There was a wonderful reminder on A Clean Heart this week. While we are working to organize, simplify, structure our houses and schedules we must not lose sight of our true goal – making a "home".  More wonderful quotes come from Secrets of a Happy Home Life published in 1894:

"There are people sheltered in houses, which are not homes."

on a home:

"It may be a fine, great house, with rich furniture, costly pictures, and all the elegance of wealth; or it may be a little house, with four rooms, cheap furniture, homemade carpets, and empty of adornment. It makes very little difference what the size of the house, or what its furniture may be. The happiness of the home does not depend on the house or on what it contains; the people who live in the house MAKE happiness, – or mar it."

and never forget:

"Few things we can do in the this world are so well worth doing as the making of a beautiful and happy home. He who does this builds a sanctuary for God and opens a fountain of blessing for men. For more than we know, do the strength and beauty of our lives depend upon the home in which we dwell. He who goes forth in the morning from a happy, loving, prayerful home into the world’s strife, temptation, struggle, and duty, is strong – inspired for noble and victorious living. the children who are brought up in a true home go out trained and equipped for life’s battles and tasks, carrying in their hearts a secret of strength which will make them brace and loyal to God, and will keep them pure in the world’s severest temptations."

Wow!  Could we possibly we need more motivation than that?

Ok I think we are back on track here if a bit soggy. ; )  I have to share what a true blessing it was that we were all caught up on laundry, dishes and so on when the power went out. It is entirely possible with 9 people that two days without utilities could have meant many MANY days of catch up. As it was we were right back to where we needed to be within 24 hrs. This routine works!

Like I mentioned previously we divided the house into zones and assigned a zone per day Monday-Saturday. Sunday is a day of rest. This is the cleaning method used for over 100 years in this country as evidenced by the charming Day of the Week dishtowels that used to be standby’s in homemaker’s kitchens. My illustrated lists are here for download. You may need to combine or divide these lists depending upon the configuration and uses of your rooms.

Another resource I have been fascinated with of late is the book Home Comforts: the Art and Science of Keeping House by Cheryl Mendelson. This is not a light read but it literally explains in great detail the proper way to clean and maintain just about ANYthing you own – from your stove to your terrier. She lays out exactly how long your leftovers are safe, the attributes of various fabrics and when fabric care labels may be safely ignored, how to care for your wood floors (hint: old wives tails are not always accurate here, I learned!),when you want an acidic  or alkaline based cleaner, and more.  Much more. Almost nine HUNDRED pages more. For about $13 used you can’t beat this for an essential reference book. it will take you from cleaning hunches to cleaning assurances. You may not elect to do all the jobs she recommends on the schedule she recommends but when you do them you can be certain they are being done correctly.

Here are the lists in my Housekeeping Binder at the moment:

Download make_your_own_cleaning_solutions.doc  basic cleaner recipes from the net and varied sources

Download bedroom_day.doc  Bedrooms

Download bathroom_cleaning_checklist.doc  Bathrooms

Download living_room.doc   Living/family rooms

Download dining_room_cleaning_list.doc  Dining rooms

Download kitchen_cleaning_checklist.doc Kitchen

Download vehicle_cleaning_checklist.doc  Cars

Download emergency_quick_clean.doc     emergency quick clean plan. This is actually what we do for basic daily housecleaning.

Download cleaning_grand_plan.doc   This is adapted from the Cleaning Grand Plan from Organized Home. It is a LARGE document – about 12 pages. It can be used for a one-time, concentrated, whole house cleaning.

Charlotte asked for some specifics in creating a journal from the ground up. First I used a 2in clearview binder.It has a plastic sleeve outside so you can slip a paper inside. I surfed Two Peas in a Bucket  under ‘planners’ for design inspiration. Then hit the craft store. They sell all sorts of coordinated paper lines. It really doesn’t matter which you get but a set that coordinates makes all the difference imo. Then you might want to choose some ribbon, stickers, or the like to accessorize. Again if you use the same line of products it’s hard to go wrong.

Pick a font, or use my templates and just highlight them and then switch to your desired font if you wish. Mine are Word fonts which you all should have. The ones used for Elizabeth’s were AL Age Old Love from Two Peas which looked most like Susan Branch’s writing. You can download those from the store section. They run about $3 a set and will download right into your Word program.

Get a set of page protectors and make your dividers. Print off the divider labels from the last post and cut and paste to your patterned paper. You might want to mount them on a piece of solid color paper first to set the titles off nicely. Slip those into protectors. Get clear index labels to mount the labels on the sides of the divider pages so you can find them easily.

I used 12 by 12 paper to cover the front. It needed a bit of trimming but it covers it all. If you get 8×11 it won’t go all the way across. (read: cheesey!)  Measure the side of your binder.  Then you can print off a cover spine: Download binder_spine.doc . You can use this one but then you will want to mount it on a larger rectangle the exact size of your binder spine. If you aren’t used to changing text direction in Word it will save you that step. If you look at the top of your document before printing you can change the font and color by highlighting the text and hitting the "A" with the colors underneath right by the font box on the top toolbar.

I also printed off an inspirational quote for each section of the journals. I had seen some women’s journals with parts of Proverbs 31.  I also liked some other famous quotes about order and such so I mixed mine up. After printing, these are slipped in the same page protector as the divider page – on the back side of it.

Download health_divider_quote.doc

Download housekeeping_divider_quote.doc

Download education_quote.doc

Download contacts_divider_quote.doc

Download faith_divider_quote.doc 

That is that. You can then start printing the articles, lists, and whatnot and filing them in the appropriate sections. I would keep all of those in page protectors also unless you are including a calendar you will be writing on. In that case include a nice pen. Gold or black is motivating imo!

Next up are the housekeeping lists. Bear with me. Late pregnancy and my need to actually LIVE this are trumping writing about it. Unfortunately I know too well how easy it is to be snowed under in no time. : /

We do laundry daily so there is no separate Focus Day for this. If you live in the city and/or have less clothes to wash this may not be as necessary. It taxes a septic system to do too many loads at once however.  It sorta taxes mom too. ; )  I start the first load before breakfast. Change it after breakfast. Then again during our morning break and again at lunch if need be.  The goal is to have all the clothes folded and put away by midafternoon. No stacks when dad walks in the door.  That is the goal anyway!

I realized my recent habit of sleeping in an extra half hr  or more was throwing it all off for the entire day. I have a chronic pain problem that is exacerbated by immobility. This has been known to wake me in the middle of the night and then I am up for an hr til its better again. I was making up that time by sleeping later. Not a good idea. It is better to get up like my early bird friends and then rest later, when the house is well under control. Today is already a better day. Two loads done so far!

Download impressionist_laundry.doc

Download laundrychart.doc  this one was made by Mrs. Wilt of The Sparrow’s Nest blog and modified with our fonts. It is meant to hang over the machines so the washers know how to set the temps and so on correctly.

I realize some women may be offended by this whole concept but I was so profoundly affected by the story I am linking here regardless. I have fallen into the trap of ‘helping’ in all sorts of ways that in the end did not help at all.

   I want to preface this post with a couple disclaimers. Lest you get the mistaken idea that I am channeling Martha Stewart you should know my history.  As my ten facts revealed I am an only child.  An only child of a single mom to boot. I did not grow up in a traditional family and had no daily father figure. Mom worked odd hours at times and I took over a lot of cooking and housekeeping by necessity, not because of my great training or skill in those areas. As a result things happened whenever they could and we were often a day late and dollar short. This is how I started my homemaking venture.

   Shortly after we married I got pregnant. I was immersed in attachment parenting lit, which though lovely and encouraging did have one drawback – it stressed the need to let go of household standards in favor of rocking babies. This is probably excellent advice for Type A women. If you, like me, find yourself waaaaaay down the alphabet someplace it can spell disaster.  It DID spell near disaster for us. My husband was used to an orderly house and was totally unprepared for my haphazard approach. Couple this with exceptionally poor health on my part and you have the makings for chaos.

   I worked diligently for the better part of that first decade of wife and motherhood to get healthy. I also began reading lots of lit geared towards women seeking to be keepers of their homes and a blessing to their husbands. It became clear to me that though I was physically at home my inability to manage it in a way that blessed my husband was in itself an act of defiance. I knew better after all.  I had read the articles. : / 

   We have spent the last few years in attitude rehabilitation. Actually *I* have. It has been driven home to me in recent weeks that not all my children have been brought fully up to speed in my motives and why it is important to take care of the things Dad has worked so hard to provide for us. So we tweak. We talk. We rededicate ourselves to the challenge. We occasionally call friends in desperation and tears to be reminded that this can happen….

   Like I said, my housekeeping schedule is based upon the Large Family Logistics model. She has a flylady type mailing but unless you are looking at your screen all day (which needless to say will sabotage your housekeeping!) the prompts don’t necessarily come as you need them. I modified those prompts and lists to fit our home and printed them out so I could refer to them throughout the day.  MUCH better!

   The first thing she, FLylady, and other organizers recommend is to have your general day plan set. Include your morning routine such as exercise, lunch and dinner prep, laundry started, whatever you start your day with. Then hit your evening routine since so much depends upon having a good start. This would include checking your calendar, prepping coffee and breakfast, having a clean sink, and general house pickup. Next figure out what chores will happen on which days.( Few of us can clean a house in a day. If you can but then you miss it that scheduled day life is BAD. ; )) For us these chores happen in the afternoons. If you homeschool you will need to figure in when that will happen. We start with Table Time – the seatwork subjects that usually require time with me. That gets scheduled after breakfast. Times are general guidelines. As the LFL says if stuff happens – as it will – then you just ‘do the next thing’. Best advice I have ever heard on the subject.

   I will start the downloads with our Download daily_school_and_chore_routine_binder_page.doc . We have two – one has the general schedule for our "big picture" and another is a checklist so each child/adult can track their personal participation daily. It is laminated and a dry erase marker is nearby so I know if we are indeed staying on track.

   Next we have our Download focus_room_days.doc . You can move these around to suit your schedule. I had to! The LFL lady had a different errand day and it threw off our week. I had to plan mine around the only time we could get piano lessons. You may choose entirely different formats for your forms. I am uploading these in case you wish to use the same fonts and clip art. Then you need only cut and paste your own tweaks. Again these are for personal blessing only. It took HOURS to set up and find the clips so I am hoping to save some of you that precious time. Gosh you hate to even have to say it, but there are women who are selling forms like these on the net or Ebay. Please don’t. 

   Focus room lists to follow. Stay tuned. <g>

    I have been working on my Home Management Journal for some months now. Actually I have been working on several of them – for myself and dear friends. This is hardly an original idea. A few moments on the web will net a number of hits to these binders. I thought it might be helpful to articulate what I loved and what I really didn’t love about the whole concept. Why would a woman who professes disdain for running a home like a factory even entertain the idea much less spend months creating one? Well here goes….

   It all started last summer when I saw a similar binder online. I was intrigued, as I usually am, by super-organized women and their methods. The reason I was intrigued was not to turn my home into a bells-on-the-hour, finely tuned machine however.  Initially the motivation was a bit morbid. It occurred to me that if something tragic happened to me there was really noone on the planet who could easily jump in and take my place. Granted there is probably no ‘easy’ way to do that in a large family, but still, I realized I was storing a LOT of information in my head.  If I went, it was all going with me.  Twenty years of trial and error, of tweaking techniques, of who needed vitamins, of what size the kids were, of how-to-run-this-place. 

    It also occurred to me that while dying is not a common thing for me <g> it DOES happen that my husband or children need to step in and help for varying amounts of time when I am down for the count due to pregnancy complications, postpartum, a child’s surgery, or some unforeseen excitement around here. Even when I am right here there was always some question about when a job was really finished or how to do a task properly or what was expected from school each day. Having all that written out would seem to eliminate a lot of stress on everyone’s part. No more surprises or misunderstandings about expectations.

   I bounced the ideas off of Jen and Elizabeth and we all realized these were very real issues in our homes. While you might be able to wing it with a couple children and a fairly static schedule you can forget smooth sailing if you have a full house and a deployed dad or a pregnant mom or a child with health issues – or how about several of those things! We needed to spell out how things were done and when they should be done. We also realized that we had children who might not have just absorbed by osmosis all the homemaking knowledge that had taken us the better part of two decades to accumulate. It wasn’t that they weren’t awesome kids. But, they did not have the benefit of the years of experience we did. It would be so nice to have a place to share with them what actually worked and what we valued. It would be nice to be able to pass it on.

   So the project began. I had a few priorities for the journal. First it had to be practical. Volumes of papers weren’t likely to be waded through. Only the most useful everyday info was going in here. Second, it had to be pretty.  REALLY pretty. It’s all visual for me. True confession – I just can’t stand the business like forms for housekeeping and menus etc readily available online. They looked sterile and generic to me. If I used those there was a very real possibility that this binder would end up like many of my day-planners – a necessary evil I looked at as rarely as possible. To prevent that from happening I decided to make scrapbook style dividers and covers and to search the net for the nicest clip art to illustrate the pages. While the binder was my nod to the need for order and structure, the look of it was my statement about resisting the institutionalizing of education and the home.

   Since I was making one for myself I figured I would make multiples and share with my friends. Each of us got a theme.  Mine is Vintage. Jen’s was more Country Floral (see pics left).  Elizabeth chose Susan Branch since her daughter Mary Beth loved her graphics.(I will link to Elizabeth’s as soon as she has the pics uploaded) The same fonts (different for each of us) are used throughout on all the forms to lend visual continuity.  The end result was some binders we could all live with and use daily with a smile. I have been using mine for some time now and feel comfortable sharing the repro’s if they are of help to other women. I am going to begin uploading today but will likely need to break up the posts over the next several days due to time constraints. I hope to put the downloads on the sidebar as soon as possible also so they are easy to access.

   Meantime – you can download (for personal use only please) the Download vintage_binder_dividers.doc in Word documents. You can also download the divider labels in ovals if you prefer Download mcd_dividers.doc . The label sizes are ready to go for index labels. I glued a bit of glue stick to the backs to make them stick in the clear label holders. The filler pages, which will be posted shortly, are all in Word Fonts so they should be viewable and printable on any pc. Though mine are in Victorian fonts you may want something different. You can highlight the document and change to a different font easily. The clipart is from all over. It cannot be used for resale.

    I will send the first section’s filler pages and lists – Housekeeping – in the next post.  Enjoy!

Care to spend about 40% less on your Christmas gifts? Pick up a Sunday paper this week! Your local Michael’s, Hobby Lobby, and Joann’s Fabrics generally run catalog flyers in the the Sunday paper with a weekly 40% off coupon.  The catch is you can only redeem the coupons for non-sale items and only one item per visit. This is fine news for gift shopping however since most of the items I would normally buy are often not the loss leaders in the flyers.

If you haven’t actually walked all the way around one of these stores let me suggest a couple aisles that caught our eyes last week. First of all, the doll section. Michael’s had an American Girl look-alike doll for $15.  I kid you not. With the coupon that comes to about $9. Less than a tenth of the original AG dolls, which though lovely DO in fact get ratty hair and lost limbs. I can testify to that. : /  There was a wall of clothing and accessories to go with the dolls, none of which remotely resembled a Bratz doll wardrobe. If you want authenticity you can purchase the lookalike doll at Michaels and get a vintage dress from AG.

Further on in the toy aisle there were classic wooden toys like lacing beads and alphabet blocks. There were also a number of kits – science kits, construction kits, pencil by number, beading, mini looms, pottery kits, hand sewing projects, and more.

In the actual stitchery section there was also a find – Jean-e-ology iron on embellishments for skirts, tops and of course jeans. You can take a simple homemade skirt, purse, etc and give it chain store appeal for about $3.  Or $1.80 with your coupon <g>  My girls were ALL over these fwiw.

Hobby Lobby has a similar offering and Joanns has a bit less. I plan to make a weekly visit to at least two of these stores while the kids are at piano lessons in coming weeks.  Assuming I can keep shopping – sigh! The spirit is willing but the flesh is…. contracting. : p 

Had a request for more specific directions for downloading those fonts shared the other day.  It can be maddening to attempt the first time! I remember several phone calls to Jen and a few expletives aimed at the screen when I realized how many free fonts were available and how few I could figure out how to load.

Here is the tutorial with graphics of the windows used.  Basically you right click on the font you are downloading and click ‘save target’. You want to have a file set up to save it to of course so you can find it again. I created a ‘font’ file under Windows. You will need to unzip your font file, so you must have an unzipping utility like Winzip installed. It will open a window with a TT(True type) icon once you unzip it. This is where most people get stuck. If you click on this icon you get a lovely sample of your new font and can do absolutely nothing with it. So…. don’t click on it yet <g> Proceed to:

Open your control panel (on the bottom left of the screen hit start, then control panel). Go to Appearance and Themes and then find the Font prompt and open that. Mine is on the top left at this point.  This should pull up a window with all the TT font files already installed on your computer. Drag your new font icon over into this window and release it. It will automatically install. If you go to your word processing program and select a font it should be there ready to go. Do double check the linked tutorial.

Once the world of free fonts is opened to you the newfound options for school work, notebooks and scrapbooks will amaze you. A couple of my favorite font sites are:

Dafont.com  I like the handwriting, script, and school themes.  The serif and sans serif are great for scrapping.

One Scrappy Site

Scrap village

When you see layouts you like in scrapbook mags be sure to check the materials info included. Do a search for the fonts listed and you too can get the same look.  If you are a homeschooler check the school fonts from the first link. (linked in the Adventures in Grocery Shopping post as well) You will save a fortune over the ones available in school supply catalogs. These are perfect for making handwriting practice pages. You can adjust the font size to whatever stage at which your young writer is currently performing.  It is particularly nice to make notebook and copywork pages by starting your text half way down a blank page and printing on cardstock. The child can illustrate the top half and practice the copywork on the bottom. Or he/she can dictate a nature notebook entry which you can print in light gray and he can copy and illustrate that. The list goes on. Enjoy!

We actually tackled the craft room job last summer though you wouldnt know it by the stacks of books in the craft room at the moment. : /  I mentioned I have a room for scrapbooking and sewing in this house. It is painted a taupe/tan color with cream trim. We purchased a large black banquet table which is the perfect size for crafting – not too deep and long enough for more than one crafter or to use one side for sewing and one for scrapping.  I had an old armoire style entertainment center that was on its last legs. The doors had long since broken off. We painted that black and it holds large items now. Next I bought several sets of the black wire snap-together cubes from Target and made shelving around two sides of the room. They are deeper than most shelves and can store deep photo boxes and fabric cuts etc. Also on the shelves are patterns, magazines (in holders) paper, scrap supplies and unfortunately preschool materials. They are safer up there!

Creating Keepsakes has a great article online this week  about organizing your scrap space. Many of the tips could be translated into a home office imo. They have a second link to organizing on a budget featuring my favorite – magazine holders with labels. <g>  Here is  yet another room we haven’t linked to previously. Very bright and cheerful. 

I am also in love with the home office and storage pics at Pottery Barn online (sample pic left). Lots of great ideas for stashing your stuff. <g>  My fantasy is to move directly into a Pottery Barn catalog – preferably a page with LOTS of fabric lined baskets and deep shelves lol!

Speaking of shelves – we decided to tackle the bookcases downstairs completely this week. Realizing how stressed the stacks are making me it seemed wiser to move the best of the old cases into the living and box whatever doesn’t fit comfortably. At least we can get back to order and clean. I don’t think the built in’s will happen until after the baby with all we have scheduled in the next two months and the thought of approaching Christmas and birthing with a torn up main level puts me over the top. SO, better get moving on that note! 

Oh, yes, the home office. In progress! We have yet to decide where that will be. It is in the kitchen right now and may move to the craft room or livingroom. We are organizing the components and then a move won’t be a big ordeal. Remember that organized does not need to look institutional nor modern. This site explains. or you could go Mexican country, English Country,primitive, cottage, or American classic country.

Here are some further links to organizing your home office:

essortment

http://www.hgtv.com/hgtv/dc_design_office_workspace/0,1792,HGTV_3378,00.html  home offices

http://interiordec.about.com/od/planninganoffice/