KonMari, kitchen, and adoption

         I now have extra motivation to get stuff that doesn't bring me joy out of my house as quick as possible. Yesterday, Aaron and I submitted our adoption application. We want to adopt a child from Bulgaria! I'm so excited about what this journey is going to bring for us. After we submitted the application, we were given a list of pictures we need to submit of our house. OH NO! Ok, our house isn't that bad, but, with moving quickly through the KonMari method, it should make it even better.

        The room I'm concerned with most is the kitchen. I'm currently in the process of repainting our kitchen. With three littles under foot and Brenda finishing up kindergarten, I've had to work on it a little bit at a time, so it's taken longer than I wanted. Let me describe my kitchen for you, because it actually is so bad right now that I don't want to take a picture for this blog. First, it was mother's day weekend, so I didn't do any cooking or dishes this weekend which means that no dishes got done. Yeah, I'm going to get on that today. Second, all the cabinets and drawers are out in the middle of the floor ready to be painted. Fun fun. I think it's going to look great. I just need to finish it. Along with continuing with going through books, that's exactly what I'm going to do.

        As far as my book progress, Aaron loaded up three boxes to donate this morning. I'm also working on organizing them better. I hit a slight pause while cleaning off my daughter's book shelf. It needs a new paint job, so before I put her books away, that has to be done. So much to do!

KonMari Day 9

I gathered about half of our books and put them in the classroom. This is what I could find from mine, and the kids rooms:

Our books not including Aaron's and most of our school books. Yikes!

After clothes comes books in the KonMari Method. This step is going to be harder for me than clothes. I have always loved books even books that I have never read, but want to. The hardest part is that we homeschool. We use books every day! Lots of books! There are also lots of books that I want my kids to read eventually, so now I have to decide what I actually will read, what my kids will read, and what is just taking up space. 

KonMari Day 8

Lorelai "helping" sort clothes.

            I think I'm calling it on clothes. I feel like I've gone through everything. We had 3 days without water last week, so my laundry got backed up which paused the process. I just can't seem to get it all put away! If my family would stop wearing clothes for a day of so that would be great. I don't want to feel unmotivated to continue, so I'm going to do one load a day in my efforts to continue to catch up and I'm going to move on to books. I know she wants everything put away before moving on, but, once again, I would have to say that she doesn't have kids. I'm not sure if this would even be possible in my house. I would be stuck on the never ending laundry step and the rest of my house would stay the same. That is why I am making the decision to move on.

Total clothes gone after the KonMari method:

8 garbage bags donated

1 garbage bag trashed

1 garbage bag ready to sell

That's 10 garbage bags of clothes gone. What!?!? That's crazy and it is after I already went through our clothes at the beginning of the year! Books here we go!

Konmari Day 1

       The Konmari method starts with clothes. She wants you to gather all the clothes in the house and put them in a pile to go through one at a time. You should only keep the clothes that bring you joy. Then you thank the other clothes before getting rid of them. This lady obviously doesn't have kids. 

      Even though I wanted to follow her instructions to a T, I had to break this up. Otherwise, my kids would have drug all the clean clothes all over the house making them dirty. That wasn't going to happen. I still had issues with one small one at a time. Lorelai thought it was hilarious to climb through the pile, mix up my organization, and unfold all clothes that didn't make it back in the drawers fast enough. Regardless, I pushed on. By the end of the day, I made it through half of our clothes excluding Aaron's. He has to go through his own stuff.

       

       This is my day one results:

All these things will be leaving out house shortly. Yay!

Starting the KonMari Method

           I have tried every decluttering method I could find. I feel like I should be able to manage my house by now. After all, I have spent days, months, and years decluttering and cleaning. I have tried getting rid of two things every time one item came into the house. I've tried getting rid of 40 bags in 40 days. I've tried getting rid of 2015 things in 2015. I completed this one and my house still has too much. I've tried getting rid of things corresponding to the day of the month challenge, one thing for the first day, two things for the second day. I've tried by room. I've tried setting a timer. I've tried one drawer or area a day. I've tried books where they give you a specific thing to clean, organize, and declutter every day. I've taken courses. I'm even a fly-baby flunk out. (She lost me at "you must wear shoes in the house." Yeah, I don't think so!) All these methods helped, but none of them worked completely for me. Many made me feel like a failure at house keeping which is a big deal since I consider that part of my job. 

            Why can so many stay-at-home moms handle their homes and I can't? Well, I can't yet. I will figure out this secret! Yesterday, I jumped on the KonMari bandwagon and finally purchased a copy of "The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up: The Japanese Art of Decluttering and Organizing". I ordered the kindle version because I didn't want a book on decluttering cluttering my house. That's just wrong. I finished reading it and even though I think the author is a little crazy, I plan to utilize this book to the T starting with saying "Thank you, all previous decluttering/ cleaning methods for getting me started. You have served your purpose in my life." 

8 DAYS! And sunny side up.

8 days until Lorelai is due! I am really excited to meet our newest family member. I say a lot that the baby stage is my least favorite, but that doesn't mean that I don't instantly fall in love with my babies. I remember looking at Dominick and thinking "wow, he's awesome." The great part is it just keeps getting better for me from there. Yes, dominick has his challenges (he's screaming at me right now to get on my lap which he no longer fits on), but I love him even more than I did on the first day I officially met him. I know Lorelai will not be any different. I love her so much already and I just can't wait to see the woman she will become. That being said, right now she is being a little bugger, is face up and will not move for me. At least not yet. I have been doing exercises to get her to turn all week and I guess I will have to continue until she's born. Brenda is also super excited. She's counting down the days as well. If all goes as planned, she'll hold my hand when Lorelai is born and she wants to cut the cord. I hope I get some great pictures of this. It should be an awesome bonding moment between sisters, that is as long as there are no complications.

They are so excited about the new baby! Ok, Dominick was excited about getting his picture taken and Brenda was excited about Kitty Aaryn letting her pet him, but on the inside, they are excited about their baby sister. :)

Fear of the Unknown

       I really wanted to post more than once a month, but since the news of Aaron's deployment, our lives have been crazy. He's been gone for over a week now and I miss him terribly. The kids miss him, too. I caught Dominick getting on Skype today to try and call Daddy. Every time the phone rings or my computer makes a noise, he yells with excitement "Daddy! Yay! Daddy!"
       To make the stress and sadness of the situation worse, both kids have not been acting normal for the past month. I'm sure it's because of Aaron being gone. That's a lot of change for littles. Brenda will lose it over the smallest things. I don't even know how to respond to it sometimes. Dominick is just difficult. He started hitting, throwing toys and screaming at me. Time outs are a common event for him. He doesn't want to go to anyone else if I am in the room. He clings to me at church or when we go anywhere, that is unless I want him close to me, then he bolts at the first possible opportunity. Let me tell you, he's FAST! Much faster than a 36 week pregnant woman. I wish there was something I could do for them to make this easier.
         This all makes a time that should be a joyous occasion, the birth of our third child, terrifying. I'm so scared of how Dominick is going to react when he can't be the center of my attention anymore. He's the one I'm worried about and to top it off, I have to do it alone. It's not fair to Lorelai. She deserves the bonding time that I may not be able to give her. She deserves to be able to eat without her brother screaming in her ear for my attention. She deserves the cuddles and kisses from her Daddy. It's not fair.
         I am so thankful that I will have one of my best friends here and my sister here for her birth (if she comes on time), but a few days after she is expected to be born, I will be alone with my three blessings and I'm terrified. I know that in a few months, I will be used to my new normal and it will all be ok. It's the unknown of how I'm going to handle everything that I'm terrified of. I pray more than anything that Lorelai will be an easy baby and that she is the only one in there, because, God, that would not be funny!