My friend Vanessa posted the other day about how you'd think she was pregnant because of all the "nesting" she was doing....well I have DEFINITELY been nesting lately (but I guess I have the excuse of actually being pregnant :)

Which is weird, because I almost didn't nest at all with Eva. About a week before she was born I started making a list of how the recycling needed to be taken in, the garage needed to be cleaned and organized, I had to paint, the basement needed to be organized and turned into a spare bedroom, and this little table we had needed to be sanded, stained and varnished so it could go in Eva's room. Needless to say, being 9 months pregnant I made it as far as renting a belt sander and spending an afternoon sanding the table....and that's it. It's still in the garage 15 months later waiting to finish being sanded, stained and varnished. The basement being turned into a spare bedroom? About 6 months later we FINALLY got around to it. And that garage organization? Never happened. Yep...that was the extent of my nesting. I was tired from belt sanding so I spent 2 days lying on the couch sleeping and recovering.

This time has been soooo different and I really think it all stemmed from getting our finances in order. I've kept track all month long on my spreadsheet, kept receipts and scrimped and saved. It feels SOO good that I just want to do MORE. I have already been meal planning for a couple years, but this month I learned how to be more frugal with my meals by planning around the weekly grocery store flyer, and finding coupons online. I LOVE finding coupons. I'm getting a high out of getting things for really cheap by waiting for it to go on sale and then BOOYAH!...hit 'em with a manufacturer's coupon on top of it. We also switched where we fill up with gas to the gas bar at our grocery store...they give us 7 cents per litre in grocery bucks, which by the end of the month will have added up to about $15. I seriously love saving money. Who knew?

Once my money was in order, I wanted the rest of my life to be organized and in order too. I've been going crazy organizing our mail, bills, etc and ACTUALLY filing it away. Now it isn't sitting in a rat's nest in my kitchen, burying the majority of the table so we can only use the corner to eat on. It's nice.

I've also never been one to be organized with my house cleaning duties. By not organized, I mean like....I never clean. Oh sure I tidy up, and when company is coming I shriek "Oh crap!" and run to the bathroom and scrub the toilets and tub for an hour because it hasn't been cleaned in months. And my laundry? NEVER on top of it. It's all over our bedroom floor as well as the laundry room floor, and each pile is either dirty or clean.....no one ever knows except me which is which. When Steve's looking for a clean pair of jeans he'll yell "Kin! Where are my jeans?!" to which I reply "there's 3 big piles of laundry on the floor in the basement....the one on the left is all the clean ones...steer clear of the other two piles!"

So because of Vanessa's suggestion of a website called FlyLady I now am on the road to being clean and organized. Today I started at Day 1: Go Shine Your Kitchen Sink. I asked Steve if he could look after Eva while I took half an hour to shine the sink....well it looked so pretty and sparkly, I wanted the counters to be all nice. So after I wiped them down, I was totally aware of all the dirty splotches on the back splash. But after I wiped them down, that made it all the more clear that my cupboard doors were filthy so I had to wipe them too....on and on I went, and shining my kitchen sink turned into cleaning my kitchen from top to bottom. Literally. All my cupboards were wiped down, my stove, my fridge, all the appliances, the bottom cupboards and I even swept and washed the floor. Everything looked so amazing I just couldn't stop and my 20 minute sink shining turned into a 2 1/2 hour overhaul. It obviously needed it, but now it looks AMAZING. My hubs awarded me by picking up KFC for dinner so I didn't even need to dirty anything by cooking in it. That Fly Lady is one smart chick...how did she know that making my sink shine would make me so happy I'd be motivated to make the rest of my kitchen sparkle?

This is the most motherly and house-wifey I've been in my entire life.

I love it.