There is a kitchen in here!

It seems to take about a year and a half after each kid was born to re-emerge. I recall it distinctly with Skadi. Like an awakening where I had to drop those extra 10 lbs that didn't fall off naturally after childbirth. And my house was no longer good enough. It was like the fog of "the baby" lifts. I suspect it is all hormone induced. I was lucky to never suffer post-partum depression - I know people who have - but I think for me it was a post-partum fog.


The fog lifted last month and I have gotten down to business. My wonderful Master bedroom emerged last month and this month I found that I do have a kitchen. In fact, I have a great kitchen!


The goal for the month of October was to deep clean, organize my kitchen. It needed it bad. Two weekends in now and I would put it at 75% complete. I have emptied out the cabinets and moved stuff! I am not a rearranger at all - once a piece of furniture is in place I will nearly never move it. Well only on a rare occasion to clean under it (dare I admit). My mom was a rearranger and to be honest, it drove me nuts growing up.


But I went against my gut, listened to my husband's very rational complaints about the cookbooks located in the far back of the pantry, and I moved them! And I love them now! So rearranging isn't awful!


Most of the rest of the kitchen was just emptied out (4 huge garbage bags just this weekend!) and cleaned and put back. Phew! My pantry is lovely, the cookbook shelf is fabulous. The cleaned off and actually purposed as a desk in the kitchen, is lovely too. The rolling cart of crap has been cleaned off, but purpose yet to be determined. The lazy Susan still needs to be tackled as does the very tip top shelf of my glass cabinet that holds stemware we never use (it has been there since we moved into the house - apparently I don't feel the need to put my martinis in a martini glass).


We are hosting a Halloween party in two weeks and panic set in this weekend. Two weeks to get ready! It is always a huge undertaking that is fun and always appreciated by our friends after the fact. But two weeks is NOT enough time! AB suggested that we quit the deep organizing stuff (as beneficial as it is) and start putting lipstick on the pig in the name of the party.


So yeah. Time to lipstick that pig.


Then the last weekend of the month will be spent recovering our kitchen from the madness and finalizing those last couple kitchen things.


And then there is November. I have two thoughts. Back to the Master Bedroom for Thanksgiving week painting and Master bath pick up (easy) and Master closet purge (ugh). OR - I finish Skadi's quilt. I need to finish her quilt.

September - 80% Done

It always feels so good when the goals start coming together. A bit addictive! I love seeing progress. I have to try to avoid tunnel vision though. I get this at work too. The “Got.To.Finish.It.Even.If.It.Kills.Me”mentality. Baby is crying and clinging, but got to finish this room! No. Stop. Go pick up the baby and sit down with him, feed him. At work it is, stop typing, stand up, grab bag, go and meet the bus so that kids aren’t standing alone in the house, eating. Eating chocolate and everything bad for them.

 

Last weekend I pounded on the Master bedroom hard. I scraped crap out of the corners. I started on one side – mine – and worked my way around the room. Huge bag of trash generated. A box and two bags of stuff for Goodwill. Laundry done. AB helped me empty out under the bed and we put the frame back under our mattress which elevates it about 8” higher than it was. (And got the frame out of storage under the bed.) AB built our bed and I wanted it tall. He made it tall. Then I birthed Silas and freaked out – our bed can’t be that tall! And logistics with the cosleeper made it next to impossible to have the bed that tall. So we took the frame out and it was normal height. But now it is tall again! And I love it!

 

The Master Bedroom is 80% complete now. It doesn’t include the Master bath, which has minor issues. Or the closet – which has bigger issues. I may be able to do the final 20% and tackle the Master Bath this weekend. Except Skadi has her final acting class for the month, which includes a presentation. Then her cousin is coming over to play. (Hey yeah, so she has a COUSIN who lives in the same town as we do and is her same age. Ok, so cousin like three times removed or something like that and that she just met for the first time over Labor Day, but cool!) I want to go to Michael’s, and PetSmart and Target and get groceries and then Skadi could use shoes (boots) other than her Keen sandals for the fall. Then Leif has soccer. And then I have this crazy idea of surprising the kids and going to Shakey’s after soccer because I love their pizza and the kids love the game room and Silas can scream and hardly anyone will notice and I wouldn’t have to pick up.

 

I will at least get the last 20% done, hopefully convince AB to rent a Rug Doctor and clean the carpet in there. And I maybe will get to the bathroom, maybe not. I got home today and AB had started on the garage. And not just a clean of the garage but like massive reorganization. And I am excited. So I may abandon the Master Bath pick up for the garage.

 

Next month my goal is the kitchen. Now reason would state that my Master bedroom is all cleaned and organized that I should paint it. Because I want the Master bedroom painted. But the issue is that I don’t feel like doing it. I don’t feel like taping it off, draping everything and painting and doing all the edges. And I don’t really feel as though the month of October is the time to be stuffing myself inside a smelly room. And I haven’t convinced my husband of paint colors.

 

So hello kitchen!

 

Actually I need that bad before fall baking/cooking fun and our annual Halloween party. So starting next weekend, the first weekend in October, my kitchen is going to undergo a massive dumping and re-orging so as to confuse everyone in my house about where things will go.