Selfish, In a Good Way

I'm adding myself back into the equation!

No I don't think the world revolves around me, but it was my birthday on Thursday, so what better month to be nice to myself?

This is not having a spa day and letting the kitchen pile up. This is taking a little time for hobbies and taking care of myself. Too often, I put myself last, and while I shouldn't be first, I should be in the top three.

My ideas for the month are simple things like actually making an appointment with the eye doctor because I've been noticing things getting a little blurry; getting a haircut (trim) because it's been a while and the split ends are bugging me. And fun things, like actually taking time to scrapbook at home and working through the learning to sew book I have.

Even practical things like knocking out a bunch of home small things I've been procrastinating on (I know I'll feel so much better as each is done); figuring out some systems for my new position at work; and staying caught up on the dishes.

...

There! I just got up for 5 minutes (less, actually) and got the bananas that were past their prime (WELL past) peeled and into the freezer. It's nice not to have to look at them ;)

These are the kind of small things that I don't bother doing and then every time I walk into that room I get bombarded with all the little things that need to be done. This month, I'm doing them!


So anyway, thank you for joining me, and I hope I can help you! It really is fun to be a Homemaking Diva!!

Please comment or send your questions to me at homemakingdiva@hotmail.com

Have great day!

Valerie :D

A Clear Space

I mentioned last time that  I was focusing on finding balance this year. And step one is a clear desk. Well, today, it's clear! I took about an hour this morning and put things away, decluttered, dusted, filed, dusted,... And now I have some nice space surrounding me.

It really is a big change. The plan is to keep it clear, and put things away as I'm done with them. The really big factor to all this is keeping a list of things I need to do and putting the object away, instead of plopping the object on my desk as a 'reminder'. And then following through with taking care of the things on my list. (That's the kicker!)

I've been trying to figure out how to establish routines when my schedule is so odd... it can make your head spin, if you're not careful. Night shift, day shift, DH having days off when I still have to work, crazy Mondays, laundry marathons based on hydro rates.... erg! So no straight-up, you-always-do-this-on-Tuesday-at-10am-type routines. Balance.

Balance..... balance.... wherefore art thou, balance? I am seeking you. :D

I need to stop thinking of my life as a calendar, and try and think more as a pie-chart. I'm going to work on that and see how it goes... a pie chart visual of my day in balance. :D


So anyway, thank you for joining me, and I hope I can help you! It really is fun to be a Homemaking Diva!!

Please comment or send your questions to me at homemakingdiva@hotmail.com

Have great day!

Valerie :D

Finding Balance

It's January, and many people are making resolutions. I'm not making a resolution per se, but I'd like to  take this time to reflect and set some goals.

My main goal for 2012 is Finding Balance. And that's a huge undertaking, but I have a whole year (actually the rest of my life) to work on it. Balance isn't a destination. It's a journey. You can never really be done. It's something to consider everyday. If I have a wonderfully balanced day today, that does not guarantee me a balanced day tomorrow.

I need to seek this balance so I can love the life I have and live the life I love.

So my overall goal for the year is to find balance - between work, home, DH, and play. For January I'm working on clearing my desk (by Friday) and keeping it clear. I spend a LOT of time here at my desk, so having clear space really will make a clear mind :)

Today I have worked on clearing my desk, started a goals binder/control journal/thingy-whats-it and I do see progress, and that's always a good thing.

So anyway, thank you for joining me, and I hope I can help you! It really is fun to be a Homemaking Diva!!

Please comment or send your questions to me at homemakingdiva@hotmail.com

Have great day!

Valerie :D

Almost Christmas!

OK people, it's the day before Christmas Eve!

Challenge #1: This is the LAST day that you WANT to do any shopping, so triple-check your fridge against your list (if you don't have a list, you want a basic plan/idea of what you will eat from now until at least breakfast on the 27th). And check your presents if they're not done and get going! You want to enjoy Christmas Eve, Christmas Day and Boxing Day with family. Besides, many places will be closed, have weird hours, or be packed because they're the only ones open.

Challenge #2: Take something OFF your list! Make one less side for Christmas dinner, do one less activity, clean one less area (just close that door). YOU need enjoy Christmas also :)

Challenge #3: Pre-prep! What can you do today so you don't have to do tomorrow? What can you do tomorrow that you don't have to do Christmas Day? What can you do in the morning so you don't have to do right as Christmas Dinner is being served?

I have most of my wrapping done, just the gifts for my nieces and nephews left, but they're for the 2nd, and I HAVE the gifts. I'm hosting Christmas Dinner with my in-laws Christmas Eve. I'm making Saving Dinner's white bean dip today and one of my sides today. I'm going to make the mashed potatoes in the MORNING and put them in the crock cooker with a little butter over the top on 'keep warm' (this is a FABULOUS tip, but you really should TEST your crock before you try this for a meal, different crocks have different temperatures and as Leanne Ely says: 'Your mileage may vary' you don't want them to scorch). I'm also going to arrange my 'goodie tray' while the potatoes are boiling (and stick it covered in the garage).

So that means I'll only have one SIMPLE side to make while the turkey is 'resting' and I'm making the gravy :)

Saving Dinner's Christmas Morning Strata has become a tradition for us. (I usually half the recipe because we're only 2 people and then we eat it for a few days - love the toaster oven for re-heats!) It's super-good, decadent but easy AND you prep it the night before, and just pull it out of the fridge and bake in the morning! LOVE that!

Here's to a less stressful time! Merry Christmas!

So anyway, thank you for joining me, and I hope I can help you! It really is fun to be a Homemaking Diva!!

Please comment or send your questions to me at homemakingdiva@hotmail.com

Have great day!

Valerie :D

A Simple Christmas - December First

Christmas can get so busy... I love FLYlady's babysteps... Holiday Cruising is what she calls it. I'm aiming for a simple Christmas this year.

December 1st!! We're embracing DH's Scottish heritage this Christmas :) Today we did 3 small Christmas things:

1. Added plaid bows to the wreath and put it on the front door
2. Put up the tree (pre-lit, simple) with just the lights and our new angel for now
3. I brought up the Christmas dishes (OK, mugs and 1 glass, plus some hot pads and tea towels) and put the dishes in the dishwasher, put 'regular' mugs right back into the same box and put the box back downstairs :)

I started the Christmas Baking with my sister at the end of October. We spread it out over 3 different days, making 2 or 3 things a day, doubling some recipes and splitting everything. We finished November 25th!

So anyway, thank you for joining me, and I hope I can help you! It really is fun to be a Homemaking Diva!!

Please comment or send your questions to me at homemakingdiva@hotmail.com

Have great day!

Valerie :D

Christmas is Coming! But First: Company and Carpet :)

Confused by that title? :D Let me explain.

First of all 'Christmas is coming' - not very difficult to comprehend. I know many of you are groaning: 'But it was just Halloween, gimme some time!' Please don't get upset, I agree with you! It drives me crazy that there's Christmas stuff in all the stores already and personally, I refuse to decorate one iota before December 1st.

But! NOW is the time to plan and prepare! Flylady's Holiday Cruising Missions are in full swing, and the organizing sites are bursting with time-saving ideas. What's a Holiday Cruising Mission? Well, simplest way to put it is Flylady sends out one mission per weekday, starting mid-October, and she helps us to baby-step our way through preparing for Christmas. There's a fun little game behind it where you're pretending you're going on a cruise December 1st-21st and you HAVE to get everything done ahead of time. It's a great system, keeping you on track, one baby-step at a time.

While I'm not exactly following the Cruising Missions, I am baby-stepping my way through Christmas.

My sister and I do our baking together, and we've already planned what we're making, who's bringing which ingredients and supplies, and when we're making each recipe. This is our third year doing it, so we have it down to a science, I have a simple spreadsheet with recipe names across the top and ingredients down the side and the amounts of each ingredient per recipe in the middle with columns on the end for totals and initials (who's bringing what). We mostly make our same traditional goodies each year, so all I had to do this year was pull up last year's spreadsheet, do a 'save as' and make some minor tweaks. We're making 7 recipes, plus icing over 3 days together and we already did one day. We have fun and get it done, and THAT'S the Flylady way :D

I pulled out my Holiday Control Journal (a free printable from Flylady.net) and I have all my little notes from the last few years. I don't use it quite how Flylady set it up, but I do have everything together. I added a non-Christmas section, and that's where I have my sheet of paper that lists how many kids we had for Halloween each year, so I have a good idea of how much candy to pick up. I also have my Thanksgiving meal planners in there - one page checklists of what order to make each dish, how far ahead... Sound like a lot of work? Saving Dinner just posted theirs and you know it's gonna be fool-proof :D

So I'm starting to THINK about Christmas now, plan a bit here and there, I've picked up a few things already. I got all the stocking stuffers already - a friend of mine had a craft sale with all kinds of pretty and useful and yummy things :D A word of caution: If you're picking up gifts ahead of time and hiding them, be sure to either note where they are (put a reminder in your phone's calendar to ding at you on, say, December 12th, and then you can wrap the gifts and put them under the tree) or keep them all in the same place. I have a spot in my house that I usually hide DH's gifts, and he hasn't found it yet, not that he's been looking. So I know where things are, because they wouldn't be anywhere else :)

ANYWAYS, what was the rest of the title? Oh yes! 'Company and Carpet' right.

So I'm having overnight guests on Saturday. They said they'd get here around 8pm and they're visiting someone else on Sunday before they go home, so I'm figuring a snack Saturday night plus breakfast Sunday morning. I'm keeping it simple, but fancy at the same time. Old bananas were reduced drastically a while back and they called to me, so I brought them home and made two loaves of banana bread. We ate one, but I froze the other, so there's my Saturday night snack :D

Also, I wanted to do something fun for breakfast. I have a cookbook that was a fundraiser for the hospital I bought at a concert and recently I've been trying some of the recipes. And guess what?? The chocolate crepes recipe (which is sooo good - oh yeah, I'm making that today, too for post-night shift 'breakfast' - see my post on shifting) it says to make the batter 1-24 hours ahead of time! (I actually didn't notice that the first time I made it, and didn't care the second time... whatever) So I can make the batter and the whipped cream to go with it (I do Dream Whip: packet + milk + vanilla = DONE) sometime on Saturday before they arrive and then breakfast will be a snap!

Really, I've let the housework slide a bit too much, so having company coming is a great deadline to get myself into gear. And THEN once I've tidied everything up, it's so simple to maintain and I can have a stress free Christmas!

Carpet: My last post was all about how I'd finished painting DH's office. Well, the carpet guy is coming on Friday, so I need to tear the old carpet out (it's cheaper if I do it, once I get into it, I'll decide if it's worth the $35 savings :D it's probably easier than you think). So not only do I have to prepare for company, I have to make space for the carpet guy. But that ALSO means that we can start setting up DH's office :D and then my 'Joyous Snowball' will start rolling down the hill!



Please comment or send your questions to me at homemakingdiva@hotmail.com

Have great day!

Valerie :D

A Joyous Snowball

Finally, Finally FINally DONE!! DH's office is 100% painted!! YAY!!! (Can you see me happy-dancing??)

That took WAY longer than I thought, mostly because it's RED and required 80 million coats! Whatever. It's done and it looks great!

When we're done this set of nights, I'll call 'Uncle Jimmy' and make an appointment to get the carpet installed. Still need to get DH to have a 'boy party' so they can haul the carpet from my parents' house to here... that's in the works. Almost happened on Thursday, but it was too rainy :( (My dad had bought this carpet for their bedroom and, of course, my Mom then decided she wanted hardwood instead... although I think she's just procrastinating clearing all the junk in their room, it's Hoarders-worthy in there).

After the carpet's in, I can install most of the baseboard - provided I pick up finishing nails... (I repainted the old trim, but a few small pieces broke...) And Dad said he'd be available in November for helping with the rest of the trim (that needs to be cut). But after I install *most* of the trim, we can put together DH's desk and chair, maybe the other three bookshelves that have been sitting in the way in the entryway...

Then DH can move into his office, which will clear out the spare bedroom downstairs, and the closet down there, plus there are two closets in the office (one is HUGE) and then I'll be able to get stuff out of my dressing room (luggage, extra pillows...) down into the spare bedroom, and THEN I can set up my dressing room nice-nice for scrapbooking and sewing!

And THEN I can spend some extra time from night shifts doing fun, crafty things :D

And in case you were wondering, yes, we DO have a ridiculous amount of space :) We're two people in a large bungalo with a finished basement.... 5 bedrooms altogether ;) It will be really nice to have use of the closets in DH's office, we have a lot of space, but not that much storage space, very little furniture... we're baby-stepping that :D

Can you tell I'm excited? :D

One thing at a time. This will be a big oppourtunity to declutter, especially for DH, but I'll try not to be too pushy :)

So anyway, thank you for joining me, and I hope I can help you! It really is fun to be a Homemaking Diva!!

Please comment or send your questions to me at homemakingdiva@hotmail.com

Have great day!

Valerie :D