Hello, Tuesday

OK, so I finished the hat for my MIL on Sunday, washed it, blocked it and let it dry yesterday. This afternoon, I'll wrap it, and this evening I'll give it to her. Maybe even get some pictures if she brought her camera. If not, I'll get a couple of shots with my phone before I wrap it and post those. The hat turned out really nice, I think, and I'm proud of it.

And then I thought about my kitchen.

I was thinking about cleaning up this morning and I think I've come up with some reasonable expectations of what I'd really like to get done in terms of cleaning up and trying to get more organized.

First, my house will never be perfect. It will be reasonably messy, considering I have three kids and a full time job and I just don't have that kind of time. Things will not always find their way back where they belong, and I'll still find sippies under the cabinet from last week. However, I do not need to hang on to every scrap of paper and it does good to get rid of things I don't use - I joined Freecycle for a reason, dammit. I was also a bit taken aback by the number of things in one cabinet that were expired or rotten. Cleaning is good, obsessing about cleaning is bad.

Second, it will never last. I will mop the floor and ten seconds later, a sippy will explode chocolate milk all over the kitchen. Spahgetti night will always resemble a crime scene. Legos and matchbox cars have a way of traveling as yet undiscovered by modern physicists. God, grant me the soap to clean up what I can, the right tone of eggshell to paint over what I can't, and the wisdom to know when I'm beat and just get rid of it before we move out.

Accepting these two givens, I have two goals. I want to get my kitchen in order. I want things I actually use on the top shelves, not just things I don't know where else they should go. I want a little room to be able to let Andy play with his crafty stuff out of reach of his sisters. I want some space to stow my work bag and set up a laptop and do a little work in relative peace and still keep an eye on the kids.

Second goal - get the basement to a point where I don't have a panic attack thinking about the utility room. Maybe even be able to find a project or two without having to unpack five boxes. Stop tripping over (and feeling guilty about) projects I didn't finish or crafts I'm not as into anymore.