I've never claimed to keep the tidiest, most pristine house on the block, but things have gotten even worse around here. Don't call Hoarders. Don't be concerned for my children's health and safety. My house is clean enough, but it is NOT tidy or organized.
Because we have two climbers (moving chairs, perching on the arms of couches and chairs, standing on tables, etc.) around here, I am constantly looking for new places to keep items out of their reach: important pieces of mail, spare change, an industrial hole puncher, student papers, jewelry, grooming products, chapstick, puzzles and games with many pieces/parts . . . basically anything they find and begin to use in a manner that is potentially harmful to themselves, the item, or my sanity. The attempt to keep items out of the boys' reach coupled with my too-much-crap-too-little-organization issues have resulted in many of the flat surfaces of our home becoming ridiculously cluttered. Exhibits A, B, and C:
Excuse the poor quality of the photos. I used the laptop web cam and the lighting was not good.
Parts of our living/family/dining room (it's all one room) look like a storage closet, not a home. I'm embarrassed and posting pictures in the hopes that sharing my shame will motivate me to address these surfaces once I surface from this semester of teaching.
Don't judge my husband for the cluttered surfaces you see. Or my mom. Or his mom. And don't judge me either. If your surfaces look the same or worse, know that you are not alone. If yours are tidy and dusted, just enjoy that smug feeling of having your act all together, NTB, unlike that darn MEP who thinks she's so great.
I hope to post some "after" pictures soon.
8 comments:
I've never been a clean freak, but always fancied myself as tidy. At some point in the last several years, I just surrendered that label as well. I looked around my house yesterday during one of Wook's two 20 minute naps she graced me with and wondered "where do I even begin?" I am numb to the mess a lot of the time but a few times a month I go all out on the cleaning (my definition of "all out" at least)...only to see my hard work get destroyed within hours.
I'm really not sure why we are going to bother with Christmas decorations, as most of them will probably just be obscured by piles of craft supplies and misplaced toys. I feel your pain.
Did you sneak into my house to get those pictures?! Only, you missed the towering piles on TOP of the kitchen cupboards. And Heaven forfend you should actually OPEN any of the cupboards under the bathroom vanities..
My DESK. Oy. The top of my fridge. YIKES. And yet, my husband is 6'5" and he never wipes a single thing down, or moves a single thing off of these high surfaces that I need a chair to reach. So I am TOTALLY blaming him.
I have recently begun hosting a weekly playdate with the express intention that this will force me to keep my house cleaner. Or at the very least, that once a week it will get mostly cleaned. Otherwise my house is not so tidy. And I am a conservative hoarder, ie I don't keep everything, but I do have a hard time getting rid of anything that *might* be useful someday. So not being tidy means there is stuff EVERYWHERE.
This frustrates Neil to no end. However, he's the one that says "this place/table/room is a mess" and then never does anything about it. Oh well. We'll see how the playdate approach works.
You are definitely not alone. Though my piles no longer tower on the tops of flat surfaces, they are still present - everywhere. I thought as the kids got older the messes would become less...HA! No, they are just in different places. Life with kids is just messy, I am resigned to this basic fact I've fought for years.
I tend to keep my piles to a relative minimum, but any strides I make toward organization are overshadowed by my husband's zealous enthusiasm for multiple towers of assorted papers, opened envelopes, and loose business cards. Alas.
much like carabee, i invite people over so that i will clean up a little. i can't bare to have a mess if anyone visits. it makes me extremely uncomfortable.
also, i have to deal with a partner who shares habits with actchy's partner. his mess is confined to one spot. but it is a rather visible spot, unfortunately.
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