Tandaina,

You wouldn't want to post on an open forum on the FlyLady site. She'd just accuse you of whining. That said, I like the ideas she presents, but her exact system doesn't work for me either. So I felt very empowered when I gave myself permission to take what I could use and leave the rest. For one thing, you can declutter your computer by filtering all FlyLady messages into one mailbox/folder, or stop getting them altogether.

It sounds like you already have a morning routine. With your early schedule, I think you can excuse yourself from any cleaning then. Set up an evening routine that works for you - pick out clothes, monitor hot spots, do a five minute room rescue on the living room (or room you use most).

For me, the thing that overwhelmed me about FlyLady was all the non-cleaning things she added to the routine: exercise, date night, bubble bath, pamper mission, etc. So I ignore that part (not whining, just ignoring). My house doesn't match her zones, so I set up my own zones. I can't do all she recommends in the home blessing hour, so I decided what was important to me and do that, mostly every week.

Hang in there. Just do a 1 Fling Boogie, if that's all you have time for!

Susan

Hello Tandaina. I wouldn't beat yourself up for not keeping up with all the messages -- they definitely can be overwhelming. I work evenings and used to get the messages at work -- I'd arrive, log on and be instantly overwhelmed by the sheer volume of emails that had built up through the day. They proved especially daunting once our family got caught up in constructing an addition to our home. So I unsubscribed -- though I'm reserving the right to sign back up when things are less hectic. I have other friends who never subscribed at all -- but just check the Web site for tips. I think, as Susan suggests, that you can adapt many of flylady's suggestions --- and she does, after all, suggest coming up with routines that work for you. good luck!!

lol, I suppose I will also just ignore the emails. I'd like to get them because I like the idea of daily missions, and if I DON'T get some sort of reminder to do something I tend to not to anything. :P

Guess I'll just use them as a reminder and pick through for one assignment a day or some such thing.

(I wonder if I'm the only one who instantly deletes all the "testimonials"?)

Sounds like the Flylady morning routine is what you are already doing especially if you are cleaning your sink the night before. I think Flylady would suggest you make the bed but heck, we all will understand if you decide you don't have the time.

Have you tried requesting the emails in "digest format"? Most yahoo groups allow this. That means all the messages in one day are collected together and sent out as one message.

That said, I just sort my inbox alphabetically by the sender and delete all the messages I don't want from flylady. Kind of feels cleansing and usually doesn't take too much time. Of course I'm recently retired so I know there is no comparison in stress levels with someone who works outside the home.

I have just started Flylady and am going very slowly. She herself says that it all started with a commitment on her part to keep her sink clean so it was clean when she woke up at least for 30 days. I've kind of started that way and progressed to some additions. But I'm taking it very slowly.

I LOVE the testimonials she sends out. I delete almost everything else but always read testimonials. I don't have children but even the ones about kids are inspiring. Housework can be so BORING. I had a career as an engineer before I retired and I'm having trouble coming down to real life and trying to have consistently an organized fairly clean house (that is in the middle of being remodeled because we were conned by a contractor but another story..).

The testimonials and sometimes some of the messages (depending on where I'm at) really keep me from feeling I'm in a dungeon with horrible boring tasks and no one that understands.

Anyway, I figure at the rate I'm going that my house may look pretty decent in about a year or so. Just do what she says, don't worry about being behind, just jump in where you're at.

Maybe we could have a thread on this Cleaning Board for flylady support? I'd like that. You made a good start. Once it reaches 99 posts (I think that's max number), we can start "volume 2" like they do on some of the other forums. Of course with your work schedule, you may not have time. If you don't want to, I don't mind starting a thread.

Let me know if you are interested and also share any of the other "challenges" that you have in particular that are driving you crazy.

One last important thing. If we do this, we have to be concerned about Flylady copyrights and we can't cut and paste anything from her site (or from her emails). Hopefully, just share our problems with our clutter. I think we should still be able to use some of her terms such as 27 Fling boogie where you run thru the house as quickly as possible finding 27 things to throw away. I have modified it to be used with a timer and usually set it for 15 minutes or 30 minutes. Does wonderful things. I usually have to force myself to quit decluttering when the timer goes off.

Maybe a Flylady thread would make more sense in the "Organizing Home" forum? What do you think?

--Alice

I really wasn't sure. For me its more of a cleaning issue than organizing. I'm still "starting out" and just don't have that much stuff, sure a few things I need to sort through but I have only been living on my own (not counting college) for 5 years. :P

I signed up for the cleaning schedule since I have a horrid time motivating myself to clean when I get home from work, its the LAST thing I want to do.

I made a control journal last week and as my first new thing sat down with my room mate and made a menu for this week and went grocery shopping. I nearly died of SHOCK. Normally I can eat for $200 a month easilly. We spent $100 just getting the stuff for next week's menu.

We'll see how long this menu planning thing lasts, I may go back to my OLD cooking habits, maybe a bit boring but at least affordable!

Hi Ladies, I'm also using the Flylady system. I signed up for it about 2 1/2 years ago and only lasted a month. I was just too overwhelmed. This time I've been going for several months and it is finally sinking in. I can totally see how it would be so much more difficult for a working person. I am a SAHM with both kids in school, so I do have the time to get it all done--the ENERGY and organizing my time is my problem.

Just try to take it very slow. Maybe even just one new habit at a time. If you can just keep your sink clean for the first month, you will be ahead of the game. The next month you could add making your bed into your morning routine. If you time yourself, I bet you will find that it takes less than 2 minutes. Before Flylady I NEVER made my bed, unless company was coming over. Now I can honestly not imaging not making it. Just think, if you can squeeze in that two minutes in the morning, you will come home to a bedroom that looks 100 times better with the bed made. That might motivate you to pick up a few things maybe as you are changing out of your work clothes... it kind of "snowballs". Just don't try to do it all at once.

Good luck!
Jamie

Tandaina -

I'm impressed with your energy. For someone not too long out of school, you are on the right track. But don't burn out.

Regarding the menu planning, I also have spent more money but it is mainly because I am stocking my cabinets. I didn't have baking powder, corn starch, seasonings (that weren't real old) such as thyme, basil, oregano, etc. Seasonings are really expensive, some are over $4.00 per bottle.

The good thing about my new cooking habits is that I have left overs which are turning out as money savers. Hopefully, even though you are single, you can make use of these.

Like Jamie has indicated, I think the Flylady system may be best for those who are so far behind that they are totally impressed if they can develop one new habit consistently that helps clean/organize their home. That is me. The sink cleaning has been quite amazing for me.

Another main point of her system is the decluttering as you probably are aware. I think I'm just starting to see that if you really really declutter and get rid of all non-essentials, then keeping things clean and neat will be a whole lot easier. (duh - some of us are a little slower than others, LOL). We're talking serious decluttering, not just picking up and throwing out a few things here and there. Something really has to justify room in my house or at least it will when I've graduated to where I want to be.

I now am managing to do some decluttering on most days and that is really giving me motivation to do more. Our house is total chaos so the little improvement from Flylady routines really becomes noticeable quickly.

It has taken 10 years for our house to get to this low point. I just gave up because I was too overwhelmed (for reasons better explained somewhere else). So it is not going to become perfect over night.

I have hope now that we will be moving out of the "third world" hopefully within a year or so.

You are lucky that you haven't had to live in such chaos before learning about Flylady routines.

Good luck, take it slowly and prioritize and don't be a perfectionist.

--Alice

An example of how I am customizing Flylady ideas. In one of her recent emails, she recommended that we clean our floors thoroughly. This sounded to me like she meant getting down on our hands and knees with a toothbrush (which I have done in an earlier life, much earlier). She tends to be a little vague on these kind of things recognizing, I think, that we should all develop our own system/routine for the task.

Anyway, I bought some masking tape and plan to go around the house one square at a time. I'm going to mark the floor up into many sections with the tape, (we have all hardwood or linoleum) probably at least 4 sections per room (and our rooms are small.) I'll probably only tape up one room at a time. Then I will attack one square/zone at a time and pull up the masking tape for that section when its clean. The tape is going to get weird before it gets pulled up, I know, but it won't be any more weird than the filth that's on my floor. It may take me 3 months but by golly, the floor is going to get cleaned like it hasn't been cleaned for years. Think I'll use my steamer.

Doing this in baby steps as she calls it or thinking about doing this in baby steps makes it so much less overwhelming to me. It keeps me from getting totally shut down and unproductive (like I have been known to be.)

--Alice

I thought I'd chime in too (I am also a FlyLady fan with a paying job).

It sounds like you are frustrated because you want to do it all and can't. That's perfectionism, which is what got many of us into a mess in the first place.

Nobody can do it all. You just want to build some routines and strategies to make your life more manageable.

As others have said before, just delete the unwanted E-mails and read the testimonials if you have time.

You are a "payroll SHE" (Sidetracked Home Executive with a paying job) so look for that phrase on the website for ideas specific to you. As you said, much of it is set up for homemakers.

Adapt and customize, as "alice's" and others have said.

I would guess your evening routine will be most important. You'll want to make some preparations so that you can just jump out of bed in the morning, get ready for work and go. Just make a short list for yourself.

I love the ideas for weekly menu planning, so I can shop once on the weekend for all the suppers and not waste money on fast food. Now I use the crockpot more often, so the main dish or one-dish meal is ready when I come home from work.

Setting the timer for 15 minutes and focusing on one messy area works for me. It is easier to start cleaning if I know I won't drive myself crazy and spend all day trying to get it perfect. When the bell rings, it will be better than it was, and that's good. I can give that area another 15 minutes later, when I have time. Eventually, it will look nice.

Baby steps!

I've never subscribed to the emails because reading through the reminders is just one more thing for me to do,but I have her site on my favorites and go there when I need inspiration to get off my behind.I clean houses all day for a living,so reading through her site is just another tool to me.Cleaning when I come home is often difficult.It is a physical job,and coming home to do more of it can be daunting,so I use as many motivational tools as I can.The organizing forum here has also helped me get moving.The best flylady technique to learn when you are starting out is the fifteen minute cleanup.Sometimes I even break it up into five minute segments at a time to make it bearable when I'm exhausted.I have divided my chores into those that are essential to make my household run(laundry,cooking and kitchen cleanup,animal care) and those that are nice to have done,but won't make or break the house.As long as I am getting my priority chores done,I can rotate the rest of them as my level of energy dictates.Flylady has a nice site,but there are tons of books and sites on cleaning.I have read volumes on the subject because of my occupation,and I can tell you that there are all kinds of systems,and all of them work.Some good reading material for someone who would rather do the bulk of the cleaning on their day off is anything by Jeff Cambell of The Clean Team.Good luck,Sandy