beach or go on a cruise, we stayed home. Next month, we will take a short
Trip to Utah. We will be visiting a friend of Darrell's from High school.
Her name is Cyndi. She and I are looking forward to meeting.
Anyway, while on vacation, i Have been relaxing and taking it easy. Yet, I
also have been working on cleaning and organizing our apartment. Today, I
received an e-mail about how to organize and how to live clutter-free. I am
not one of those people, not one, who has everything in its place.
However, I am somewhere in the middle, not a perfectionist nor a slob. I am
not real messey and I am able to find things,most of the time.
Furthermore, I was looking at this one site on how to reduce stress and
become organized. I found some very good information there. One of the
things I came across is this message on Housekeepping and Humor. Its very
funny and think most of you will appreciate it. Take care.
You know when it's time to clean the fridge when:
The magnets are abandoning ship.
Your milk carton features an ad for the 1932 World's Fair
You have replaced your refrigerator lightbulb with a bug zapper.
Your Vegetable bin appears to be breathing.
Geraldo Rivera asks to lead an expedition into your fridge.
Your son can't find his science project in the fridge.
Your son's science project is the fridge.
Your freezer contains actual ice from the Ice Age.
Your lunch meat has petrified.
THIRTY MINUTES TO A CLEANER HOUSE
You're getting company in 30 minutes. Your house is a mess.
WHAT WILL YOU DO?
Welcome, ladies and gentlemen, to the first session of Housekeeping Tips for
Regular People. If you're a Martha Stewart type of housekeeper, this column
is NOT for you. However, for the rest of you, this is your chance to learn
15 Secret Shortcuts to Good Housekeeping that your mother never told you.
SECRET TIP 1: DOOR LOCKS
If a room clearly can't be whipped into shape in 30 days--much less 30
minutes--employ the Locked Door Method of cleaning. Tell anyone who tries to
go in
the room that the door is intentionally locked.
CAUTION: It is not advisable to use this tip for the bathroom.
Time: 2 seconds
SECRET TIP 2: DUCT TAPE
No home should be without an ample supply. Not only is it handy for plumbing
repairs, but it's a great way to hem drapes, tablecloths, clothes, just
about
anything. No muss, no fuss.
Time: 2-3 minutes
SECRET TIP 3: OVENS
If you think ovens are just for baking, think again. Ovens represent at
least 9 cubic feet of hidden storage space, which means they're a great
place to
shove dirty dishes, dirty clothes, or just about anything you want to get
out of sight when company's coming.
Time: 2 minutes
SECRET TIP 4: CLOTHES DRYERS
Like Secret Tip 3, except bigger.
CAUTION: Avoid hiding flammable objects here.
Time: 2.5 minutes
SECRET TIP 5: WASHING MACHINES & FREEZERS
Like Secret Tip 4, except even bigger.
Time: 3 minutes
SECRET TIP 6: DUST RUFFLES
No bed should be without one. Devotees of Martha Stewart believe dust
ruffles exist to keep dust out from under a bed or to help coordinate the
colorful
look of a bedroom. The rest of us know a dust ruffle's highest and best use
is to hide whatever you've managed to shove under the bed. (Refer to Secret
Tips 3, 4, 5.) Time: 4 minutes
SECRET TIP 7: DUSTING
The 30-Minutes-To-A-Clean-House method says: Never dust under what you can
dust around.
Time: 3 minutes
SECRET TIP 8: DISHES
Don't use them. Use plastic or paper and you won't have to.
Time: 1 minute
SECRET TIP 9: CLOTHES WASHING (EEWWW)
This secret tip is brought to you by an inventive teenager. When this teen's
mother went on a housekeeping strike for a month, the teen discovered you
can
extend the life of your underwear by two ...if you turn it wrong side out
and, yes, rerun it. CAUTION: This tip is recommended only for teens and
those
who don't care if they get in a car wreck.
Time: 3 seconds
SECRET TIP 10: IRONING
If an article of clothing doesn't require a full press and your hair does, a
curling iron is the answer. In between curling your hair, use the hot wand
to iron minor wrinkles out of your clothes. Yes, it really does work, or so
I'm told, by other disciples of the 30-Minutes-To-A-Clean-House philosophy.
Time: 5 minutes (including curling your hair)
SECRET TIP 11: VACUUMING
Stick to the middle of the room, which is the only place people look. Don't
bother vacuuming under furniture. It takes way too long and no one looks
there
anyway.
Time: 5 minutes, entire house; 2 minutes, living room only
SECRET TIP 12: LIGHTING
The key here is low, low, and lower. It's not only romantic, but bad
lighting can hide a multitude of dirt.
Time: 10 seconds
SECRET TIP 13: BED MAKING
Get an old-fashioned waterbed. No one can tell if those things are made up
or not, saving you, oh, hundreds of seconds over the course of a lifetime.
Time: 0
SECRET TIP 14: SHOWERS, TOILETS, AND SINKS
Forget one and two. Concentrate on three.
Time: 1 minute
SECRET TIP 15:
If you already knew at least 10 of these tips, don't even think about
inviting a Martha Stewart type to your home.
It's time to clean your house when.....
It's time to clean your house when.....
1. If you have just stepped on something and danced around in pain until you
slipped on a magazine, it's probably time to pick up again.
2. If you find your scissors by feeling around your dining room table until
you feel something hard of the correct shape, it's time to clear off a few
things.
3. If you need a gas mask to open your fridge, you might think about
throwing away some of those leftovers.
4. If you drop your comb in the bathroom and you pick it up with more hair
than is currently attached to your head, it's time to sweep.
5. If your feet stick walking across the kitchen floor, it's time to mop.
6. If it takes more than 20 minutes to find your kids when you wake them up
in the morning, it's time to have them clean their rooms.
7. If you haven't seen the floor of your car for a week because of the Happy
Meal litter on the floor and 'wash me' is written in the dust on the outside
of the car, it's time to take the hint.
Martha Stewart to Erma Bombeck:
Hi Erma,
This perfectly delightful note is being sent on paper I made myself to tell
you what I have been up to. Since it snowed last night, I got up early and
made
a sled with old barn wood and a glue gun. I handpainted it in gold leaf, got
out my loom, and made a blanket in peaches and mauves. Then to make the sled
complete, I made a white horse to pull it from DNA that I just had sitting
around in my craft room. By then, it was time to start making the place mats
and napkins for my 20 breakfast guests. I'm serving the old standard Stewart
twelve-course breakfast, but I'll let you in on a little secret: I didn't
have time to make the tables and chairs this morning, so I used the ones I
had on hand. Before I moved the table into the dining room, I decided to add
just a touch of the holidays. So I repainted the room in pinks and stenciled
gold stars on the ceiling. Then, while the homemade bread was rising, I took
antique candle molds and made the dishes (exactly the same shade of pink) to
use for breakfast. These were made from Hungarian clay, which you can get
in almost any Hungarian craft store.
Well, I must run. I need to finish the buttonholes on the dress I'm wearing
for breakfast. I'll get out the sled and drive this note to the post office
as soon as the glue dries on the envelope I'll be making. Hope my breakfast
guests don't stay too long--I have 40,000 cranberries to string with bay
leaves
before my speaking engagement at noon. It's a good thing.
Love, Martha Stewart
P.S. When I made the ribbon for this typewriter, I used 1/8-inch gold gauze.
I soaked the gauze in a mixture of white grapes and blackberries which I
grew,
picked, and crushed last week just for fun.
Response from Erma Bombeck:
Dear Martha,
I'm writing this on the back of an old shopping list, pay no attention to
the coffee and jelly stains. I'm 20 minutes late getting my daughter up for
school,
packing a lunch with one hand, on the phone with the dog pound, seems old
Ruff needs bailing out, again. Burnt my arm on the curling iron when I was
trying
to make those cute curly fries, how DO they do that?
Still can't find the scissors to cut out some snowflakes, tried using an old
disposable razor . . . trashed the tablecloth. Tried that cranberry thing,
frozen cranberries mushed up after I defrosted them in the microwave. Oh,
and don't use Fruity Pebbles as a substitute in that Rice Krispie snowball
recipe,
unless you happen to like a disgusting shade that resembles puke! The smoke
alarm is going off, talk to ya later.
Love, Erma
Erma Bombeck was a humor columnist for US (and perhaps other countries)
newspapers. She also had books out. She passed away last year I believe. Had
a lot
of 'realism' humor--being a mom, etc. (input by Jann. Thanks!)
You Know You're a Mom When:
1. Your feet stick to the kitchen floor. . .and you don't care.
2. When the kids are fighting, you threaten to lock them in a room together
and not let them out until someone's bleeding.
3. You can't find your cordless phone, so you ask a friend to call you, and
you run around the house madly following the sound -- until you locate the
phone
downstairs in the laundry basket.
4. You spend an entire week wearing sweats.
5. Your idea of a good day is making it through without a child leaking
bodily fluids on you.
6. Popsicles become a food staple.
7. Your favorite television show is a cartoon.
8. Peanut butter and jelly is eaten at least in one meal a day.
9. You're willing to kiss your child's boo-boo, regardless of what body part
it happens to be on.
10. Your baby's pacifier falls on the floor and you give it back after you
suck the dirt off because you're too busy to wash it off.
11. Your kids make jokes about burping, farting, pooping, etc., and you
think it's funny.
12. You're so desperate for adult conversation that you spill your guts to
the telemarketer who calls and HE hangs up on YOU!
13. Spit is your number one cleaning agent.
14. You're up each night until 10 PM vacuuming, dusting, wiping, washing,
drying, loading, unloading, shopping, cooking, driving, flushing, ironing,
sweeping,
picking up, changing sheets, changing diapers, bathing, helping with
homework, paying bills, budgeting, clipping coupons, folding clothes,
putting to bed,
dragging out of bed, brushing, chasing, buckling, feeding (them, not you),
PLUS swinging, playing baseball, bike riding, pushing trucks, cuddling
dolls,
rollerblading, basketball, football, catch, bubbles, sprinklers, slides,
nature walks, coloring, crafts, jumping rope, PLUS raking, trimming,
planting,
edging, mowing, gardening, painting, and walking the dog. You get up at 5:30
AM and you have no time to eat, sleep, drink or go to the bathroom, and
yet...you
still manage to gain 10 pounds.
15. In your bathroom there is toothpaste on the light fixtures, water all
over the floor, a dog drinking out of the toilet, and body hair forming a
union
to protest unsafe working conditions.
16. You buy cereal with marshmallows in it.
17. The closest you get to gourmet cooking is making rice krispie bars.
Are You Organizationally Challenged
1. Do you make panic runs to the garbage can for fear that someone has
thrown away something "important"?
2. Could you feed a family of four for more than two weeks from supplies
found inside your sofa?
3. Have you put off purchasing a refrigerator until you can find a
self-cleaning model?
4. Have you written to Dow to ask how you can get your Janitor in a Drum
out?
5. When you hear the phrase "cleanliness is next to." do you fill in the
blank with "impossible"?
6. Do you own more than 5 sets of keys you had made when the current set was
"missing in action"?
7. Is there something growing inside your refrigerator that puts your
houseplants to shame?
8. Have you ever put off a diet because you lost the book?
9. Do you put off redecorating the den because you haven't seen the floor in
so long that you've forgotten what color the carpeting is?
10. Do you know laundry can reproduce in a hamper?
11. Do you have at least three bags of "stuff to sort later" stashed
somewhere in the house?
12. Have you ever lost something in your bedroom, like the bed?
13. When visitors suggest that they'll throw their coats on the bed, do you
offer to set up a cot in the hall?
14. Does your storage system consist of 30 boxes marked "miscellaneous"?
15. Have you ever gone to put up the holiday decorations, only to discover
that you hadn't taken them down from last year?
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