Week Nineteen: The Mission

It's become a habit during the last couple of years to spend time with my nieces at their home - not mine. Partly because it's so convenient. Their toys are there, their clothing, their special foods, their diapers --- all the gear you need to babysit a two year old and a ten month old. To be perfectly honest, though, part of the reason is that when your home is as chaotic and messy as mine used to be, you stop extending invitations. Because having somebody over means having to clean like a maniac before they arrive.

Last weekend, my sister brought my nieces over on Sunday. They're having some work done at their house and the washing machine and dryer have been disconnected, so she brought some laundry over to my place. It was a wonderful afternoon. Kitten fluttered about, investigating all of Auntie's knick knacks and jumping on the bed, while the baby - I'll call her Poppet - played patiently with a deck of cards. Picking them up, passing them one at a time to whomever was near, messing the pile about. The nicest thing about their visit was just how relaxed and un-tired I felt. I had a few things to do before they arrived to put my living room and bathroom to rights, but the housekeeping routine I've been carving out for myself has made such a difference! I guess I hadn't realized how far I've come until I was suddenly seeing the place through new eyes. My kitchen was clean, the bedroom was clean, my living room was tidy. And all this before I made any special preparations for their arrival...

What a change in just four months. My morning and evening chores have become practically natural. My weekly chores on Mondays through Thursdays still make me groan on occasion, but they don't seem nearly as tough as they used to. And the feeling of going to sleep at night having accomplished all of my missions for the day is so good. Just like a great day at work, where I'm busy, busy, busy - but knowing come 5:00 that so many of my "to dos" are done. My weekly cleaning-of-the-kitchen is far from a habit, but that, too, will come in time... One of my fondest hopes is that my nieces will have lovely memories one day of Auntie's house. That it was a cozy, clean, happy place with good meals and pretty things. It's amazing how children (even when they're one step removed) make your future a fixed target. Suddenly, that future is right in front of you and it's time for me to create that home I want them to enjoy visiting. Even Aunties feather their nests!

While I'm adjusting to the kitchen work and the dinners, it seems kind of convenient that my next mission is not a labor intensive one.

Do the bulk of the weekly food marketing on Saturday afternoons.

As I mentioned some time ago, the manual recommends that the housewife do the bulk of her marketing "on a day when local stores offer special prices. Often Friday and Saturday are bargain days." The authors of The Good Housekeeping Housekeeping Book (1947) also advise their readers to do some marketing twice a week, but suggest that Mondays and Fridays would be the most efficient days to do so. My plan is to do the bulk of my grocery shopping at the supermarket on Saturdays - probably Saturday afternoons - and to supplement it with a quick stop on Wednesday evenings at one of the stores where I buy organic milk, free range eggs, etc. The Wednesday trip alone hasn't added much in the way of efficiency to my household, but I'm hoping that the two in tandem will make a real difference.

Week Four: The Mission

This week's mission will be the last step in building my early morning housekeeping routine.

Put living room in order.

• Open windows top and bottom for free circulation of air.
  
• Pick up and replace small articles belonging in the room, such as books, magazines, music, games, victrola records, cards, etc.
  
• Gather up on tray to be taken out: used ash trays, articles belonging in other rooms, plants or flowers to be tended. Collect trash in waste basket.
  
• Carry out tray.

Why does the living room come first? Why not get the breakfast dishes washed before embarking on the day's work? Why not get started cleaning one of the other rooms? The authors of the manual explain the method to their madness as they describe why each member of the family should help straighten up the living room before going to bed at night:

The living room belongs to the whole family. To each person it is a place for quiet recreation, relaxation, study or rest. Surely those who enjoy the living room should share the responsibility for seeing to it that clutter and confusion do not mar its restful air of hospitality.

This does not mean that the room should not have the charm of livability. It does mean that each person should be thoughtful enough to put away school books and papers, playing cards, sewing or the stamp collection, as the case may be, when work or play is over. If every one helps by picking up newspapers, returning magazines to table or rack, and emptying ash trays just before bedtime each evening, the homemaker will have just that much less to do during the busy hours of the next morning. And the living room will present a serene face to the earliest caller.

Pop ins! Getting everybody fed and off to school or work was top priority, but being prepared for pop-in visitors was the very next item on the agenda. Even if you were busily working away in another room when a salesman came by or a neighbor popped in for a cup of sugar, you'd have a tidy living room in which to receive them. Our homes today are so much more private than they were once upon a time. We expect visitors and guests only when they've been invited. And rarely do any salespeople knock on our doors these days. Imagine what it must have been like knowing that you might have a caller at any time between breakfast and bedtime...