In the summer we changed the kids' beds for bigger ones, it was that time already, the lasts for years toddler beds had not really lasted all that long at all and they needed more space.
So I moved the stuff out of their rooms and we changed the beds. So far completely normal. What I didn't do was put all the stuff back again. I only put back their very favourite toys. I wanted to see what would happen. They haven't missed a thing. As long as there is lego, ponies and make believe food, they are happy.
I must confess that the toys are still sitting in my room. I still need to take the next step and send them all to charity or the tip.
Today this article popped up on my FB feed and it reminded me that I need to keep going with the great declutter. The big problem now is that I can do kitchen ware, clothes and cheap paperbacks easily, the big hurdle is going to be the crafting stash. It will probably take a few reminders from friends to make that one happen.
The really interesting thing is going to be whether the big clear out results in a happier and more together woman at the end of it all. Watch this space.
http://www.mother.ly/life/how-getting-rid-of-stuff-saved-my-motherhood
Thursday, 5 January 2017
Wednesday, 4 January 2017
Low price bath cleaning
Cleaning the bath is a job that I don't enjoy and that is putting it mildly. I am just a bit short too reach the other side comfortably and give it a good scrub,at least without getting soggy myself.
So what I do is....
Have a spare plastic body scrub flower in the bath, a different colour to any you may use for yourself.
Have a bottle of super cheap shampoo or washing up liquid.
While bath is still warm after use (or rinse well with warm water) , give it a goôd scrub with the shampoo and scrubby thing.
Rinse with cold water.
The secret here is that soap scum comes off much easier when warm or hot.
If you don't want to use shampoo or washing up liquid then bicarbonate of soda, worked into a thick paste on a washing up scrubby sponge works well too. Warning, bicarb can leave bathroom with powdery, gritty streaks. If that happens, wipe down with vinegar.
This does leave bathroom smelling a bit like fish and chops but has probably killed as many germs as expensive household cleaners only with non of the pollution, cost or skin rashes.
So what I do is....
Have a spare plastic body scrub flower in the bath, a different colour to any you may use for yourself.
Have a bottle of super cheap shampoo or washing up liquid.
While bath is still warm after use (or rinse well with warm water) , give it a goôd scrub with the shampoo and scrubby thing.
Rinse with cold water.
The secret here is that soap scum comes off much easier when warm or hot.
If you don't want to use shampoo or washing up liquid then bicarbonate of soda, worked into a thick paste on a washing up scrubby sponge works well too. Warning, bicarb can leave bathroom with powdery, gritty streaks. If that happens, wipe down with vinegar.
This does leave bathroom smelling a bit like fish and chops but has probably killed as many germs as expensive household cleaners only with non of the pollution, cost or skin rashes.
Monday, 2 January 2017
Why the cleaning tips?
It must be said that the art of household management is not popular, sexy or appreciated. Every day we are bombarded with media and cultural messages that tell us that time is too precious to waste on cleaning. Phrases like, "just a housewife," and "only a cleaner" combine with magazine images of perfect women giving us advice on how to raise children, have a career and fit in gruelling hours at the gym to present the idea that cleaning is beneath us. I have yet to see a "perfect man doing house, jobs, kids and image" style article despite the fact that many men do just that.
This has lead to two problems. Most importantly it has made it culturally acceptable to pay cleaners a pittance and secondly it has lead to stay at home adults being written out of the economic structure of the country. Housework doesn't count as a skill to be proud of because an adult that stays at home to look after relatives, do the cleaning, cook the meals isn't paying tax. They are not contributing to the economy by paying tax so they are fair game to be victimised as lazy scroungers.
Well personally I would like to see every cleaner and bin man on the City of Westminster go on strike. If the powers that be had to live with mucky toilets and smelly, over flowing waste they might start to value the people that clean up after them. If there was no pharmacist to run to with their cold symptoms they might start to value the power of a home made hot toddy. If the low paid kitchen staff all got flue they might start to realize how long it takes to make a fully balanced meal from scratch every day.
I am not advocating strike action but I am suggesting that we need to start thinking about our own home skills as important. We should value those skills because each and every skill we have means that we are able to do something for ourselves. The economic system wants and indeed relies on us buying ready prepared food, buying expensive and harmful cleaning chemicals that will make our lives easier, wants us to spend, spend, spend on the latest gadget to make our lives easier. In the process this creates job, pays tax to the government that we all benefit from.
It also makes us dependent on companies that move those precious jobs to other countries. It makes us need big multinationals that peddle harmful cleaning chemicals under one name and soothing hand creams under another.
Worse that all of this though, it gives the impression that some basic human skills are not important, not needed and the people that employ those skills for the good of others can be ignored, paid badly and generally undervalued or forgotten.
This post was not meant to sound so political but actually I think a lot of this needs to be said. If you find a job smelly or unpleasant then you should pay someone a lot of money to do it for you.
I don't like cleaning so I am prepared to spend time planning ways in which to make cleaning easier, quicker and cheaper. You make sure your phone and internet link are efficient. I think the same about keeping my house clean.
Please note, my house is not a sparkling clean palace,it looks like kids live there, with a crazy craft lady and a man with too many computer cables lying around.
There is dust, clutter and unwanted stuff, it is a work in progress. To keep your sanity you need to steer well clear of pictures of perfect houses and regard your home as a home and not a furniture advertisement.
This has lead to two problems. Most importantly it has made it culturally acceptable to pay cleaners a pittance and secondly it has lead to stay at home adults being written out of the economic structure of the country. Housework doesn't count as a skill to be proud of because an adult that stays at home to look after relatives, do the cleaning, cook the meals isn't paying tax. They are not contributing to the economy by paying tax so they are fair game to be victimised as lazy scroungers.
Well personally I would like to see every cleaner and bin man on the City of Westminster go on strike. If the powers that be had to live with mucky toilets and smelly, over flowing waste they might start to value the people that clean up after them. If there was no pharmacist to run to with their cold symptoms they might start to value the power of a home made hot toddy. If the low paid kitchen staff all got flue they might start to realize how long it takes to make a fully balanced meal from scratch every day.
I am not advocating strike action but I am suggesting that we need to start thinking about our own home skills as important. We should value those skills because each and every skill we have means that we are able to do something for ourselves. The economic system wants and indeed relies on us buying ready prepared food, buying expensive and harmful cleaning chemicals that will make our lives easier, wants us to spend, spend, spend on the latest gadget to make our lives easier. In the process this creates job, pays tax to the government that we all benefit from.
It also makes us dependent on companies that move those precious jobs to other countries. It makes us need big multinationals that peddle harmful cleaning chemicals under one name and soothing hand creams under another.
Worse that all of this though, it gives the impression that some basic human skills are not important, not needed and the people that employ those skills for the good of others can be ignored, paid badly and generally undervalued or forgotten.
This post was not meant to sound so political but actually I think a lot of this needs to be said. If you find a job smelly or unpleasant then you should pay someone a lot of money to do it for you.
I don't like cleaning so I am prepared to spend time planning ways in which to make cleaning easier, quicker and cheaper. You make sure your phone and internet link are efficient. I think the same about keeping my house clean.
Please note, my house is not a sparkling clean palace,it looks like kids live there, with a crazy craft lady and a man with too many computer cables lying around.
There is dust, clutter and unwanted stuff, it is a work in progress. To keep your sanity you need to steer well clear of pictures of perfect houses and regard your home as a home and not a furniture advertisement.
How to debobble a jumper
For a while now I have been trying to not buy things I don't need, to make my things last and generally take a step back from the race to shop our planet to destruction.
This week I learnt something new and realised how easy it is to fall into the, "I need that trap."
I bought a battery operated jumper debobbling gizmo. I wanted to give my old jumpers a few more months at least and they were looking very tatty indeed. My little razor type machine worked OK. It did the job and very tidily collected the fuzz so you could use it to stuff toys. However after one jumper it was going slower and slower. Time for new batteries. That was when my brain kicked in and reminded me that there was another way of de-fuzzing a jumper.
Use a razor.
Lay the jumper flat on a hard surface and gently shave the jumper. That is all there is to it.
On the plus side it is much quicker than the little machine, doesn't need batteries and doesn't fill my cupboards with more stuff.
On the minus side you do get a lot of jumper fluff all over the table or floor. Have a vacuum cleaner or broom on standby. Also, you might want to give it a good shake outside.
I know it might sound odd to keep fluff for stuffing toys but I can guarantee to always find a toys with holes and stuffing missing in the kids' rooms somewhere.
This week I learnt something new and realised how easy it is to fall into the, "I need that trap."
I bought a battery operated jumper debobbling gizmo. I wanted to give my old jumpers a few more months at least and they were looking very tatty indeed. My little razor type machine worked OK. It did the job and very tidily collected the fuzz so you could use it to stuff toys. However after one jumper it was going slower and slower. Time for new batteries. That was when my brain kicked in and reminded me that there was another way of de-fuzzing a jumper.
Use a razor.
Lay the jumper flat on a hard surface and gently shave the jumper. That is all there is to it.
On the plus side it is much quicker than the little machine, doesn't need batteries and doesn't fill my cupboards with more stuff.
On the minus side you do get a lot of jumper fluff all over the table or floor. Have a vacuum cleaner or broom on standby. Also, you might want to give it a good shake outside.
I know it might sound odd to keep fluff for stuffing toys but I can guarantee to always find a toys with holes and stuffing missing in the kids' rooms somewhere.
Sunday, 10 July 2016
So one the possible, future prime ministers is claiming that she cares more because she is a mother.
Oh great, just what mothers need, someone like that putting their foot in it. It is already too easy for the world to completely discount all the skills you learn raising kids as having any relevance to the outside world and then an idiot comes along and pretends that I'm a mother arguments make them superior. Being a mother doesn't give you superior rights to caring but it does teach you a lot about many different subjects very quickly indeed.
The trouble is that, as with any other job, you need to outline and prove the relevant skills and experience. I expect that if you wrote a job description for the perfect people to run a country it would include such key issues as conflict resolution, managing your money, working out where it is going to come from and not running out, making sure everyone gets food and clothing when the need it, understanding in great detail what happens when people get bored and fed up, the importance of clean water and basic hygiene, what happens if too many people end up crammed into small spaces. Forward planning in the areas of housing, health, education and employment. THERE WAS A REASON THAT YOUR MOTHER HOPEFULLY TRIED TO TEACH YOU HOW TO SHARE NICELY AND NOT BE GREEDY.
Also carrying on when the world gets difficult because people are depending on you for their survival because simply resigning and saying sorry will only make things worse and it not an option.
I must say that as a mother I have yet to find a use for an in-depth knowledge of classics (and that is with two kids with a Greek background), how to run a good war and what makes a great general have also not been needed.
Do you need to be a mother to have all these skills? Of course not!
My point is that the skills of being a mother have long been ignored or derided (our economy is based on the work of Adam Smith who spent a long time looking at the production of a loaf of bread but forgot to mention that someone bought it, sliced it, cooked it and served it (can't remember where I read this but great illustration)) while we soul search about where our classically trained politicians have gone wrong. They have gone wrong because they haven't a clue how to run a household budget, probably haven't lived at home since they were 7, saw nothing about caring for other people beyond knowing if there was enough money to pay the school fees or hire a nanny. If they wandered around a dilapidated council estate they would find a lot of women who had more relevant experience on how to run a country than the whole of parliament put together.
Note, this is not an endorsement for any Tory politician, just fed up with the stay at home mum stereotyping that I see
Sunday, 26 June 2016
It the EU debate has taught us anything, it is anger. A nation voted out of anger and frustration, now there is anger at the result, at the lies, at the economic mess we are in and now I say, let's use this anger. We have long joked that it doesn't matter how you vote, the politician always gets elected. Let us use this anger and take a long, hard look at the system that has got us to this point.
The second thing we have learnt in the last week is that voting can change things, it can make massive changes. We should use our votes and our anger to actually make this country a better place and we can do it.
I have been getting cross about politics for quite a long time, my friends have put up with a lot of ranting of the "it is just not right," type. I even tried to raise a particular subject with my local councilors, their answer? "have you ever thought of standing for the local council?"
No, I have not thought about standing for election, or more accurately, I have looked at the option briefly and decided that it most definitely not for me. We have politicians to do that. The trouble is that trust in UK politicians is at an all time low. The system has been broken for years and we have all put up with it. Only now the country is heading for a crisis is it becoming clear how badly the system fails to deliver for a modern country.
We are proud of our history in the this country. Unfortunately, in the same way that we are discovering that Victorian water systems were ground breaking and revolutionary but not fit for purpose (ask Yorkshire Water about none pumping, gravity feed water engineering sometime) we should also be asking if being the proud owners of one of the world's oldest democracies is actually a good thing for us today.
The last few days has been a massive shock to the whole country. Even the people who won, the politicians that won and have to deal with their victory are walking around looking shocked and stunned. Mr Farage is dancing in the streets but he is not the one who has to push the buttons, sign the cheques and carry the can. He can waltz off into the sunset and sit smugly on the sidelines while the elected, Westminster MPs have to sort out the mess.
Those who lost are also having to have a re-think. Usually the loosing side sit around for four years quietly saying "I told you so" and "don't blame me, you are the one that voted for them" until another election comes around and we all have another go. This time there is no second go, no change of mind. We have voted and realised that our system is lacking in checks and balances.
Politics in this country has been characterised by an endless merry-go-round of small changes that alter nothing. Until the EU Referendum.
We wall woke up to the fact that our vote can and does change things and that vote is not a joke to be used lightly.
What is most startling is that while the country is reeling with shock, jubilation and despair in roughly equal measures all the elected politicians seem to be doing is carrying on with business as usual.
The man who put the country in such a dangerous position, the elected leader who is supposed to, well lead, has resigned. He is supposed to run the country but as the Pound falls on the stock markets, prices rise at the petrol pumps (to be followed the supermarkets and heating bills soon after I suspect) does he stand up and do something useful to calm the money markets? Does he bring out the emergency plan the government put together just in case? Does he do anything at all helpful? No, he walks away at the time when the country needs stability the most.
Mr Cameron, you should not be allowed to walk away. You made this mess, now have the courage to deal with the consequences! If you resign then you should pay back the salary that you have been earning for running the country and you should pay back in full because your job is to make this country a better place and you have failed. Suddenly we see that the whole country has been put on performance targets but MPs don't have to go through an annual review at work and justify their pay rise like everyone else. Yes, they might loose their jobs but that is what safe seats are for.
And the opposition, what are they doing? They are busy getting back to what the Labour Party do best at the moment, ignoring the people that traditionally vote for them in order to keep their own seats in Westminster. They immediately announce that they have no confidence in their leader and that they won't be able to get elected into Government with Jeremy Corbin in charge. Wake up and smell the coffee, your voters all voted for him to be leader. They only voted for you because you wear a red ribbon and you are a slightly better choice than the person with the blue ribbon.
No one is actually looking at the bigger problem here, that our democracy is not working for the country! Even the Conservatives must now realise that first past the post is not a good system of voting but I am talking about more than that.
I think the system of local MPs is not working either. At the moment, if a large factory closes and thousands of people in one area loose their jobs then under our system of government only one MP actually cares about it. Sure, others might make noises and if you are lucky and the right party is in power they may try and help but at the end of the day the local MP is the one that cares.
I was lucky enough to visit the Houses of Parliament for a brief visit years ago. The government were bringing in the CRB checking system and the charity sector realised that this was going to bankrupt them. The Guide Association hosted an event on the terrace at Westminster so we could lobby on behalf of the rest of the charity sector. Also in the news at the time was the IRA. They bombed two different English cities on the previous 2 Mondays and the whole country was worried who would be next. Everyone in the country cared, this was a big issue and any city could find itself targeted a few days later.
When we arrived the ushers apologised and told us that there would not be many people at our reception as there was an emergency vote on Northern Ireland happening that evening. We understood, this was important stuff, why would they come and talk about CRB checks when so many lives were at stake.
Anyway a small number did turn up and the GA staff quietly managed all the conversations. Over the evening I pretended to actually live in Durham (where I was living), Tyneside, the West Midlands and Worcestershire (where I came from), because an elected MP, it turns out, will only actually engage with someone who is able to vote for them. They will rapidly ask where you live and politely get rid of you very quickly if you are not their voter. So the event comes to an end and the ushers ask us if we would like to visit the House.
Of we go to see democracy in action. We were going to watch an important debate about our National Security. What we found was about 6 MPs in a nearly empty room. Shocked and stunned we ask the usher where they all are. It is a Northern Ireland debate he explains. Yes, the IRA are bombing us at the moment, where are our MPs we ask? Well, gone home early of course. This is a Northern Ireland debate. Only the MPs from Northern Ireland care about being here tonight.
That evening about 20 young women who were politically interested and motivated realised that there was no point in even trying. We had it all wrong. The elected MPs were only interested in their own area. They didn't care about the country as a whole. They didn't care who got bombed next Monday, as long as it wasn't them!
Can we blame them for going home early? No, because at the moment that is how our system works. Their job is to care just about the small area that voted for them. The Cabinet is concerned with the business end of things. As long as they get enough money going around the system to stop us going bankrupt then they are doing their job. They all sit in safe seats so they don't have to worry about keeping their voters happy. They can assume they will win their seats and the problems of an industrial wasteland that was our country and once provided all the money? Not their problem!
So lets use the current anger we all have! Vote for another referendum if you want but I say, lets call for a complete change, lets call for a change of how we run the country. Not just a change of colour but a whole change in how we vote for them, how they work and how we hold them responsible.
We voted for change, lets call for some real change. Yes, this is a big ask, yes, it would be expensive, yes we would have to learn a lot about political science and economy but isn't it about time that every kid in Britain learnt enough basic political and economic science to hold their politicians to account and not just those who go to Eton?
I want to put together a Change.Org petition. I want to stop feeling helpless, I want the whole country to stop feeling helpless. Now I need advice and to probably spend a lot of time learning about how other countries run themselves.
The second thing we have learnt in the last week is that voting can change things, it can make massive changes. We should use our votes and our anger to actually make this country a better place and we can do it.
I have been getting cross about politics for quite a long time, my friends have put up with a lot of ranting of the "it is just not right," type. I even tried to raise a particular subject with my local councilors, their answer? "have you ever thought of standing for the local council?"
No, I have not thought about standing for election, or more accurately, I have looked at the option briefly and decided that it most definitely not for me. We have politicians to do that. The trouble is that trust in UK politicians is at an all time low. The system has been broken for years and we have all put up with it. Only now the country is heading for a crisis is it becoming clear how badly the system fails to deliver for a modern country.
We are proud of our history in the this country. Unfortunately, in the same way that we are discovering that Victorian water systems were ground breaking and revolutionary but not fit for purpose (ask Yorkshire Water about none pumping, gravity feed water engineering sometime) we should also be asking if being the proud owners of one of the world's oldest democracies is actually a good thing for us today.
The last few days has been a massive shock to the whole country. Even the people who won, the politicians that won and have to deal with their victory are walking around looking shocked and stunned. Mr Farage is dancing in the streets but he is not the one who has to push the buttons, sign the cheques and carry the can. He can waltz off into the sunset and sit smugly on the sidelines while the elected, Westminster MPs have to sort out the mess.
Those who lost are also having to have a re-think. Usually the loosing side sit around for four years quietly saying "I told you so" and "don't blame me, you are the one that voted for them" until another election comes around and we all have another go. This time there is no second go, no change of mind. We have voted and realised that our system is lacking in checks and balances.
Politics in this country has been characterised by an endless merry-go-round of small changes that alter nothing. Until the EU Referendum.
We wall woke up to the fact that our vote can and does change things and that vote is not a joke to be used lightly.
What is most startling is that while the country is reeling with shock, jubilation and despair in roughly equal measures all the elected politicians seem to be doing is carrying on with business as usual.
The man who put the country in such a dangerous position, the elected leader who is supposed to, well lead, has resigned. He is supposed to run the country but as the Pound falls on the stock markets, prices rise at the petrol pumps (to be followed the supermarkets and heating bills soon after I suspect) does he stand up and do something useful to calm the money markets? Does he bring out the emergency plan the government put together just in case? Does he do anything at all helpful? No, he walks away at the time when the country needs stability the most.
Mr Cameron, you should not be allowed to walk away. You made this mess, now have the courage to deal with the consequences! If you resign then you should pay back the salary that you have been earning for running the country and you should pay back in full because your job is to make this country a better place and you have failed. Suddenly we see that the whole country has been put on performance targets but MPs don't have to go through an annual review at work and justify their pay rise like everyone else. Yes, they might loose their jobs but that is what safe seats are for.
And the opposition, what are they doing? They are busy getting back to what the Labour Party do best at the moment, ignoring the people that traditionally vote for them in order to keep their own seats in Westminster. They immediately announce that they have no confidence in their leader and that they won't be able to get elected into Government with Jeremy Corbin in charge. Wake up and smell the coffee, your voters all voted for him to be leader. They only voted for you because you wear a red ribbon and you are a slightly better choice than the person with the blue ribbon.
No one is actually looking at the bigger problem here, that our democracy is not working for the country! Even the Conservatives must now realise that first past the post is not a good system of voting but I am talking about more than that.
I think the system of local MPs is not working either. At the moment, if a large factory closes and thousands of people in one area loose their jobs then under our system of government only one MP actually cares about it. Sure, others might make noises and if you are lucky and the right party is in power they may try and help but at the end of the day the local MP is the one that cares.
I was lucky enough to visit the Houses of Parliament for a brief visit years ago. The government were bringing in the CRB checking system and the charity sector realised that this was going to bankrupt them. The Guide Association hosted an event on the terrace at Westminster so we could lobby on behalf of the rest of the charity sector. Also in the news at the time was the IRA. They bombed two different English cities on the previous 2 Mondays and the whole country was worried who would be next. Everyone in the country cared, this was a big issue and any city could find itself targeted a few days later.
When we arrived the ushers apologised and told us that there would not be many people at our reception as there was an emergency vote on Northern Ireland happening that evening. We understood, this was important stuff, why would they come and talk about CRB checks when so many lives were at stake.
Anyway a small number did turn up and the GA staff quietly managed all the conversations. Over the evening I pretended to actually live in Durham (where I was living), Tyneside, the West Midlands and Worcestershire (where I came from), because an elected MP, it turns out, will only actually engage with someone who is able to vote for them. They will rapidly ask where you live and politely get rid of you very quickly if you are not their voter. So the event comes to an end and the ushers ask us if we would like to visit the House.
Of we go to see democracy in action. We were going to watch an important debate about our National Security. What we found was about 6 MPs in a nearly empty room. Shocked and stunned we ask the usher where they all are. It is a Northern Ireland debate he explains. Yes, the IRA are bombing us at the moment, where are our MPs we ask? Well, gone home early of course. This is a Northern Ireland debate. Only the MPs from Northern Ireland care about being here tonight.
That evening about 20 young women who were politically interested and motivated realised that there was no point in even trying. We had it all wrong. The elected MPs were only interested in their own area. They didn't care about the country as a whole. They didn't care who got bombed next Monday, as long as it wasn't them!
Can we blame them for going home early? No, because at the moment that is how our system works. Their job is to care just about the small area that voted for them. The Cabinet is concerned with the business end of things. As long as they get enough money going around the system to stop us going bankrupt then they are doing their job. They all sit in safe seats so they don't have to worry about keeping their voters happy. They can assume they will win their seats and the problems of an industrial wasteland that was our country and once provided all the money? Not their problem!
So lets use the current anger we all have! Vote for another referendum if you want but I say, lets call for a complete change, lets call for a change of how we run the country. Not just a change of colour but a whole change in how we vote for them, how they work and how we hold them responsible.
We voted for change, lets call for some real change. Yes, this is a big ask, yes, it would be expensive, yes we would have to learn a lot about political science and economy but isn't it about time that every kid in Britain learnt enough basic political and economic science to hold their politicians to account and not just those who go to Eton?
I want to put together a Change.Org petition. I want to stop feeling helpless, I want the whole country to stop feeling helpless. Now I need advice and to probably spend a lot of time learning about how other countries run themselves.
Sunday, 8 November 2015
What's in a name?
Just a little thought for the day
So far I have put up just a couple of posts about natual cleaning products but I am well aware that I am walking over a lexicographical minefield.
First of all, natural. What exactly does that mean? While defining it might be fun I do know that it should not be used to mean that a products is automatically safe to use, non-toxic or in other ways benign. Borax is a great cleaning agent, derived from natural mineral deposits but you would not want your kids or pets messing around with it.
Next - chemicals. this ia whole nest of controversy waiting to happen. I know that everything is a chemical. It matters not whether a product was dug up from the ground, given a quick dust off and popper straight into a box of whether it was brewed up in a complex, industrial process, they are all chemicals.
The difficulty comes on how to differentiate correctly between the unpleasant, potentially harmful, industrially derived sort of chemicals and the ones that are in teh air around us, or in fact, are the air around us.
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