Plumbing Issues?

We have some kitchen drain issues in the apartment ladies and gents so let me give you the back story.

We moved into this apartment on 3 April 2014. After two weeks here we noticed a draining issue in our kitchen sink. Basically the water would take forever to go down the drain. If we used the tiniest drop of water it would take 2 minutes to drain. 

After days of this we headed to Woodies DIY store and got ourselves some drain unblock. I was so excited that our drain would now cooperate with us and do what all kitchen sinks do. How disappointed was I when I noticed that after using the 14euro product the drain did not unblock :(

We went back to Woodies another day and picked up a high quality product but still would not budge the blockage, in fact I think it made it worse. The draining was impossibly slow we had to resort to washing our dishes in the bathroom.

As this is a rented property we contacted the letting agents and demanded someone (a plumber) be sent out to us. On Tuesday 3 June a plumber arrived with industry strength drain unblock. As he was pouring it in the smell would literally burn your eyes and nostrils. Both the plumber and I had to stand on the balcony the smell was that bad. 
He left the product in there for 15 minutes and tested, there was still clogging issues. He proceeded to pour boiling hot water from the kettle into the sink. Eventually the block was dislodged and now we have a fully functioning sick. I could have kissed the man I was that happy, until I looked into the sink after he left and saw this.

He left a stain that will not budge, I've tried everything I could think of (bleach being the main ingredient in all products tried). Does anyone have any ideas on how to remove this?

If you know of anything I can try to remove this stain please let me know in the comments below. 

I hope you have a great day. I will see you all in the next blog.

A review of the first week with my new cleaning schedule.

As the title suggests this short post is to review my first week with the cleaning schedule.

I can confirm that everyday except Tuesday I followed the daily cleaning. As for the weekly schedule that was a complete fail. I deep cleaned the bathroom but that''s about it. 

Today is June 1 and I plan to ensure that I follow the full schedule from here on out. I have planned out the weeks of June below.


June 2 - June 8

Everyday - Daily cleaning
Monday -  Laundry
Tuesday - Kitchen & Office
Wednesday - Bedrooms
Thursday - Balcony Screen & Rubbish Bins
Friday - Living & Dining 
Saturday - Bathroom

June 9 - June 15

Everyday - Daily cleaning
Monday -  Laundry
Tuesday - Kitchen & Office
Wednesday - Bedrooms
Thursday - Refrigerator & Oven
Friday - Living & Dining 
Saturday - Bathroom

June 16 - June 22

Everyday - Daily cleaning
Monday -  Laundry
Tuesday - Kitchen & Office
Wednesday - Bedrooms
Thursday - Windows & Blinds
Friday - Living & Dining 
Saturday - Bathroom

June 23 - June 29

Everyday - Daily cleaning
Monday -  Laundry
Tuesday - Kitchen & Office
Wednesday - Bedrooms
Thursday - Kitchen cupboards & schrod paperwork
Friday - Living & Dining 
Saturday - Bathroom

Thanks for reading, I'll see you with the next post.

Creating a cleaning schedule

So todays post is how to create a cleaning schedule which hopefully I can stick to. 

On researching this subject I came across a lot of layouts on Pinterest and although most were very good they weren't specific enough to what I needed. I also watched YouTube videos on cleaning schedules to get an idea of how other people handle the cleaning routine.

Currently I do a blitz clean, this is to get the whole house cleaned on one day usually a saturday morning. That my friends is the extent of the cleaning schedule in my house. If I was cooking and something spilled or water over boiled chances are we would leave this there until cleaning day. So as you can see we are a little bit slobby, I can't even imagine what it would be like if we had kids, I think the house would be a tip.

I have outlined the steps I have taken to make a cleaning routine that satisfied my schedule while spreading the chores out over the week. 

Check out this video from the Tidy Things Ireland YouTube channel which I made earlier, it runs through the below outlined steps as well. (www.youtube.com/tidythingsireland)

• Making a list of all cleaning to be done.

Do exactly as it says above, make a list of all the cleaning you can think of around your house. I thought of the following items and put them on a spreadsheet as pictured below. Once you have listed all the cleaning that needs to be done, have a look at the layout sheets from my Pinterest board to see if you have missed any for your own home. (http://www.pinterest.com/tidythingsirl/cleaning-schedules/)

• Split the list into categories

Next you need to define whether the chore is a daily, weekly, monthly etc task. Once this is complete sort the list so you have it grouped by how ofter it needs to be completed (column b).

• Create the schedule into a word document

To add more structure and as a better visual aid it is best to move the schedule to a word or pdf document. Please see the above video for the completed schedule and instruction on this.

To download this schedule please click on the Cleaning Schedule Download tab above (at the top of the page) or by clicking the following link. (https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B6yuPUxjriLVSnR5eDZuYlM5VXM/edit?usp=sharing)

Where do I start???

I have to start somewhere but where will that be. 

One of the first things I've done is made a list of goals I want to achieve over the course of this project:

• Create a cleaning schedule (daily, weekly, monthly, quarterly).
• Track my household finances.
• Plan out my meals.
• Lower my spend on groceries.
• Create an area for all important files.
• Create a binder or Filofax that contains all information above.
• De-clutter my home.
• Sort, sell and donate unwanted belongings.

I'm sure as time goes on I will add things to this list but for now the above seems a little daunting, as I've mentioned in previous posts I'm very lazy and all that seems like hard work :)

To start today I think my best bet is to do what I hope will become my daily cleaning schedule. 

1. Make the bed.
2. Hoover/Vacuum high traffic areas.
3. Put away or de-clutter items on coffee & dining room tables.
4. Collect dirty laundry.
5. Wipe clean kitchen sink, counters and stove top.
6. Wipe clean bathroom sink.
7. Bleach and clean toilet.
8. Wash & dry any dishes immediately after use.
9. Take out the rubbish/trash.

This above list might look like day to day chores for you but for me the lazy lady I usually make the bed and wash the dishes but don't dry them. I know its terrible but that's all changing.

My next blog post will be on Wednesday where I hope to share with you my full cleaning schedule and the method used to make said schedule.

Be sure to sign up to email updates so you can be the first to hear when a new post is live. Also you can follow me on twitter https://twitter.com/TidyThingsIre 

So wish me luck my follow bloggers and readers this is the start of a long rewarding process.

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The first day of the rest of my life!

I just wanted to start this blog off by introducing myself and to let you know what this blog will be about.

My name is Karen, I'm 27 and I'm from Ireland.

The purpose to this blog is to share with those reading, my journey from a lazy slob to an organised lady (hopefully).

We have just moved into a rented 2 bed apartment, we don't have much space but we have an awful  lot of belongings. We also have boxes and boxes of belongings stored at my in-laws that also need to find a place in our home if possible.

So above I called myself a lazy slob, to be perfectly honest that's a little harsh but lately I am totally unmotivated, I get up late, watch a lot of TV & YouTube and barely do enough to keep the house reasonably clean.

The reason for my lack of motivation is I have been unemployed for 18 months. In February 2013 thru June 2013 Rob & I travelled throughout Asia and it was the best experience of my life to date. After arriving back in Ireland I searched for a job but unfortunately I have yet to find one so as a results we are living off of Robs salary which is stretched thin every month (rent in Ireland is extremely high). In the past 3 months I find myself emotional, moody and slightly depressed. I hope having more organisation in my daily life will help immensely and I think creating a routine will help improve my mood each day.

This blog will be filled with a lot of to-do lists, pictures/posts of my unorganised life and hopefully pictures/posts of how I organised my life :) If that interests you please keep reading (your comments are also welcome) and following my journey.

My next post will my home tour, this will show you how my home looks before the changes happen.