I Think I Forgot How to Clean House?

Ok, I'm on Twitter first of all, my name is TCblogger. So far I've found my cousin and my niece and am following some lady from Canada who is a life coach? We will see how that goes?

I have a job, a 40 hour a week job, I might not HAVE to work now that my husbands business is doing better but every little bit helps and he has the impression that I like my job. OK, I have stories to tell him when I come home but I find myself counting the hours and minutes till I can leave, the days till my next day off and so forth. Since I've had this job housework has been kept to a minimum. Since there are only two of us and two dogs here in the house it doesn't get very dirty. BUT I know what a CLEAN house looks like. I just don't remember how to get there.

I ran my husbands business for like 3 years, had a lady come in and clean house one day a week and then I did yard work, laundry, extra cleaning, and cooking, kept me busy. Then we lived in a 35 ft camper and then a 38 ft camper for a couple years while in MS and FL cleaning up after hurricanes which I could just about clean with q tips in a day. Then I did ebay and stayed @ home and cleaned when it needed it. Then ebay dried up and I got a real job, I've worked outside the home many times before and @ jobs that required longer hours but now I just come home and plop down and read, blog, take a bath, put a few clothes in the washer, make sure the animals are fed and go to bed if husband isn't home. So I guess I will have to slow down on the reading and the blogging if I want a clean house?

What caused this sudden interest in cleaning house? My daughter has a "friend" she is bringing home, daughter is 33 (I really was a child bride) and they are coming for mothers day. He has a mother but lives much closer to her than my daughter lives to hers. I just can't see the 2 TVs sitting in the family room, my husbands desk full of paperwork, the small refrigerator that is supposed to go somewhere that has had it's home on the bench by the door, or any of the outside junk by the back door (shovel, battered imitation wrought iron table with dead plants on it, garbage can, storage box for gardening stuff, cat shelf, ancient bar b que grill) impressing my daughters "friend"? Much less the dog needs brushed, his nails clipped and I have to lay out clothes for tomorrow and get to bed! We won't even talk about the second guest room which is full of stuff from the camper we moved out of or the extra room off the kitchen which is supposed to be a sewing room, right now it's called the library, that doesn't mean the books are on shelves, it does mean the jeans that need thrown away or patched are in there and all my extra baskets, movies without a home, and the dog and cat food sits right inside the door. Glorified messy closet. Anyway here's pictures of my living room,

I'm proud of it, there are muddy cat paws prints on the windows though in the dining room, egads!!! Does anyone have any suggestions? Just get up and do it? I think it's the energy thing that has me stalled out?

BTW my panic may be caused by unrealistic expectations, I just don't seem to be able to find the dividing line between clean and dirty, a happy medium. I used to clean my Venetian Blinds weekly when I was very newly married, like WASH them. I used to bleach my white painted kitchen cabinets and kitchen linoleum weekly not too long ago, I realize I went too far then, I just want to get some of that ability back? Now sometimes I don't run the dishwasher all the way through weekly? Just rinse till I get a full load. The guest room closet has things in it from about 4 people who don't live here but store their stuff here and part of it is on the floor, pardon me my grandkids extra clothes are in there too..... Help!!

My Day in Snowy MO

This is what I emailed my cousin this morning.

My goals for today are paying the bills that HAVE to be paid, dusting if it ever gets light, giving the dog a bath, and cleaning the leftover Christmas mess off of the dining room table and dusting and sweeping in there.

Getting dressed is high on my list of priorities right now. We here in MO are supposed to get a bunch of snow this week and for added fun and enjoyment a wintry mix, this is what it looked like from my front door a few minutes ago, road looks better than it did. That's a state highway in the distance, snow and sleet seemed to be blowing off of it because it's so cold.
Ok I did the getting dressed thing. Also have to do a load or two of laundry, fold what I did Friday on my non day off and put anti freeze in the old pickup because from the weather forecast I'll be driving it to work probably. Car does fine but if pickup goes in the ditch or hits something else it might improve it's looks?

Had an evacuation @ the Wal Mart where I work, can't say too much but it was a bomb threat evidently, that much was on the local news so I guess I can say that. I wasn't there, all went fairly smoothly, they determined it was just a threat and no bomb was present and employees were back in the store in an hour or so. I knew about it when it was going on, had to be @ work early the next morning, I called to make sure they were there. I wasn't about to go in if the store wasn't open!

My daughter surprised me last Thursday, she lives in KS, I called her about noon and casually asked what she was doing later in the day, she said she was going to go somewhere, mama intuition kicked in and I asked if she was coming home. Point blank question, she can't lie, she was going to try to surprise me @ work. It didn't work, I got off work early that day anyway but she had to tell me what was going on, other daughter was supposed to evidently find out what was going on but was busy. We sat outside Thursday evening because it was WARM, like no coat could sit outside warm. Here's a picture of her and Dispatch the Bichon and Crusoe the orphaned cat, you can read about them in my other blog, animals that give pause, also a fine picture of the kids toys or grandpas toys kids left outside and the dead plants in the planter. January in MO 60 degrees isn't unheard of but felt we HAD to sit outside and enjoy it for a bit.
So she came for a SHORT visit, we went to KC on Friday on business and then my other daughter and kids came over for a bit. We visited an office I hadn't been to for like 3-4 years in KC, I told the guy there my daughter was in for a short visit and he asked if she was home from school. She is 33 years old, she will bless that baby face soon. Everyone else went to wrestling meet for two of the grandkids but I had to work (they lost, that doesn't happen very often, Zach has gone to state two years in a row, Jacob the little one was on his mamas lap and told her he had a temperature, he meant temper cuz he lost)! Then life returned to normal after younger daughter left and it started snowing, bah humbug.

Can you tell I'm not looking forward to whatever this week is bringing as far as the weather is concerned? My cousins are in law enforcement and live next door so we all keep each other informed as to local road conditions etc. and all work different shifts so it works out well but I almost totalled a lincoln continental in the ice one year, NOT a fun thing to do!

Husband has to drive through OK @ some point this week, last time I looked @ the forecast for Oklahoma City it was freezing rain straight through till Wednesday. Lets hope it doesn't materialize! Don't know if you can see the snow flurries in the picture here but it's definitely gotten thicker, @ least it's snow now. That's the house I was raised in and my dad was raised in and some of the other buildings are ones my great grandpa built or helped build. My brother owns it now and my cousin and her husband live in it.

Hope everyone pays attention to the weather and stays safe and warm, don't forget the pets, I give mine hot water several times a day, the ones that are banned from the house per my husband, also we have 6 cats, that would be a bit much in the house. Don't feel too sorry for them, there's a log cabin full of straw in the first picture across the driveway behind the cedar tree, they don't go there unless it gets really cold but when it is cold the dogs and cats have been known to forget animosity and huddle!!
Oh and I promised myself I would forget my pride and put a picture of my dining room table on here so I would be forced to show a clean picture later which means I'd be forced to actually clean it off today and admit the holidays are OVER. I keep telling myself laziness is a sign of depression and not real laziness, I read that someplace, sometime, too lazy to remember? I remembered where my cookie sheets are now, on the dining room table, kids used them to sort puzzle pieces, there's a completed puzzle too, daughter didn't take it with her this time either did she? Basket is a fruit basket, I love baskets, thanks Deanna, paper cups and plates do have a home and it's not there.
If this guilt cleaning by posting it on the internet works maybe I could put a picture of my supposed to be spare spare room that is like a glorified closet supposed to be a place for the books with a single bed in it? The books are there and the bed is there but you can't really see the bed, the dog and cat food is inside the door, that's about what it's used for daily a closet to store the dog and cat food.

Update, 7:30 pm, life is what happens when you aren't looking. Things were going well, then I decided to take a nap. Long story short, look @ my other blog http://animalsthatgivepause.blogspot.com/ for details of my day, I did get some bills paid and laundry done, not folded and the dog still has to be bathed but here's a picture of my oldest daughter holding him after brushing, isn't he cute?