with housework is it never ends.  I'm not kidding.  You can have all the laundry done only to find more piling up in the hamper the very same day.  I know many set aside a day for certain chores and at one time I was rather rigid in my scheduling of the chores because I had to be in order to maintain sanity in our household.  I even religiously followed FlyLady for a few years.  A few years ago, I decided to forgo my planned career and stay at home as a result of an injury.  With that came a paradigm shift in my way of thinking about household activities.  The 'clean the bathrooms' every Monday, Wednesday and Friday routine clearly wasn't going to work.  I certainly did not want to spent 8 hours of my Saturdays cleaning either so I went onto plan B - clean as you go.

A good portion of housework involves dealing with clutter.  It's not that the house is dirty it is messy due to clutter.  The rules are: never leave a room empty handed and always leave a room better than you found it.  I kept the 27 Fling Boogie, 15 Minute Rescue, and shiny sink from FlyLady because quite frankly both work well for me.  We live in a bi-level house so we have an upper level, ground level (garage and entrance) and a lower level.  Why they call it a bi-level is beyond me because technically it is three levels but I don't think the ground level is considered living space.  I do a lot of activities that tend to create a bit of chaos especially home canning which involves moving equipment and ingredients from the lower level to the upper level then putting it all away along with whatever food was canned.  So, I am up and down those stairs several times in any given day.  Here's a few ways I keep our home neat and tidy without being a slave to housework:

• one in one out rule - Clutter can be a huge problem so we developed the one in one out rule. What this means if an item comes into the house then an item must leave.  For example, if I buy a towel it is to replace a towel that is worn out.  
• paper clutter - Honestly, I am the queen of paper clutter.  I'm not kidding!  I still have all my notes from university, hang on to grocery receipts and pretty much anything paper encouraged by the fact that one of my hobbies is genealogy so you  never know when you will need that piece of paper.  I have decided that enough is enough.  I went to digital for my day planner, to-do lists, and shopping lists so no more bits of paper floating around the house.  If I want to spurge on the rare magazine, I by an electronic version.  I am in the process of digitizing important papers but keeping only the ones we absolutely have to.  Essentially, what we have done is stopped the flow of paper clutter into our home which makes it a lot easier to maintain not having to deal with paper clutter.
• never leave a room empty handed - We have a large house which means I spend a fair amount of time each day moving from room to room.  We have developed the rule to never leave a room empty handed.  Surprisingly a lot of 'stuff' gets moved around and put away using this method.  For example, I get up in the morning and grab my bedside water bottle along with any dirty clothes.  The water bottle gets dropped off in the kitchen where I add any dirty t-towels to the dirty clothes then make my way to the laundry where I leave the dirty clothes and bring any air dried clothes back up to our bedroom and so it repeats.  This method is a sure fire way of ensuring nothing piles up anywhere.  
• 15 Minute Rescue - This method is ideal for quick kitchen and family room clean-ups like folding afghans and clearing coffee tables.  I can easily fold a hamper of clothes in 15 minutes or put a pot of homemade soup on.  The variations are endless but it is really surprising how much you can actually get done in only 15 minutes!
• the commercial break - At one time, I watched television during the day more for noise but occasionally to watch a program.  During the commercial breaks, I would toss a load of laundry in or fill the dishwasher or empty it.  You get the idea.  They were quick to do tasks that often get pushed to the back burner then all these quick tasks pile up resulting in hours of housework.  I still do this, taking a short break from whatever I'm doing just to tidy a bit.
• 27 Fling Boogie - The 27 Fling Boogie is a left-over from my FlyLady days but it works well for me.  I use the method at least once a week.  It's simple.  Grab a bag then go though you house and collect 27 things you don't need as quickly as possible.  Those items can be donated, put into the recycle bin or trashed but as long as they are out of your house you have met the goal.  
• the shiny sink - FlyLady stresses to always have a shiny sink.  It you do nothing else that day your kitchen sink should be scrubbed an polished.  The premise behind this task is it serves as a motivation to do another household task.  I took this idea a bit further because every room should have a 'shiny sink' in principle that serves as an incentive to keep things neat and tidy.  
• leave a room better than you found it - This goes hand in hand with never leaving a room empty handed but it is a bit different.  I do my morning routine followed by a quick wipe down of the bathroom sinks, faucets and mirror.  It takes only a couple of minutes but saves a ton of time later.  I keep spray bottles of rubbing alcohol and homemade cleaners in the bathrooms and kitchen so all I have to do is grab, spray and wipe.  In all of less than 5 minutes everything in that room is sparkly clean.  
• put things away as you go - We do a lot of cooking and home food preservation.  I am adamant about putting ingredients away as they are used so at the end of the cooking session there is no big clean-up.  This leaves very little in the way of kitchen clean-up so the kitchen is always ready to go for the next round of cooking the following day.
• cleaning baskets - I keep a basket of cleaning needs in both bathrooms, the kitchen and utility room.  That way if I notice something needs cleaning I do it right then before I forget about it.  This really helps to prevent having to do a larger cleaning session.

Vacation Home Toilets

Our vacation home has two toilets.  Unlike RV toilets that can be cleaned then a chemical holding tank fluid poured into the tank to prevent odours, vacation home toilets must be shut down during extended periods of absence.  Once the toilet has been cleaned we turn the water off to prevent any problems that could occur in the event of a burst pipe or water leak.  Normal toilets have a P-trap to prevent sewer gases and odours from entering the house.  The P-trap is designed to hold a certain amount of water.  During extended periods of the house being shut down there is the possibility that the P-trap can dry out through evapouration.  This would allow odours to get into the house along with any critters like Palmetto bugs that can come up through sewer pipes.  We learned this tip from our neighbours in our vacation home community.  Covering the top of the toilet bowl with plastic wrap is a way to prevent water in the P-trap from evapourating.  In the event a critter gets in the sewer pipe it will be confined to the toilet bowl instead of getting out into the house.

Garden Gnome
©2006-2011

The Importance House Insurance

I was watching the news yesterday when a story came on about a house fire where the folks lost everything.  The good thing was no one was hurt but they did lose everything.  Apparently they had lived in the house for a little over 30 years and had no household insurance.  Now this just boggles my mind!  How can you own a house and live in it for that many years without having household insurance? 

We pay about $660 per year for full household insurance coverage.  There are some things that regardless of the amount of insurance can't be replaced but that $660 provides a lot of replacement coverage from clothes to lost food to furniture and appliances.  If you take a walk through your home and document just how much it would cost to replace what you have in there it quickly becomes apparent that $660 is an excellent price for the security of knowing even if we lost everything we would not lose out of pocket replacement costs.  We would not have to rely on the generosity of others to help us rebuild our lives.  So it is a nice piece of low cost security.

Think of household insurance as a must have, necessary cost of living.  Those who are renting should look for a reasonably priced tenants' insurance package.  This will cover the replacement costs of your possessions for $200 or less per year.   If affording household insurance is a problem there are so many ways to cut back in other ways so you can afford the necessary protection.  Basically at the cost of our household insurance we would need to cut $55 in expenses monthly to afford it.  Surprisingly saving $55 just in food costs per month is not as difficult as it sounds.   Taking an eco-friendly, garbage free lunch to work instead of grabbing a fast food sandwich daily ($5, 20 days per week) can save you $100 less the cost of food for the lunches that would leave you a net of about $70 in saving.   If a couple spends $40 every two weeks to eat out they can eliminate that to save $1,040 per year that pays for their household insurance and still gives them a bit extra to pad the bank account.  Now that is just looking at savings to be had that are food related.  If you apply this to the rest of your living expenses not only will you be saving money but the material possessions including your home will be protected in the event of a disaster. 

Garden Gnome
©2006-2010

Freezer Basket

Yeas ago we were gifted with an ancient 20 cubic foot chest freezer.  Being young with a growing family we were very much appreciative of such a generous gift.  We've had chest freezers ever since and for the past several years have had two chest freezers plus the freezer component of the refrigerator.  A freezer basket comes in handy with the larger chest freezers but not so much with the smaller ones.  We currently have a 7 cubic foot and 5 cubic foot freezer.  The premise was one was slated for our bulk meat purchases while the other would be for in season produce I freeze and other miscellaneous freezer foods as needed.    The goal when we moved here was to use the freezers as the salesman that sold us the 7 cubic foot freezer said was now the growing trend.  He said people are buying two smaller freezers, then as one empties it is unplugged and cleaned out ready for the next large influx of freezer food.  Ideally that is our goal but so far have not got to the point of being able to unplug one of the freezers yet but we are still working on it so perhaps in the up coming year.

Smaller freezer items tend to get put in the refrigerator freeze compartment so I have little need for freezer baskets especially in the smallest chest freezer.  I removed the baskets from the smallest chest freezer.   I've picked up couple more freezer baskets along the way so decided to put them to good use.  I attached one freezer basket to one of the walls in the pantry where it holds snack items like potato chips.  Another one is used for root vegetables and squash to keep them contained and off the floor.  Yet another serves as temporary overflow for mason and other jars.  I use a smaller one (pictured) to cart frozen foods from the chest freezers to the refrigerator freezer compartment.  I even use one in the garden not only for carrying things but inverted to hold things like cleaned hand gardening tools and solar lights to be brought in for the winter.  Freezer baskets aren't just for freezer use! 

Garden Gnome
©2006-2010

Best Improvements When Selling a House

If you have been following this blog you will know that earlier this spring we decided to sell our house.  As a bit of an update, our house is still listed and we put in an extension request for the house we are interested in buying.  However, there is a possibility we may remove our house from the market so things are still very much up in the air.  When we decided to sell the house we set about decluttering and doing a few small finishing touches.  For the most part our biggest expense was finishing up a renovation project started just before deciding to list the house.  We continue to do a bit each day just to keep the house ready for showing. 

Now that we may take the house off the market we are going through with the middle yard make-over but the rest of the rip-out will take less than a day as we are hiring that out.  Spreading the top soil for seeding will take little time as will seeding or installing new raised garden beds.  In total the project will be completed with the exception of planting the beds and a couple of new trees in the period of a weekend at a cost of under $700.  If the house stays on the market we expect that this improvement will pay for itself because it falls under cleaning-up (removing delapidated beds) and getting rid of junk (tree stumps).  It will definitely make the house show better.  If we take the house off the market we will be able to enjoy thisDeciding what projects to do when selling a house can be a real issue. 

Some will immediately set about doing a renovation job in the hopes of making the house more salable.  According to Forbes in most cases you should not start any new renovation projects when getting your house ready for sale as in most cases you will not realize a good return on the investment.  They indicate the best investment is cleaning-up your act so decluttering, getting rid of junk and giving your house a good cleaning from top to bottom then keeping the house tidy until it is sold.  Forbes does recommend painting to cover up blemishes or bright and/or outdated colours.  According to several of the home and garden shows on HGTV a fresh coat of paint can really help sell a house.  Painting is a low cost way to spruce up a house that can be done in under a weekend.  Simply painting the front entrance door can be extremely effective and the colour most often recommended is red!

Garden Gnome
©2006-2010

Household Uses for Lemons

Lemons are naturally high in acidity making them a low cost, eco-friendly and healthy alternative to cleaning with harsh chemicals. Here's a few ways lemons can be used:

• Pour lemon juice where ants are found to get rid of them.
• Mix lemon juice with borax for a powerful toilet cleaner.
• Place sliced lemon in the refrigerator to absorb food odours.
• Mix lemon juice with baking soda. Rub on chrome or copper and let set for a few minutes. Wipe off with a clean cloth for a clean shine.
• Use lemon juice as a natural air -freshener and mood lifter.
• Cut a lemon in half then run it over a chopping block to disinfect.
• Squeeze fresh lemon juice onto stained surfaces. Let sit for 20 minutes then rinse.
• Sprinkle salt on a lemon wedge with a gentle scrubbing to shine the interior of copper cookware.
• Add a ½ cup of lemon juice to the wash cycle to brighten whites.
• Spray stained white socks with lemon juice then hang in the sun to remove the stains.
• Run a half lemon through the garbage disposal to clean and freshen it.
• Put ¼ cup of lemon juice in the soap dispenser of the dishwasher and run through the normal cycle to remove mineral deposits.
• Use lemon juice to clean grout around tiles.
• Rub lemon juice on brass to remove tarnish.
• Apply lemon juice with a sponge on glass shower doors to clean to a sparkling shine.
  

Garden Gnome
©2006-2010

Towel Solution

We have been trying to find eco-friendly solutions for keeping the household running smoothly. When we bought the extra capacity washer and dryer (more here) the main consideration was energy efficiency and low water usage. An unforeseen problem I quickly learned was it took a long time to generate enough whites for a load of laundry. During heavy canning sessions this was a huge problem because I could easily soil half of my T-towels! Two days of heavy canning would leave me with no T-towels yet not enough whites to run the washer. At the same time and while I still do use paper towels, I was looking for a way to reduce paper towel usage. Another consideration was the cost of buying more T-towels that really add up in price when buying a lot. The final consideration especially when canning but also for some spills is staining is almost a given. With all of this in mind I was off to find a solution.

Cotton Towels & Cloths

Our next shopping trip I found a bundle of 25 - 100% cotton wash cloths on sale for $4.99. They were nothing fancy and some would say even cheap looking because they were obviously considerably thinner than the nicer wash cloths. I saw them in a different light though. First they were 100% cotton so that meant over time they would basically be reduced to nothing. The size would be perfect for cleaning up all kinds of spills reducing the need for paper towels and staining would not be a huge concern. So I bought a package.

At our second stop (Sam's Club) I found a 24 pk of bakers & chefs bar mop (bar keepers) towels for $10.36. These were also 100% cotton and measured 16" x 19" so a bit smaller than some T-towels but more than suitable for what I needed. So I bought a package.

Armed with my purchases I was ready to set my plan in motion. I finally had enough whites to include the new purchases then washed them. I did not use any fabric softener as that interferes with absorption. I have been using both the wash cloths and bar mops for over 2 years now. Our paper towel consumption has been reduced to under 1 roll per month. I don't use bleach when doing a white load as bleach is not only damaging to fabric but can be a trigger for those with respiratory problems. When folding the freshly washed cloths I sort them into lightly stained, medium stained and heavily stained. The heavily stained wash cloths are great for easily clipping into the Swiffer® wand for quick floor mopping and wiping up spills on the floor. They make great damp dusters as well as any other cleaning chore. The cloths have also made their way to the garden and garage. My husband really likes the bar mop size for washing the vehicles and he keeps a couple in the vehicles for wiping his hands after adding any fluids. I keep them stacked in the utility room bringing out what I need for kitchen use each day. I just bought another package of the wash cloths and will pick up another package of the bar towels the next time we are at Sam's. I'm quite pleased with how this eco-friendly solution has worked for us.

Garden Gnome
©2006-2009

A Dishwasher Tip

Baby Bottle Basket

Most dishwashers have silverware baskets with hinged lids that can be closed for smaller items. But what do you do if you have items that are too big for the silverware compartments yet too small to be left on their own in the dishwasher? After oldest grandbaby was born I noticed a special dishwasher basket in the kid's dishwasher for keeping nipples and bottle lids together. Immediately I saw where such a basket would be of use for me. I was a lot of smaller lids, canning rings and small utensils that would be all over the dishwasher if placed in the dishwasher as is. So I put this idea on my thrift shop/yard sale list. This is the type of thing that would go for under a dollar if buying used and should be in almost new condition. A couple of months after oldest grandbaby was born I found one at my favourite resale shop for 25¢. Now I can wash all those smaller items too big for the silverware basket but too small to wash on their own without worrying about them. It is a simple solution! Even if you have to pay the full price of about $5 it would be well worth the purchase.

Garden Gnome
©2006-2009