How do you do it?

This is sort of the opposite of  Works-For-Me Wednesday.

This does NOT work for me, and I need your help.

Every afternoon, my house looks something like this:

And frankly, some days it’s a whole lot worse than this.  These are just the pictures I’m willing to own up to.  And these are just the 3 rooms the kids spend the most time in after school – the family room is not as publicly visible so I’m not so worried about that.

A few things I’m working on.  The kitchen table, for example, is currently a dumping ground for coats and backpacks.  I’m building a cubby with compartments for each of the girls to store their school shoes, coat, backpack, and lunchbox, so hopefully that mess will be contained in…the garage, I’m thinking?  Wherever the cubby ends up, anyway.  So that will help.

But honestly, my biggest daily challenge is just stuff. Random things that I don’t know what to do with – they don’t have a home, but they aren’t garbage, either.  Missing parts of toys, broken things that need repaired (but I can’t sit down and do it immediately), assorted school papers, newspapers/magazines I’m going to look at later – that kind of thing.  What do you neatnik readers do with all of that stuff?

I also need to get better about having the girls clean up as they go.  Annie does this very well, but her sisters not so much.  Catie whines and complains, and Lilly’s just too young to do it without heavy supervision.  I am definitely guilty of doing it myself after they go to bed, just because it’s easier.  Bad of me, I know.

So tell me, please – what works for you?

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Don’t be obnoxious

This week is a blogging theme, and we’re supposed to share our best blogging tips.  As I write this there are 163 people already linked up, and though I haven’t read them all, I’m guessing many contain the same tips.  Very good tips, mind you.  I, too, feel that you should use Wordpress, be a good commenter, and focus on keywords if you want to build a bloggy empire.  But I’m thinking you don’t need to hear that dittoed a 164th time. 

So instead I’m going to share with you a very un-PC tip.

Don’t be obnoxious.

Sounds simple, right?  It’s not.  Most obnoxious people are so self-involved they haven’t even noticed they are being obnoxious.  Don’t be one of them.

Yes, it’s your blog, but please don’t make it all about you.

It’s not that we don’t like hearing your family stories – we all like to share them from time to time.  It’s just that when the content is all deeply personal, we can’t always relate.  If you want your blog to be successful, you need to have a conversation with your readers, not just a platform to shout from.  Work hard to balance what you are passionate about with what matters to your readers.  You may be the president of your child’s PTO, but if you always write about Jefferson Elementary then you’ll lose me.  Write about the challenges of fostering parent involvement in schools, and readers worldwide will be able to relate.

This is a common problem I’ve observed among ‘big’ bloggers.  It’s all about them.  They are so busy writing to amuse themselves, they forget about their followers.  Sometimes it seems as if they’ve completely lost touch with reality, and view themselves as a celeb whose lunch selection, playground activities, and personal philosophy on skin care are absolutely intriguing to the world at large.

I actually follow several well-known bloggers that fall into this category and they bug the heck out of me.

[Um, then why are you following them?]

Glad you asked.  I check in with them from time to time to remind myself what I do not want to be.  I follow them on Twitter so I have a concrete example in front of me, reminding me of my goals.

Don’t tweet only to make myself look good.

Don’t tweet like a stand-up comedian trying out a new routine.

Don’t tweet every mundane detail of my mommy life like it’s fascinating.  It isn’t.

It does not foster a connection with your readers.  It doesn’t make you seem cool or smart or funny.  It just makes you seems self-absorbed and, well, obnoxious.

Don’t do it.

*If you’d like to read more Blogging tips that are possibly less bossy than mine, hop over to We Are THAT Family.

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Works for me!

I’m stealing this bloggy idea from my friend Darcie at Such The Spot. I just have to give a shout out to this little gem of a product that has brought so much joy to my life.

Strange reaction to a toilet bowl cleaner I know, but it’s oh-so-true. I despise cleaning. Can’t emphasize that enough. So anything that makes that nasty little job easier is worth its weight in gold to me. This is one of those products that really truly does work. I very rarely have to scrub a toilet bowl now, and if that isn’t music to a mom’s ears I don’t know what is.

So here it is, in all its glory, the Kaboom Scrub Free toilet system:

Don’t stare in wonder too long – run out and buy yourself one and see for yourself. It’s heaven I tell ya!

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