Semi-Back on Topic

I have calmed down a little since this morning. Well, actually, I redirected my rage toward alternating between yelling at the idiots I had to share the highway with and then breathing deeply to calm down.
I made it to the office in one piece, so I guess it worked.

Anyway.
I'm almost done the first of mom's mitts. I have a few rows to go on the thumb. It was hard working on the thumb last night—dark yarn/darkish room, not a good combination. I was sitting on the big couch and the lighting isn't as good.
However, the mitts are not good office knitting because of the lace pattern, so I left them at home. Just have my Mardi Gras (a.k.a Battlestar Galactica socks) with me, not that I've had a chance to touch them.
But soon I will be starting the writing process and might need to bust them out to help me focus.

More House Keeping
Because I know you were just riveted by my efforts to fight the good fight against puppy fluff over the weekend, I thought I'd let you know what I accomplished on Sunday.
At the very least you can live vicariously through my cleaning efforts. Although I should point out I've tried that and it doesn't help the state of my own house much.
On Sunday I folded and put away all the clean laundry from last weekend, cleaned the kitchen again (why can't the kitchen ever stay clean?), and cleaned the bathrooms.
Well, I just did his toilet and sink, which is half the battle really. He can do his own shower. And he has in the past. Shoot, he actually did MY shower once because he wanted to take a bath and it was getting grungy.
If you're wondering at this sudden fever which gripped me enough to distract me from knitting—hubby was out of town chaperoning a ski trip. :-( So I literally had nothing better to do than clean house because my playmate was missing. sigh. (His absence is also why I was sitting on the big couch.)
When I told him about my activities on Saturday he said, "Boy, I should go out of town more often."

Timing Is Everything
The worst part about all this house keeping is, it didn't take as long as you might expect. It all took all day because I spread it out and took plenty of knitting breaks.
Have you ever timed your chores? I have. I made an attempt to follow the FlyLady system last year. It's pretty interesting, you should check her website out. In a nut shell, her whole idea is to do quick maintenance cleanings inbetween your big cleanings so things don't get out of control. If you do a quick little thing for five minutes you make progress but don't get overwhelmed.
It's a good idea, and it actually works. Sadly, I've got one of those personalities that once the house starts looking kind of nice I figure I can take a break and quickly degenrate to square one.
So the point is, because of this, I know it takes a hour to vacuum the whole house. And I know it takes half an hour to sweep and mop entrance foyer/kitchen. And folding all that laundry only took around 15 minutes.
But cleaning the kitchen is a never ending task.
Of course knowing all this puts me in the bad position of feeling doubly bad if I don't mop more often because it's only going to take 30 minutes. (But it's a hard 30 minutes.)
On the other hand, if you wait a really long time between vacuumings, and you have two big fluffy dogs, there is a dramatic difference when you DO vacuum, which makes you feel better about making the effort.
Oh, and with all the cleaning yesterday I also make chocolate chip banana bread, did the grocery shopping (which took, no lie, three hours with travel), and make some potato leek soup.
Yeah, I slept pretty well last night.
Happily, Hubby will be home tonight! Yipee! I think I'll dust when I get home from work. That will top off my efforts nicely. Maybe I'll try to maintain it as well.
hahaha! Don't hold me to that.