Ride of the Valkyries

There's a radio station in my head. This morning when I woke up I heard "Ride of the Valkyries" in my head. My heart was pumping wildly. I put my hands over my ears and tried to think of some other melody.

Then my thoughts wandered off to the next task of the day. We need to sell the truck but can't find the title. If we get to the Secretary of State office early there won't be a long wait.

Sometimes I sing or think of songs when I'm trying to get motivated to get out of bed in the morning. Usually it's disco tunes like "Get Up and Boogie" or some other happy dance tune. As I got into the shower hounded by Valkyries shrieking in my head I started singing "Get Down Tonight" by KC and the Sunshine Band to chase them away. "...'cause that's the way uh-huh uh-huh I like it, uh-huh uh-huh..."

Then I looked online and found that the Secretary of State office doesn't open 'til 11am today. I'll shut up now and let Alfonse sleep in a little.

Sold! ...Riding Lawnmower

This is very unusual considering we have about 12" of snow on the ground. Most people have their snowmobiles out for sale right now. We had the opportunity to get rid of it, so we did. Of course, the guy had to buy our house, too. Yippee!

Next weekend we're going to look at houses in Florida. I'm so excited! I've got butterflies in my stomach, because we have to vacate our house in Michigan by the end of March.

Snowed In

We cancelled the Open House for this weekend, because of the big snow. My driveway isn't too user friendly. I think we got 8-12" of snow this week. Alfonze dug 2 tracks for the truck tires. We'll clear more later if we need to. I can't tell were the pond is, except for a few plants sticking out of the snow.

Showing No. 2

We had our second showing today since putting the house back on the market on February 1st. I was trying to remain cool, but felt spazzy inside. I couldn't figure out where to put a box that was in the way and starting crying. I wish the constant clean up and showing the house was over, but this is just beginning of the next round of showings.

Happy Valentines Day!

Cleaning Up Clutter & Getting Organized

We had a showing yesterday. I'm in "show me the money" mode. The house has been on the market on and off for about a year. Showing the house has been going on for so long that I can't get excited unless there's an offer.

The clean up process before showings isn't just about mopping the floor and dusting for cobwebs. It's also about decluttering the house and getting rid of stuff. We've been on a mission to do this for the past 3 years. I'm always amazed how the clutter re-accumulates.

I like this web site for de-cluttering and house cleaning without driving myself nuts or becoming too anal. The motto is "take baby steps."

FlyLady.net

I like author Julie Morgenstein. I recently read her book "Time Management from the Inside Out." It has helped me not be such a spaz about seemingly endless To Do lists. Now I'm reading her book about physically organizing space "Organizing from the Inside Out."

My latest de-clutter project was organizing our office supplies. We had a lot of stuff from the old shop in Monroe that was stuffed under workbenches, on bookshelves, and scattered boxes. There were about 5 or 6 jars (Mason, mayo, mustard, etc.) stuffed full of pens, pencils and highlighters. These were used on the workbenches at the old shop. I've never seen so many 3" pencil remnants. 2 weeks ago I took all this stuff and put it in sorted piles (for writing, printing, filing, mailing, etc.) on my living room floor. I cleared the shelves in my office, which was also a hodgepodge of stuff, to accomodate only office supplies. I brought the supplies back into the office as I used them. The stuff left over in the living room was to be either put into storage or gotten rid of. When we got the call on Thursday to schedule a showing for Saturday 11am there was still stuff all over the floor. It's gone now. It feels so good to have lightened that load! I think I'm learning skills that will be useful down the road, too.

It's nice to be able to open a closet without having stuff fall out. :-)

It hurts to breathe.

I go out into the deep freeze anyway, because I have things to get done. It hurt to breathe yesterday, so I held my fuzzy hood shut over my nose & mouth. I think we are in for a heat wave. We're out of single digits and headed for 20's in a few days. Never thought I'd be happy to see 18 degrees!

I was looking for more sweaters today and realized that I already gave a lot of them away. Didn't think I'd need them much after we moved south.

Long Underwear

It's cold enough for long underwear. The temps are in the single digits and wind chill is below zero. It's so dry that my hands feel like paper.