BulgingButtons

Not bad for a fat girl

Tag Archives: Cleaning Up


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23 Things I Want / Need to Get Done (Soon)

So much to do

So much to do

I’m on fall break from school, and it’s a wonderful feeling. The weather has finally broken (by that I mean it’s not scorching outside 24/7) and I’m feeling pretty motivated.

For some reason 23 seems to be a good number to me, so here’s my list of stuff I want to do today or SOON. What’s on your list? Any fun stuff?

  1. Post on BulgingButtons ( See what I did there? It’s always good to start with success!)
  2. Eat apples and honey in honor of Rosh Hashanah (the Jewish New Year, which is today).
  3. Get groceries, including apples and honey
  4. Put away the clean dishes
  5. Sort the laundry
  6. Get my doctor’s appointment over with ( a follow up to my lovely twisted ovary situation from July, which, it occurs to me, I never wrote about )
  7. Finish Maya Angelou’s I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings (it’s wonderful, I can’t believe I waited this long to read it)
  8. Clear off my desk
  9. SEW!
  10. Get the laundry done
  11. Shave my legs (TMI?)
  12. Get a pedicure. I’m thinking orange for October
  13. Go through the piled up mail
  14. Collect the next batch of mail from the mailbox ( I don’t get there too often)
  15. Clear off the kitchen island
  16. Recycle a few boxes
  17. Start the laundry
  18. Make my bed
  19. Create a menu for the week (this should be done before #3, of course)
  20. Finish reading Ransom Riggs’ Library of Souls (from the Miss Peregrine series)
  21. Read at least one of my teaching books that I have in my “to read” stack
  22. Take the puppy on a nice long walk
  23. Steam clean the bathroom floor (it was that or work on revisions to my manuscript…)

So you see I have plenty to do this week. Some of those items take a few minutes, some a few hours, and others a great deal longer (those darn revisions). At least I have a plan, sketchy as it may be.

How do you approach your “to do” list? Are you a list maker? I’d love to hear from you in the comments, and whatever you’ve got going on today, I hope it’s productive and makes you feel accomplished.


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My Home, My Showcase

My house went on the market on February 21. Today is May 8. It feels like eternity. It isn’t of course, but the amount of extra stuff that we have to do to make it look like a showroom is getting to be a drag. Actually it was a drag from the beginning, since I really don’t like housework.

Maybe it stems back to my first regular paying job outside of babysitting. I cleaned house for a neighbor around the corner, whose son happened to be in my class. I went over every Monday after school for the duration of my junior and senior  years and cleaned. Each week I thoroughly cleaned  the bathrooms, then alternated between cleaning the upstairs and downstairs. Every once in a while my neighbor would have me work in the basement rec room instead.

It may have been the easiest cleaning job ever, since I’m positive the woman I worked for cleaned before I got there. Still, I did everything I was supposed to do. After she was gracious about me ruining her bath mat on my very first day (needless to say I learned how to properly handle bleach after that), I knew that I owed her nothing less than my best effort.That house was immaculate. Mine is not.

When you clean a house thoroughly you get to know it intimately. You know where the tile is uneven, where the paint is scuffed, and where the chrome on the edge of the medicine cabinet is discolored. In the two years I’ve lived here, I’ve gotten to know this house pretty well, mostly over the past two months.

In an effort to combat the construction across the street, I’ve done my best to “stage” my house and yard. I want people to imagine themselves living here. I want them to picture themselves sitting by the pool enjoying a margarita, or baking a pie in the kitchen. I want it to feel like home.

I’m not sure I’ve accomplished my goal or not, but I do like my little touches. I just wish I didn’t feel like I need them anymore.