Sunday Times

We had a busy day rearranging our bedrooms with the new sectional pieces of couch in 2 rooms — given to us by friends Carrie and Peter, two pieces for Ana and two pieces for our bedroom. Plus I stripped all the beds and washed blankets, comforters, and throw rugs, etc, hanging them all on the line. That is a *task*.

But our bedroom looks great with the chaise — nice throw cover over it and a trunk that was at the foot of our bed is now the “coffee table” — i.e. footrest for Mr Husband. It’s quite luxurious to have a sofa in the bedroom. I hadn’t realized how big our room was; feels bigger now. Weird — should feel cluttered!

Ana also did a lot of cleaning and rearranging, then we moved the Boy’s bedroom around a bit to change the bed. This afternoon I’ve been Freecycling bags of clothing and stuff from the girls. Lots of stuff. I like when we clear things out

I will admit that I haven’t done well on the No-Spend Challenge (from my Compact group) in the last week. I worked or had meetings every night and we (the family, not necessarily me) ended up ordering dinner several nights, which I try to avoid — but I’m *tired* and with the girls in school and working, there’s not a lot of help around the house. Mr Husband works 12-hr days with a long commute, so even with my best intentions — a full week’s menu planned — we spent anyway.

I also caved in at the fabric store yesterday and bought 100% cotton yarn for holiday gifts — for crocheting washcloths. $10 is not a fortune but I could have survived or tried Freecycle first. But I didn’t, and that’s why I’m going to hell.

But I digress.

We have been terrible about the Waste No Food Challenge, too (another play-along game of the Compact folk). Part of it is my not cooking this week, and part of it is my being hella busy and tired. A lot of the veggies given to us by my organic warehouse friend ended up getting mushy and turning to compost. And I took my lunch 3 times in the past week, only to have lunch delivered at work and eating gross stuff like pizza instead of my veggie burger and then having to toss my original lunch when I realized it had been out of the fridge for too long (whipping self). I threw out a buttload of food in takeout containers because no one is going to eat hard pita bread or crusty quesadillas or wilted salad.

That’s just a different battle to fight — again, more planning, and ordering appropriate amounts or not ordering at all, etc etc (whip whip whip).

So instead, in the spirit of today’s cleaning efforts, I think my challenge is going to be the Rat Piles. That’s what we call those mysterious, slippery, tilting piles of paper, a week’s worth of mail, mixed-up laundry, magazines, to-do lists, random photos, coupons, items to mend, books and school papers, etc. I have them in every room — and at work. I am going to methodically go through the house and get rid of my rat piles. It might take me all month, but that will be my October Challenge.

Who’s with me? Or am I the only one of you who has Rat Piles in her house? Yeah, right. Fess up.

love,
Rat Queen

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