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Tidying up

(100 Posts)
Mishap Sun 08-Mar-15 16:14:03

I seem to have some vital gene missing that induces a desire to tidy up - I can tolerate a pretty grand degree of muddle before the urge to tidy up hits me - well, gently taps me on the shoulder.

I am trying to tidy the music room which is full of sheet music, books of music, instruments etc. and it is in a huge state of chaos. We just get a piece of music out, play/sing it and it stays where it is, as I am always quite sure I will be playing it again in the next few days or that, if I put it away, I will forget where it is when I need it!

I have been working on this for the last two hours and all I seem to be doing is moving stuff from one place (top of the piano now looks great!) to some other place (which now looks grim!). Is this stuff-shifting characteristic of your tidying? - and do you ever feel you have achieved anything?

There are lots of dead woodlice now consigned to the rubbish bin! (hides head in shame!).

Galen Tue 10-Mar-15 12:13:03

A roundtoit!

Mishap Tue 10-Mar-15 13:03:46

The trouble with me is that I get around to then craft projects, but not the tidying!

Today we have DGD (age 2) for the day while Mum works, so it is a perfect excuse not to tidy.

AlieOxon Tue 10-Mar-15 13:26:31

I'm GOOD at moving stuff from one place to another!

soontobe Tue 10-Mar-15 13:28:14

I iron in the bedroom too petra.

Mishap Tue 10-Mar-15 14:03:00

We all have to be good at something allie!

grannyactivist Tue 10-Mar-15 14:45:31

Another one here who irons in my bedroom.
I keep all the public rooms in the house scrupulously tidy all the time and I expect any guests to tidy up after themselves in these rooms too. Drawers and cupboards get an annual sort out and sometimes biannually if they're getting over-full of tat.
Children's things are kept in the bedrooms they use when they stay over and I've just started to encourage them to play with toys in the bedroom rather than the sitting room, but, as at home, they are responsible for tidying away their toys when they've finished playing. If we've done crafty things or baking in the dining room then the little one is given a cloth to 'wash' the table and the older one does the washing up. Still regarded as great fun. smile
I have a tendency to tidy by taking things to my bedroom to be sorted through when I have time, so often the only fairly untidy room is my own. Now and again I enter into my husband's lair and give it a good 'top to bottom' clean, but am very careful with papers and such to just leave them in an unsorted pile as some things that I would put in the bin turn out to be 'crucial documents', even though they may look like scribble on the backs of envelopes! hmm

janerowena Tue 10-Mar-15 15:08:55

I iron in the bedroom, but only every couple of weeks or so, and it's usually mainly DBH's shirts. I really hate ironing.

Anything that will need ironing is placed on a hanger, then hung from doorhooks until I am ready for it. DBH has a lot of shirts, I would rather spend one rainy afternoon getting it all over and done with than have to keep warming up the iron every day to get rid of ironing as it occurs. The stuff that sits on the stairs is things that won't crease. I keep a big stash of hangers downstairs to hang things on when wet, so that they don't crease, then bring down hangers from clothes and ironing that are no longer needed up there.

Whatever works for you, I suppose. I have a small room with my wardrobes in it, and a sewing desk and a big chest of drawers that contains fabrics and things. Sometimes there are so many piles of clothes in there, (especially when the family are staying) waiting to be hung up, that I can't get to the wardrobes!

rosequartz Tue 10-Mar-15 16:30:52

I have just been doing some paperwork and sorting out insurances etc, so all around the pc are papers, mugs, other papers to be sorted, pens, things.
Please come and sort me out grannya!

janerowena Tue 10-Mar-15 19:11:09

A new shoe rack arrived today, so all the shoes hurled under the stairs (DBH) are now on racks. He was meant to take them all bar a couple of pairs upstairs, but never did. Every time I suggested buying a rack, he said we didn't need one - for nearly eight years! He has just come home, and said 'What a good idea!'. hmm I was quite surprised to see that there were three pairs of trainers, one of slippers, and eight pairs of shoes and boots. I swear he hasn't worn some of them for years, but he is refusing to throw any out - I think I will gradually work out which ones never get worn. If that sounds callous, he has at least another half dozen pairs up in his wardrobe. He has spare spare spare shoes, he says.

loopylou Tue 10-Mar-15 20:06:13

DH never throws out clothes so I have been known to not-so-subtly sabotage ancient threadbare garments [grins evilly]

janerowena Tue 10-Mar-15 22:09:25

I have to be very subtle. Sometimes just to stop him wearing something when we go out together. I threw out a shirt last week that his mother bought him 30 years ago which makes me want to reach for sunglasses and pretend I don't know him - it looks like colourful patchwork! It had lain low for a couple of years, but sadly he found it, so it had to be evicted.

Mishap Wed 11-Mar-15 12:38:31

We've done it!!! All the music is now filed away, we can see the top of the coffee table and we are knackered!

loopylou Wed 11-Mar-15 12:39:30

Well done Mishap

rosequartz Wed 11-Mar-15 15:42:37

Well done!

(Can you find anything now? hmm)

Mishap Wed 11-Mar-15 17:24:01

No!!

rosequartz Wed 11-Mar-15 17:50:54

Except the brew on the coffee table (at least it won't get spilt all over the music now!)
Although I am sure that you aren't clumsy like me. wink

Mishap Wed 11-Mar-15 17:53:02

The weird thing about the process is that every now and again a pile of music would surface somewhere that I thought I had tidied. It was as if they were creeping up through the floor!

rosequartz Wed 11-Mar-15 17:54:50

They breed.
Like the shoes in our house.

Dotsmam Wed 11-Mar-15 22:28:15

I would love to be a minimalist but I am definitely a maximist! I can't throw anything away-just in case. Who knows when the toaster you replaced because only one side works will be desperately needed? Only problem is that it would take me forever to find it in the loft!! There could be a family living up there amongst the lamps with no shades, shades with no lamps, knitting patterns from the 80s, an inflatable dinghy ......... and I would never know. As for the rest of the house I just don't seem to notice until it has reached the point of embarrassment

janerowena Wed 11-Mar-15 22:39:04

A friend said to me recently 'I do love your house, there is so much to look at in it!' blush

My knick-knack cull last summer obviously wasn't as thorough as I thought it was! But people buy you things, don't they, and it seems rude not to display them.

Tegan Wed 11-Mar-15 23:11:00

Dotsmam; that sounds like my house [just exchange the dinghy for a dinosaur].

redwest Wed 16-Dec-15 07:16:51

Message deleted by Gransnet for breaking our forum guidelines. Replies may also be deleted.

tiggypiro Wed 16-Dec-15 08:36:03

Reported

trisher Wed 16-Dec-15 10:32:33

Untidy gene completely dominant here. I tidy the living room mostly for when the family come round. The 1year old DGS tends to find and play with/eat anything he finds that looks interesting. Rest of the house groans with clutter. But if I tidy it I can never find anything! And anyway there is so much else to do, coffee, lunch, cinema. My mother always said when she saw the houses that had been bombed during the war, she wondered about the woman who had just cleaned and polished the furniture, and decided there were better ways to spend your time.