Daily Maintenance is the key!!

 

Good Morning Friends! This post has been pending for last four days. Every now and then, I would get involved in something or the other so just could not post it. Last weekend was pretty hectic for us and jam packed with few outside ventures with a family visiting us. The visit was informed to us just a day in advance which gave me the opportunity to apply the Lesson Learnt! 

For past one month, our house has been relatively clean. I say relatively, because it is not sparkling clean all the time, but still now it is presentable at all times. I feel so nice while writing this post because this has been possible by adopting one good habit – Daily pickup and cleanup.

About a month back, I had challenged (Read forced) myself to dust the house before going to bed everyday.  Why before going to bed – you ask???? Well::

Am I right or am I right?

So before going to bed was the perfect time to get to cleaning. No matter, how clean / bad it might seem, I would still dust it, with damp microfiber cloth. There were two advantages to it.

One – Since I was dusting at night, right before going to bed, no one would come interrupt, and that time, the house would get picked up too.

And secondly – In the morning, we would wake up to a clean and ordered house (because I put the things in their respective places at the time of dusting).

I did not blog about this habit, because I wanted to wait to ensure that this is going to become a habit. And I am happy to report that this surely has become a habit for me. There still have been days when I did not dust, but honestly, the next day, it still did not look bad.

I am not using any cleaning products. A simple microfiber cloth and water, that is it. For me, it is working wonders.

Here is what I take up:

Living Room:

Daily : Center Table, two side tables, extra TV unit, console table, TV wall panel.

Weekly / 3-4 days : Photo Frames, inside the media shelf.

Dining Room:

Daily: Dining Table

Weekly / 3-4 days : Crockery Unit

Lobby :

Corner Unit ( Alternate Days)

Son’s room:

Daily: Study Table top, Side Table, Dresser

Weekly / 3-4 days : Book Rack, Study Table shelves

Our Room:

Daily: Wall unit including the folding table, one shelf each day according to the day, both side tables, Bed Back.

Weekly / 3-4 days : Crib between the bars, Photo Frames, Photo Wall Clock.

After about two weeks of doing daily stuff (As mentioned above), I included few more things in this process. I included the photo frames (on random basis – like every 3 –4 days), dusting each and every thing in my son’s room, between the bars in crib, photo frames in master bedroom. Remember the wall unit in master bedroom?? It has 10 shelves in total on both the sides. I put that on my dusting list according to the numbered days. So, on the 1st I would dust the first shelf. on 2nd I would take up 2nd shelf, and so on. Then from 11th, this will repeat. Since I started from the middle of the month, I started from the 5th shelf, but boy! Am I glad I did that… The inside and outside of the wall unit looks so clean now. Every obvious place in the house remains free of dust.

When you are just contemplating doing something, the task does feel daunting. And sometimes, that would make you procastinate and putting off the task. But as is said, Starting is always the difficult part. Once you start, it does not really take that long and does not even feel intimidating. Till the time, I had not started dusting, I used to feel that it is at least an hour job. Add to it the pickup time and I felt it is not doable daily. Oh! How wrong I was! All of this does not take me more than 20 minutes. 15-20 minutes, that is what I put and I get hours of smiles ???? … I’ll take it.

So, this daily task and the ‘Upkeep’ makes the house clean and well maintained. I am glad I have incorporated the daily maintenance in my daily schedule. This is the reason when this weekend when we were expecting company, we were not rushing to cleanup the house top to bottom.

So, this weekend when we entertained our guests, I felt so relaxed because we were not rushing to clean every inch of space in the house. It was mostly clean, just the daily stuff we had to take care of.

What are your daily chores?? I would love to know your daily routine of how you keep your home dust free….

Happy Weekend!!!!

Lesson Learnt!!!

 

‘Atithi Devo Bhava’… This is a common term used in India when it is time to entertain the guests. God visits the homes in the form of guests, and so it is our duty to serve them well – this is the notion behind this phrase. These days, visiting each other’s places has come down. But there is still one occasion, where such visits and staying over happens – The Wedding ceremonies. No marriage is complete without the gathering of relatives. But entertaining and making arrangements for the guests is an art.

I nowhere claim to be an expert in entertaining, in fact, I am learning and am in the nascent stage. I have not single handedly arranged for guests and I have made many mistakes, but a recent encounter with some intolerable mis-arrangements led me to write this post. I was so disappointed with the way no arrangements were done for a gathering of about 15 people. I have learnt a few lessons and would like to go over them.

1) Ensure the bathroom doors get locked properly. I mean this is a basic and very important room where everyone needs privacy. It should get locked even if there are no guests in the home, and when it is a gathering of four families, it definitely has to be taken care of. Three days that we spent at a recent ceremony, we used to make sure that there is someone outside to watch the door so that no one can barge into the ‘Bathroom in use’…

2) Dust your house properly. Now again, this is something that should be done daily or as required, but when people are coming in to stay, make sure everything looks neat and clean and fresh. One should feel relaxed and fresh, not going ‘Ewww.. ‘ for looking at dust in the commonly used area. Finding dust in the master bedroom bedside tables or at the back of bed is certainly not someone expects. Also, washbasins should be cleaned up before the guests arrival. How would you feel if you find dust in and around the washbasins, or the spitups still stuck to the basins… ‘Ewww’… right???

3) Make sure you have enough water daily, both for drinking and washing. Make arrangements, if the water supply or water accumulation in your daily routine is limited. I mean what harm is in there to have an extra bottle of drinking water, just in case, which so happened in our case? Wouldn’t it be thoughtful and a blessing, if there is a camper of water with ice in it for everyone to take chilled water from there, instead of either having normal water or putting ice cubes in the water every time one craves for chilled water in the hot summer afternoon.

4) Oh for God’s sake, ensure there is enough water in and through the taps and BUM GUNS (jet spray) in the bathrooms and toilets. I mean, do I really need to do that? Shouldn’t that be a pre-requisite for a normal day too?

5) If you are preparing for your guests in summers/winters, and if you have ACs/coolers/heaters at home, ensure that each one of them is working properly. I am emphasizing on the bold phrase. I am surely not saying that you need to buy these appliances just for your guests, I am just saying that if you have them, then they should be in working condition. Runtime failures do happen, and there is no fixing that, but ensuring timely service of these appliances can minimize the risk.

I do understand that mistakes do happen and there is more often than not, one thing or the other overlooked at. But the things that I have mentioned above, are the things which should be taken care of in the normal day to day life and living. These are not the things which take a lot of money to get fixed,  but yes, they do need attention and willingness of the home owners.

Above mentioned were the situations that we found very irritating and frustrating. I promised myself that I would not let my guests go through such kind of problems, at least not the expected ones. These are the things which are basic to one’s life and hygiene which I will make sure do not happen in my household. Writing this post took me almost a year back, when we had gone for my brother’s wedding. There I found something very pleasing and would like to add to my list of ensuring.

There were 30+ guests staying at my parent’s place for that wedding. Four-rooms were accommodating them and few were at nearby neighbor’s place. My mom made a small basket for each family comprising of a soap, a shampoo and conditioner satchet, a small oil bottle, small lotion bottle, a small comb and a small toothpaste. Each family on arrival was given this. I found this so charming and so thoughtful. That is something I do want to incorporate when we entertain our guests.

This has become a long post. And let me tell you, the first time I wrote this post, it was all cribbing about the issues. But I made sure to sleep over the post, and now in the morning I have written this post right from scratch and gave a twist to the episode and made it a lesson learnt.

What do you normally do to ensure a pleasant stay of your guests? The issues that I have mentioned, do you feel I am overreacting to them? Have you ever faced any such frustrating issues?

Our Living Room

Hi Friends!!!

This post has been pending since long. Last two months, we were busy with the carpenter and then the painter. Now that all that is settled, I wanted to do a post for each room one by one. And it seems, today is the day to start with the living room. Let me give you the old photograph which shows what we had in the beginning.

The fabric on the sofa was so dark, I never liked it. But that was something that we lived with for almost 8 months.

We had a wall unit for TV which was almost 6 yrs old, and was in a pretty good condition.But this TV unit just did not give 'The Look' in this living area. It took up so much space, and the side shelf units, although had a pretty good storage capacity, did not make any sense in the living room.
So, then we started with measuring and finalizing on the design and aesthetics of sofa. We decided to get made seven seater sofa (3+2+2) and two puffs in order to accommodate a good gathering. Fabric selection took the most time. We wanted to have a square center table(coffee table) to go with the sofa but were not sure of the design. And then, one fine day, I decided on a design which made use of our old coffee table too.
It took us time, but now finally what we have is what we like. In addition to changing what we had, I wanted to add in some side tables and accessories to the room. We are still lacking the accessories, but the other tables we were able to add to our liking. I added one console table to the mix as well. Now come the pics of the changed room.

The wires that you see around the TV are just temporary. Our TV crashed three times in last four months. It seemed like the life of TV was over. So had to buy a new TV this weekend. The TV installation guy from company is yet to arrive, may be today. Once he installs this TV on the panel, the wires will be gone.

It seems so open, so airy and so accommodating now in the living room. Everything seems to have a place We still need to accessorize the place, but that would be a work in progress. As and when we find something suitable, we'll add. The old TV stand that you see in changed room pic in corner, that is again going to be a changeover piece of furniture. There will be a post on that very soon. 

Do you like the changed look? What kind of changes have you taken up around your house???

Upkeep

This post comes a little late but well! these days I just try to squeeze as much time as possible. Home straightening is going on, but along with that the preparations are on for my son's 7th birthday. Mix all that with the lousy teacher discussions with the school friends' moms and then follow ups with the academic head, and you get a great 'Khichdi'.

 Anyways, These days I am upto a challenge with myself and all the other GREAT goings as mentioned above. Continual upkeep of the home. As I have mentioned, some of the areas of my home are in a mess, but still there are some which are clean and mess free. My challenge is to keep them tidy and clean at all times. I am not there 100% yet for all the areas, but I can say, I am doing very well is keeping up the master bathroom and kitchen. The appliances are kept sparkling clean and 80% of the tiles are clean. In case you are wondering of the missing challenge , let me tell you that I am not taking any extra time to clean / maintain the cleanliness in these areas. I am just utilizing my time in these areas in an efficient manner. Like, when I am making tea, instead of waiting for the tea to boil, I am cleaning up the cabinet doors and tiles. Similarly, while waiting during my son's bath, the bathroom is getting cleaned up. Absolutely no extra time is being devoted. And it is working...... (so far).

I hope they will say this for me some day....

Sell–> Keep-> Renovate-> Love

 

Hey Friends!!! In case you are wondering about the title of the post, let me assure you that by the end of this post, you will know why it is titled so. This is going to be a long post with lots of pictures….

Whole of march and half of April, our house was in the hands of carpenter or painter. And since, there were places that we could not use much, the accessible places became a mess, specially my son’s room. It is still a mess, but the rest of the house is taking its shape now. Mostly every room has undergone some change , some have minor changes and some have a completely different look. I will talk about the rooms in my later post. But this post, I am specifically dedicating to one piece –> Our TV Wall unit.

Sometime back, I had mentioned about this wall unit, that we wanted to sell. We had actually finalized on the price as well with the buyer (Rs. 3500). One fine day, we called him and told him that he needs to just take it away now that our woodwork was in progress. He responded that he will come in a day or two and will take the piece away. We waited for him for a week, and then he came. He said that he will come back in few hours after arranging for the transport.And then, he did not come back. Meanwhile, we were almost certain that he is either not willing to buy it, or he wants to lower the price. I was fed up of the mess and uncertainty and the dependency on someone. I talked to the carpenter and made a decision to reuse that wall unit.

To remind you, this is the picture of the wall unit.

We have a TV in my in-law’s room, but the wall unit was too much overpowering in that room. It took so much space and the left side shelves were really not that usable. I asked the carpenter to make four parts of this structure. One wall panel, second lower cabinet, third shelves rack, and fourth the corner unit. I have tried to depict the different components of the wall unit explaining what was made into what.

He did that , and lo, we had such amazing pieces of furniture to use. The corner unit was too tall, so I asked the carpenter to put the shelves in between to make a small size corner unit to be placed at the far end of our lobby.

We had a small unused mica sheet left from another project (Study table) and another mica sheet from the new storage almirah, which the carpenter fixed on the unit. This piece now holds our medicines and such stuff. This also gives a much needed pop of red color in this area. This is a closer view.

This is how it looks from the living room.

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I simply love this look and it serves a great function too, an accessible place for medicines.

The second piece is left portion of shelves with the glass door. The carpenter shortened it and made two pieces with one extra shelf. The extra shelf was used in the kitchen, one box serves as bed side table in in law’s room, and three shelves put horizontally and serve as book rack in my son’s room.

 

Remaining were the wall panel and lower cabinet. The wall panel is put on the wall with a small TV, and I got a shelf inserted in the lower cabinet which is now used for seating and inside is a book rack.

 

I am still not done with the uses. There were still a few pieces left. Two big shelves which were used in this console table.(Yes, I got that made too). I will relate the story later.

The crockery unit that we had gotten made, did not have enough shelves to put cups and glasses. So the glass shelf that we got from wall unit, I put that in the unit and wow… we had enough space.

Can you see the extra shelf which has the glasses on it???

The only thing remaining was two small shelves and the glass door. The shelves again went into the kitchen for extra shelving needs in cabinets and the glass door, I got that fixed in the balcony horizontally to hold the smaller and cute looking planters for plants.

This is in its current state. We still have not cleared up the mess from balcony and my son’s room.

After having got all this done, I feel really satisfied . A simple book shelf would cost us Rs. 2000. Even by including the cost of labour , around Rs. 2000 , I feel that we got stuff worth more than 12-15K.

Phew!! That is it from my side today.. For past one and a half months, I have not been writing regularly for my blog. Although, in my head, the posts publish daily. I have written earlier as well that I do intend to go back to writing regularly but something or the other happens and all my commitments go down… So, today I am not committing anything. We’ll see how it goes.

In the end, do you now relate to the title of the post?? Is the title apt?? What do you think of the uses I got out of the wall unit? I would love to know….

Hurray!!!!!!

Finally !I am glad I am writing this post!!The carpenter is out of our house. Now the wood polish and paint work is remaining.. But that will just be a 2-3 days job,once it gets started,hopefully tomorrow! This past one month,I have got so many things done,that I just am not able to understand as to from where should I start narrating. Oh well'! I will just go one by one. The house is still a mess but this is still tolerable. From tomorrow, I will be on organizing spree, and I plan to share all that with you! Oh , did I mention ,I am glad to be back on blogging! And actually, I have already started organizing bits and pieces, and the proof of that - I am blogging from my googlenexus - the tablet. I have charged this tablet after around 8 months! Don't ask me why please!!!!

Phew!! I will just leaveyou With a few pictures of my home in the current state. From tomorrow, I will post about the work/organizing and other stuff.....

Slow and Steady!!!!

Dust, Mess everywhere and still loving it!!! Dont get me wrong! Although now, I am a bit tired of looking at the mess all over at home, I am still loving the feeling that finally  I am getting some concrete and beautiful done and that too to my liking.

I had mentioned in my last post, that we have outsourced the woodwork that we had planned to get done. Although the closet that we wanted was completed in a week, I am coming up with new work for the carpenter almost daily. And so far, we have gotten quite a few things done.The work is in the last stages now, hopefully it should be over by this weekend, provided I dont come up with any new tasks.(wink wink)

Since all that is getting done, the laptop remained hidden for the initial days. Then One fine day, it surfaced and I thought of writing down my post. Then realized, that it was not charged. Looking for the adapter to charge it was going to be a tidious task with a baby in one hand. So, I just let it be.

The reason I am narrating this story is to let you know that although in my head I really did not want any gap in my blogging, but sometimes my laziness, sometimes circumstantial, it just happened.For past few days, all the time I am thinking of the stuff that I want to be done with the residuals, much to the dismay of carpenter.

 I will be back next week (With high hopes) with pictures of my home.