31 Days to Clean Giveaway

HEY! Don't forget about the great giveaway of the 31 Days to Clean E-book.  For instructions and links, check my 31 Days tab at the top of the blog.  The giveaway will end THIS FRIDAY!!!!

31 Days to Clean: The $3 solution

First off, you should know what the problem was. It boils down to this: storage space. This house has SO much more closet space than our old house. (It has actual closets). It is fantastic to have a good place to put things away. The problem is that there are no shelves in most of the closets, so they end up collecting junk (toys, clothes, coats, instruments, etc) and things disappear into the abyss that we know fondly as “the closet”.

Problem #2 – We have 2 dressers for 4.5 people. SO – we've got this nice set of built in shelves in the boy's room – I was stacking clothes on the shelves for a long time, trying to keep them organized, and trying to keep the boys out of them. It did not work well – they are toddlers – they like to remove clothes and toys from shelves.

Some friends gave us 2 beautiful tall shelves that they had been using for homeschool storage. We (I) chose to make poor Mr. Crum help me drag one upstairs so I could use it for Cracker's clothes. (I put Monkey's clothes in the small 3 drawer dresser that my mom had given us when he was tiny). It worked fantastically for holding clothes – BUT – I have kids... they like to pull things off of shelves, AND they discovered that this shelf was particularly fun to climb or hide in.

Back to square 1. We have been hunting for a dresser for a while. In fact, we had gotten 1 from Mr. Crum's wonderful sister, but it did not work to take it up the stairs to their room and it did not fit in our room. We have searched Craigslist for months (when we thought about it) to no avail. This weekend we went driving and hunting for garage sales. I took some cash with us, because I fully intended to find a dresser that would work.

We did not find a dresser.

THE SOLUTION: At a particularly high priced garage sale we found a stack of plastic shelving. You know, the kind that people use to store things in their basement or garage to get it out of sight? This variety stack of shelves had a label that told us it was not so high priced as some of the other items. In fact, this whole stack of shelves was only $3. We bought it.

We took the shelves home and cleaned them very thoroughly. I put them together as they got clean. For $3 we had bought 2 sets of shelves that are each about 6 feet tall, with 5 shelves on each one. The narrower shelves fit perfectly in the side of the now emptied closet in the boy's room. Guess what – their clothes fit on the shelves! I could not use all 5 shelves though, so I stood 1 on the floor for holding shoes – and their box of stuffed animals fits perfectly underneath!

Hooray!

31 Days to Clean: The Crackers Factor

Yep, this is a good part of my problem with keeping my kitchen clean...

31 Days to Clean - My pantry

Okay, so I felt overwhelmed the other day when I needed to clean my pantry.  You see, our "pantry" is in the basement and it's a variety of shelves we've thrown together... and also, has plenty of other "important things" in boxes that we dig through when we need to find them.  Mess... MESS!  Take a look at before and after.  Note: After is still not perfect, but it's a lot easier to use now, and I know what's in there again!

31 Days to Clean: Day 6

I have NOT completed Day 7 yet - I took a break for my day of rest, and did some other cleaning today while waiting for our "special visitor".  Poppy came to town to help us build a "cage" for the boy's stairs.  The top of the staircase to their room was a shelf with an open top - Monkey is, well, a monkey and worried me because he had already started experimenting with climbing over.

BUT I'm writing about Day 6 -

For Day 6 I needed to make a list and clean out my cabinets.  The list is a fantastic tool for organizing my day.  I am starting it tonight as I look toward tomorrow's necessary tasks.

The 6 things that need to get done tomorrow:

1) Laundry - washing/drying clothes and boy's bedding

2) Laundry - sorting/organizing everyone's clothes (Mr. Crum will have to do his own)

3) Menu for the week & grocery list

4) Make dinner

5) Call Monkey's doctor about ENT referral

6) Call about insurance paperwork

31 Days to Clean: Days 3-5

It's been a busy week, a lot of extra errands to get done.  I had a hard time keeping up on challenges. Fortunately, yesterday I was able to catch up on days 3-5 (it was day 6 for me) AND conquer a mountain of laundry that needed to get folded in our basement!   The laundry has been on my to do list for some time now and I'm so glad to have it to-done!  I think that will help me immensely with my feelings of not being able to catch up/keep up!

How is everyone else doing with chores this week?

31 Days to Clean: Days 1&2 a slow start

There are so many reasons that I have committed to participating in this 31 day challenge. Here's an example: Today is Tuesday – I dread Tuesdays right now. This is the day that Monkey has therapy – twice! That means that 2 people are coming into our home to work with him on learning and growing in some necessary skills. I spend a good portion of Tuesday morning cleaning the house and end up leaving my boys to do whatever it is they want to do.

I don't like it that I feel like I have to clean before someone comes over. I don't like it that I feel like I have to make my boys entertain themselves all morning while I clean. I want to change these habits! The good news: Monkey turns 3 in just over a month and he will grow out of First Steps Therapies... that means we just have Cracker's Therapist coming every other week (whichever day she shows up).

Nonetheless, I don't want to live in fear of filth!

Why do I say I've had a slow start? Because the book starts out slowly. It gives me time to analyze my reasoning and really know what I want to accomplish. Day 1 doesn't even require any cleaning! I did clean though, because I've just got to get on top of this! I have not yet completed the Day 2 Martha Challenge, my first cleaning assignment – but I will get it done before bed tonight!

How has my home changed? See for yourself, look at this problem area (it took about half an hour to finish REALLY cleaning this):

The kitchen counter is a landing zone... this is not "normal" for this space, but it does tend to stay messy.

The kitchen counter now

What are your problem areas?

31 Days to clean: giveaway instructions

Did you read my earlier post about the great e-book 31 days to clean?  I'm working through the book right now and planning to share my journey with you (don't you feel special?).  I am also giving away a copy of the ebook to one of my readers.  There are a few simple ways to enter and they are as follows

HOW TO ENTER

Complete any or all of the following tasks.  Make sure to leave 1 comment for each completed activity (no need to leave a comment here if you've commented on other posts - I'll track that.  Leave your email address in each comment!

1) Check out the 31 Days to Clean Website, tell me something you learned (leave a comment below).

2) Like 31 Days to Clean, leave a comment below telling me you have done so.

3) Subscribe to the 31 Days to Clean Blog email newsletter - leave a comment telling me you've done this.

4) Leave a comment on ANY of my other posts about the 31 Days to Clean Challenge - you can leave a relevant comment on as many of those posts as you want, each comment is 1 entry into the giveaway.

5) Tell me why you need this book! (Comment below).

6) Subscribe to Crum's This N That via Google Friend Connect.

Mary (more on 31 Days to Clean)

Okay, so 31 Days to Clean has a subtitle. “Having a Martha House the Mary Way”. I know the Bible story of Mary and Martha, I've heard it many times and read it more than a few times as well. So what's the big deal?

Well – Mary was a devoted daughter in the Kingdom. She loved to sit with Jesus, listen, and learn. I imagine she asked a lot of questions too. This really frustrated her sister, Martha, who was a fantastic host and wanted everything to be just perfect for her guests. In the story of Mary and Martha in the book of Luke, this is exactly what is going on. Mary is soaking it all in. She's sitting on the floor, listening to Jesus and Martha gets upset. Jesus tells Martha that it's okay, Mary is making a good choice.

What does Mary sitting at Jesus' feet have to do with cleaning? Hmm... she wasn't helping her sister clean, she saw something more important than making the house spotless and went for it. Her house WAS clean though (Martha made sure of it). Mary was not being lazy or irresponsible, she was devoting her time and energy to a greater task. She knew that the dishes could be washed later and the laundry hanging on the line could get folded after she was done learning. She knew she was in the presence of someone amazing.

I was thinking about Mary last night and ways that I am like Mary. I like to find more important things to do than clean – but it's not because they are greater and I know I can get the little things done cleaner. I am not like Mary in this way – I don't like to clean because, well, frankly, I feel overwhelmed by the task at times so I avoid it!

I want to be like Mary though, I want to be able to know that the things I am reaching for are greater than a perfectly tidy house. I want to learn to sit at the feet of Jesus and soak it in. I want to spend my energy doing things that matter.

I can think of one Mary-like time in my recent memory, I know there are others, but this scene comes to mind:

My grandpa was sick, he was recovering from an illness in the hospital – this was near the end of his life. Having a large family has some benefits – when my grandparents were sick we were able to develop a plan so that they never had to be alone. My cousin Ashlee and I were visiting with grandpa while he was there. I loved talking with him – he was my hero (and still is). As we came into the room another cousin was leaving. We had Grandpa to ourselves. He was in a good mood and very chatty that day. Somehow we got him onto the subject of World War II – he had been a prisoner of war in Germany. Ashlee and I sat at the sides of the bed on the edges of our seats, soaking it in, asking questions, yearning for more. All of our energy was devoted to learning what life had been like for this amazing man.

My grandpa was not Jesus, probably not even close. He does however, represent Jesus in my life in a lot of ways. As I remember that afternoon in the hospital, I long to be captivated by the stories of Jesus the same way I was caught up by my grandpa's tale of war and love.

That is what it means to me to be Mary. I am hoping that as I embark on this 31 day journey, I can learn to be more like Mary and practice sitting at the feet of Jesus daily.