I’m done. There is still two more days left to Norouz and I’m finished with my organization.

Still have to clean up the house but that’s the daily chores, doesn’t count

It was a very interesting and enlightening project. To tell the truth I was very close to calling it quits. At the beginning, it was kind of difficult to see things in a different way, in a more practical order. After a few drawers, I got the hang of it and then it was not that bad.

I kept these tips in mind during the project:

1-      Sort out

2-      Keep related things in one place

3-      Use containers

4-      Keep order of things as practical as possible

5-      Find the bottle neck that makes the mess, remove it

I can say I’m a changed organized mom now, and the kids are getting the hang of it too. They are more organized than they were before, of course for a toddlers.

Off to baking cookies

Until later,

Tags: amoo norooz, Home Organization, norooz, preschooler, toddler, toddlers

Last Friday kids and I had fun spring-cleaning. As soon as dad came home I started emptying, cleaning and reorganizing kitchen cabinets one after the other. After I guess two of the cabinets, my son came and told me he wants to help. He started helping in emptying and wiping the cabinets. My daughter as well asked if she can also clean something, so I gave her a clean wet towel and told her to clean the cabinet doors.  They had a blast helping me and they were proud of themselves telling dad that they are helping mom getting ready for Nowruz.

This lasted only about half and hour, but it was the most enjoyable half an hour of my life. They had a goal, a purpose. We all enjoyed working together. They still like to help but not that excited about it.

This experience reminded me of my mom telling stories of her childhood and Nowruz cleaning (spring cleaning). Unlike now they used to live in big houses with grandparents, uncles and cousins and for Nowruz the kids each, had a section of the house to clean. She always tells the story with such joy, remembering all the fun they had cleaning the house as a family all together.

I hope to create that joy for my kids too. Maybe these memories stay with them a life time.

I have only 8 days left to finish my project. So far so good with organizing, more than half the kitchen is organized. The spice cabinet is done which is the most important and difficult one. But!  Yes, there is a big but, my whole house is upside down due to my son’s birthday party couple of days ago and his sickness the day after.

Until later,

Tags: amoo norooz, Home Organization, norooz, preschooler, responsible, spring cleaning, toddler, toddlers

Well I don’t know what day of this project it is, all I know is that I only have another 18 days to finish all the things I wanted to do to get my life more organized and efficient, and do my spring cleaning at the same time.

Up to now I have organized the master bedroom (mentioned on previous post) the kids bedrooms are all organized and cleaned from top to bottom. I have changed the decoration of my son’s room, changed the place of his bed to make his room more accessible and organized.

Now the kids know what belongs where, every toy has a place! Which was not like that before; they had some toys that didn’t belong to a specific spot and ended up anywhere. So far so good, I was consistent on asking them to clean up their room before bed (putting everything back in it’s place), well they didn’t like it but did it anyway after a lot of going back and forths. I just have to keep in mind not to miss a day on enforcing this, otherwise I will lose the battle and things will go back the way it was.

Bathroom cabinets and few of the kitchen cabinets are organized as well. Looks like I’m almost there, but there are lots to do and I hope I’ll make it in time. Specially that I’m thinking of baking some traditional cookies like Nokhodchi (chickpea cookie) and Noonberenji (rice cookie) for Nowruz. These will take a good chunk of time to do.

Next stop is the rest of kitchen cabinets, fridge, and the TV stand in family room. Then vacuuming, mopping and washing the windows. Just that, nothing more, or is it! I don’t know I’ll get to it when I get there, just thinking of all of these makes me tired. I had a long day, doing my chores and keeping the children busy and entertained.          Off to bed, thank goodness for nights.

Until later,

Tags: amoo norooz, Home Organization, living efficient, norooz, Nowruz, spring cleaning

I’ve been thinking about this post since Christmas (almost), right after I saw Julie and Julia. (Have to say I loved the movie, it was funny, interesting and inspiring.) What did I think about? Since I saw the movie, I thought I could challenge myself to start a project and write about it. I said challenge because first it’s not easy to write about an ongoing project while you are messing it up, two is that quitting won’t be easy. When you say you’re doing something publicly, you have to deliver it. I’m good at finishing most of my projects, but I quitted before on projects that it was too much for me; mostly in knitting and sewing.

The project

You already guessed it, my project is organization, I’m planning to reorganize our house, rearrange everything in a way that suits our today life better. I’m always after new tips and ideas in organization. The most problem with my organization is that it is easy to get organized but very difficult to stay organized. We have 41 days to Nowruz. (First day of spring Iranian new year) and for that we are supposed to do spring-cleaning. My challenge is to get the whole house cleaned, organized and rearranged by Nowruz.

I need all the help I can get, and the sweetest thing was that just before writing this article I was checking my RSS feed and saw an interesting article on organization in tipjunkie.com. It is very interesting with great tips in homemaking check it out. I sure use it a lot.

I’m starting from my room ( for a change), tell you all about it tomorrow. If you like you can start the project with me I would love to have some company, we can share the tips we come up with.

Until later

Tags: amoo norooz, Home Organization, norooz, spring cleaning

My son has been asking for a pet for a while. One of his wishes for Santa was to have a puppy and a cat for Christmas. Now that we are getting close to spring and Nowruz (Persian New Year) he started again, he wants a rabbit or a hamster from Amoo Nowruz (Persian version of Santa, except that he wears green and his beard is not white, because he represents spring)

I have been against having a pet selfishly. I love animals, but I guess for some psychological reason I don’t feel comfortable around them. And as animals have strong sense they are always after me This is very frustrating for me because all my neighbours and most of my son’s preschool friends have pets. Especially because people who have pets think it’s normal to pet an animal, well I can’t. Most of the times I have to explain my problem so they know it’s not their pet, it’s me ???

When I saw my son being so eager to have a pet, I decided to at least do some research and see how I feel about it. The more I read on internet the scarier it got. I had no idea there are so much to do and spend for a pet and so much to read about!! Read the rest of this entry »

Tags: amoo norooz, norooz, pet, preschooler