Cleaning Fairy, Where are you???

     So, I found that book again.  The one that I keep misplacing and then finding again.  It is called "Organizing Your Home & Family" by Sandra Felton.  I agree that this is mildly ironic and a bit amusing...if you are somebody else.  If you are me...the one who is sitting at the dining room table and sees a sea of clutter between me and the front door...this is not amusing.  It is actually depressing, frustrating, and enough to make a person completely overwhelmed to the point where they just decide there is no point to even dream of a clean house.
     Here is the SHAME ON ME section of this entry:  I have blamed the mess on the kids, the ones whom I have not properly trained to clean up after themselves.  I have blamed it on not having enough time, that is even funny to me as I sit here and type this.  I have blamed my lack of organization and the inability to form a cleaning routine on my own upbringing...I am college educated for crying out loud, I bet I could write a book on methods of cleaning. ( I do have that published article on WWW.MOPS.ORG search Kimberly McCool if it is still there)Surely I'm smart enough to figure out how to do it.  I have also blamed my messy house on my lack of energy...there actually is much truth to that. 
     I have analyzed this situation of mine much too much. (thus wasting more time, and inadvertently dwelling on the negative)  If it is possible to develop Attention Deficit Disorder as an adult...I have...and I owe my husband a great deal of apologies for poking fun of his disorder, always asking him if he has taken his medicine when his constant motion and inability to stay in the room while talking gets on my nerves.  At least his ADD comes in handy for him at work.  He works on commission, so the more work he completes, the more he gets paid.  What an eye opener when he does 100+ hours worth of paint jobs in a 40 hour work week.  He does not waste time. He has several cars in the process of "prep, paint, polish" all day long, all week long.  At the end of the day, when he says he is tired, I believe him!
     On the other hand, at the end of my day...the house is a wreck, dinner may or may not be started, the kids are usually in the midst of playing, napping, or making a mess...and I'm standing around saying "I'm tired".  WTH  So I think, what have I accomplished today, hmmm...at least one load of laundry, its clean and folded, but not put away, I'll do that after I reorganize the winter/summer bins which are lining the upstairs hall... preventing me from vacuuming, the toys about prevent me from vacuuming the downstairs, the stuff all over everywhere prevents me from dusting, sweeping, mopping, etc.  Ah, there's the culprit...STUFF, ha! As much as I would like to blame it on that, it is still me...I bought the stuff!  We just recently had a yard sale to get rid of some stuff, and after that my house still looked like, as I told my MIL..."a yard sale vomited inside my house".
     This was really just an opportunity to vent, and I know that things will change when I don't have children to nurse or potty train or educate, and in the meantime I have a wonderful friend who comes to help me non-judgmentally...thanks Deanna...and a host of wonderful friends who understand...you know who you are...and anyone who is disappointed, or doesn't like a messy house...Thank you in advance for NOT coming over.

PS. Even if you don't care about a messy house, if I don't know you're coming over, don't be surprised if nobody answers the door. ;-)

Diaper Quest Part 2

So, I thought I should update my status on the whole cloth diaper bandwagon that I was on...to review, I made several cloth diapers in a few different styles hoping to succeed at one method or another.   If I had to grade myself on being green, I would have to give myself a C.  While I did save at least 2-6 disposable diapers a day from the landfill at first...I'm probably down to an average of using cloth only one day out of the week.
Before Libby was born,  I chose to make several "All In One" type diapers, 6 to be exact, and I bought 3(minus the one I lost due to it being placed on a teddy bear and thrown in a toy box), so I was working with 8 of those.  I made 12 prefold diapers, returned the Gerber plastic covers, bought 2 cute waterproof covers on "Etsy" www.etsy.com , and made 2 waterproof covers...they don't count because I made them too small. And I bought some "Snappis"on Ebay.  Lastly...I had a stash of disposables for night time, and the occasional outing.
THIS IS HOW THE COOKIE CRUMBLED, SO TO SPEAK:
First of all, I used disposables given to me at the hospital and brought the rest home, so I thought I should use them(this was the first concession I made).  After that,  I immediately went through half my supply of cloth diapers in rapid succession before I decided to start alternating between cloth and disposable (this was the second concession).  When baby was all of 2 months old...she had completely outgrown the waist size of all of my diapers and covers...so for a week, I considered myself a failure and relied completely on disposables.  After I bought diapers for both of the little ones on the same day, and stewing about the idea of spending nearly twenty dollars on stuff you throw away, I had an epiphany! Make extender tabs for the cloth diapers and you can still use them, dummy! (on a side note, I do not like buying trash bags because you just throw THEM away...but I haven't had any epiphanies on that one, yet.)
THE VERDICT
 I keep forgetting to take the extenders off the All in ones before I throw them down the laundry chute, I keep misplacing the snappis to clasp the prefolds, and every now and then a cover goes MIA...when these things happen I default to the Pampers.  Libby is almost 5 months old now and I have not mastered any single diapering method.  As a matter of fact, I prefer disposables, but my conscience and my budget keep me in the game. :-)