I'm not sure what I think about this...

.... but apparently, I'm rather productive when I have sick children and have very. little. sleep.



I think I did seven loads of laundry yesterday (starting around 5am, mind you), kept the kitchen pretty much up to date, and finished the kids' closet. Mostly. I got all the summer clothes up off the floor and on the top rack, cleaned up the floor, and hung hooks on the back of the door to the room. That's for their towels. When its time for a shower, they go to the closet, close the door, strip down, put their clothes in the appropriate basket (clothes or undies), socks go in the bag (more on that in a minute), they wrap themselves in their towel, bathe, return to the closet, dry off and hang the towel back up on the door and get dressed. This eliminates the "returning to the bathroom after getting dressed step" and hopefully, will eliminate the "finding the wet towel on the floor and ticks off Mommy" effect. They also have their own color towel, so I know the culprit in an instant. Mwah ha ha ha.



Dirty Laundry. There are two baskets in the kids' closet along the left hand side wall when you first walk in. One is for clothes, the other for underwear. Whenever I do a hot load, I'll grab the undies and throw them in. As for the basket of clothes, when the bucket is full, I run the load. For socks, ... man, this is brilliant and I wish I could take credit for it, but someone sent the idea to my homeschool group. Each child has his/her own lingerie mesh bag hanging on a hook over the laundry baskets. Their name is written in Sharpie on their bag. When its time to do laundry, I grab the bags, zip them shut, and throw them in the wash. When the basket of laundry comes back to the closet, I unzip the bag, toss the contents in the appropriate box, and hang it, unzipped, on their hook.

I think I've got all the details covered! If anyone has any questions, let me know. The night we installed the shelves, I lay in bed thinking, "Oh, no, what did I do??!" I was so afraid that we had just wasted all that money on a system that wouldn't be used and really, why didn't I just put the laundry away like a normal person? I have to tell you, having this one area of my life organized and moving efficiently has been wonderful. I haven't heard the words, "I don't have anything to wear" in over a week. That right there is huge. I don't waste time digging through "the Sock Box" trying to find socks so we can get out the door. That's BEYOND huge!

This has also inspired me to get much more organized in my life. Besides my own clothing, the kitchen is next. I'm in the midst of putting together a master list of staples for our family, as well as a two week meal plan to rotate. I remember hearing before that there are two types of large families-- highly organized or hopelessly chaotic. I'm loathe to admit that I've been in the latter category for a very long time. I am greatly looking forward to getting everything in my life organized for good!

Anyone else have any triumphs they'd like to share or questions we can all offer advice on?