FlyLady.net

Dear Friends,

In the past we have been told about a purple soup that was called FlyLady Soup? It was made with Black Beans that look purple. Did you know that you have a pie too! I like to think of it as Peace Pie!

We all start each day will a whole pie to call our own. During the day we make the choices that give away our pieces of Peace Pie. This is a special pie that nourishes you as well as feeds your soul. I am going to give you the recipe for this pie!

It starts with the desire to have a “Peace” of Pie! This peace has to come from a whole pie. So here goes with my recipe for this delightful pie.

Every pie I have ever made has a crust. This pie has a top crust and a bottom crust! This crust is made from the finest ingredients for a great foundation. These are the habits you put together to make up your routines. We start this pie the night before we want it with our before bed routine. This is the bottom crust that holds up our pie of Peace together.

It only takes a few minutes to make this crust.

Lay out your clothes for tomorrow
Check your calendar
Shine your sink and clean up after dinner
Clear off a hot spot
Put things in your launch pad so you won’t forget them
Brush your teeth
Wash your face
Go to bed at a decent hour and sleep.

This crust is a pleasure to make when you think about the joy that it is going to give you tomorrow morning when you put together the rest of this glorious pie of Peace. That alone is a great incentive. There is nothing like the taste of Peace Pie!

The top crust we will put together when we first get up in the morning. It starts with getting up a few minutes before the flow of the rest of the family. This enables you to get dressed in peace. Do you see how you can have your pie and eat it too? The pie isn’t even made yet but you are beginning to feel the taste on your tongue. The rest of your morning routine of checking your calendar, putting on your shoes, seeing what’s for dinner on your calendar, making your bed, eating breakfast and starting a load of laundry help to make this top crust fit with the bottom crust.

Now we have to put together the most luscious filling for this pie of Peace. This filling is made of our basic weekly plan and having the ingredients readily available each day we start our pie. A weekly home blessing, staying on top of Mount Washmore, planning our meals, grocery shopping, getting rid of our clutter 15 minutes at a time and taking time for you are the ingredients that make this pie melt in our mouths. Without them is the crust is very hard to put together.

Think about this. You can’t lay out your clothes if you have no clean laundry. You can’t pull out something for dinner in the morning if there is no plan and you have not gone shopping. This filling makes this pie of Peace tasty.

Your habits put this pie of peace together every day. Your lack of effective habits makes it impossible to sit down and enjoy this pie. You have a choice build your pie and enjoy it or to give away the ingredients.

Once your pie is made then you have the ability to share this peace with others and not feel deprived. This pie is dusted with granulated sugar that is your attitude of love for you. You no longer feel that someone is stealing your pie when your buttons get pushed by family or a simple mistake. You find yourself enjoying the day instead of dreading what’s next. This pie of Peace becomes the nourishment for your body and soul. It blesses all around us and you made it with your own two hands!

Can you taste this Pie of Peace?

FlyLady

Dear FlyLady,

I’ve written before and this may be a silly question, but I have been wanting to buy the dusters for sometime, but am limited on my budget.

What duster is used for what?

I hate to dust because it was always something I was forced to do because my mom hated to dust. I want to make if fun for both me and my kids. I just don’t really know the first thing about feather dusters as I was always made to use pledge and a rag.

Does the size matter? Any feedback is welcome.

Thanks,
Trying to FLY in PA

Dear Trying to FLY in PA,

We all know about being forced to dust the way our mother’s wanted us to do it! We do not have to be be our mothers to dust! We can do it our way! Feather dusters are an amazing tool that helps us to have fun and at the same time get the job done!

They don’t just move the dust around they pick it up with all of their thousands of tiny feathers. Each plume is made up of these little feathers. They do all the work, so you don’t have to!

I like to hold my duster as if it were a pencil! Then with little quick flicks of the duster; the feathers surround the items on your tables and pick up the dust so you don’t have to pick up the item. Did you know that dust does not get under the items on your tables; just around them.

If you use your duster every day then you will never have to see dust again. Isn’t that what our routines do for us! When we develop habits our homes clean themselves. Just a few short minutes in the morning and then in the evening along with picking up after yourself and your house can be on automatic pilot too!

Yes size does matter if you are vertically challenged. Our new Extreme Duster is 24 inches long and it can reach new heights. It can also reach the floor without you having to bend over!

FlyLady

Our dusters make dusting fun! The Extreme Duster and our Detailed Dusting Mitt can finally make dusting fun!

Dear FlyLady,

Thank you for all that you and your crew have done for me and my large extended family.

I found Sink Reflections at my library in November of 2002, so I’ve been fluttering over 10 years now.

I want to quickly tell you that your encouragement, routines and decluttering have saved my sanity many times over. The more recent examples include moving from Ohio to California a year and a half ago, moving from an apartment to a townhouse six months ago, and getting through my husband’s second back surgery earlier this week.

We moved twice within a year; the second time without moving help from my husband’s company, but with lots of great packing tips from FlyLady. I am writing to express my thanks regarding color-coding boxes and bags. I sealed every full, numbered container with plain packing tape, then I put a single strip of colored duct tape on top and spilling over two sides a bit, so that even in a stack, you could tell one box color from another. Yellow for the kitchen, purple, red and blue for bedrooms, green for the living room, etc.

Yes, I spent somewhere between $30 and $50 for duct tape (with some left over), but I saved well over $250 in moving costs, since it took more than an hour less than the moving company’s estimated time for their four-man crew to move us into the townhouse. I put each color of tape on a sign above the corresponding doorway, stairway or wall in the garage. Then I told the movers that red and blue make purple, so it would be easy for them to remember that those colors went upstairs. This tip, along with others from your website, made moving day easier. Even easier than our first long-distance move, when the movers packed for us.

Thanks again!

Many Blessings to you all,
Molly, a transplanted Buckeye in Mountain View, CA

FlyLady here: Sink Reflections is the first book I wrote.

In this book I tell you how I learned to FLY and then I go and teach you how to FLY, too!

Moving across town or across the country doesn’t have to be hard. You can use my moving tips and FLY to your new home.

Dear Friends,

Spring has sprung and summer is fast approaching. Are you still wearing the same makeup shades you wore all winter? Treat yourself to  a new makeup item that is a little lighter and brighter. Light summer shades are fun to wear and fun to shop for. A new lipstick, eye shadow, or blush is a great pick me up that isn’t a budget buster.

Treat yourself! You are worth it!

Love,

FlyLady Dana

Dear FlyLady,

Didn’t you know that feather dusters only push the dust around. This is not good for people with allergies.

Flybaby S.

Dear Flybaby S.

That is not the case. Chicken feathers do that but not ostrich feathers.

FlyLady

Dear FlyLady

Thanks , I did not know there was a difference. How do you clean the feathers and is it oil in the feathers that attract the dust?

FlyBaby S.

Dear FlyBaby S.

It is the feather itself that collects all the dust. There are millions of little feathers on each plume. They collect the dust. It is not oil. I took this close-up picture of my duster.

We use baby shampoo to clean the duster about once a year. Every day when you dust. You go outside and shake out the dust. We call it blessing the world.

Here is a great testimonial to help you understand how it works.

FlyLady

Dusting Should Be Illegal

Dear FlyLady,

I’m a fairly new FlyBaby. I ordered my feather duster a couple of weeks ago and just had to tell you that you’ve changed my attitude about dusting forever!

An old friend of mine and I had a saying, “Dusting should be illegal!” Neither of us liked the activity much. I always put it off until my house was thick with dust. Needless to say, when I did get around to dusting, it took forever and I’d end up sneezing and coughing afterwards. I’ve always used a rag and furniture polish, that’s how I learned to do it. After all, feather dusters just move the dust around, right?

Well, I thought I’d give your duster a try since my DH has some allergies and more frequent dusting really would be a blessing to him! I waited impatiently for my package to come (which it did very quickly) and opened it right when the mailman dropped it on the porch. It is so pretty and so luxurious! I couldn’t resist trying it out right away. I used it on my dresser which I had cleared off the last time we were in that zone. I hadn’t dusted it yet. I have to confess I was saving the dust to give my new duster an acid test. I hadn’t dusted it in probably a year. I figured it was my dresser, I didn’t have to dust it if I didn’t want to. Well, the duster stood the test! My dresser looks great. And I had such fun that I went around the rest of the house too, in a surprisingly short amount of time! Then my 4 yr old DS had a turn. We had a ball!

So now I have to say, Dusting should be illegal, it’s too much fun!

Thanks for the tool to make blessing my family fun.
FlyBaby in Staunton, VA

Dear Friends,

It is a glorious morning that has been given to us. This is the day that I spend renewing my spirit. It is up to each individual to figure out how best to do this. I have been thinking about how clutter has alienated us from family and friends.

Do you remember when we were children that people used to visit one another on Sunday afternoons? You didn’t make a phone call to warn them or ask their permission to come on over. You just got in the car and dropped in. What ever happened to this freedom to enjoy each others company?

Well I believe that the demise of visiting has occurred because Clutter has invaded our lives. All that clutter, made us not want to open the door. If you did open the door you were embarrassed by your home and your guests felt your uneasiness. How sad to think that we have lost relationships because clutter put such a guilt trip on us.

Today I want us to think about what Clutter and CHAOS has done to us as a family and a community. We no longer know our neighbors. It may take some doing, but I believe that we can revive the simple practice of visiting if we will just close the door of isolation and clutter, and open our heart to the love and joy of our friends and neighbors.

Go visit someone today or invite someone over.

Are you ready to FLY with your neighbors by your side?

FlyLady

Here is another essay that is spiritual in nature. Read if you want to!

What are you going to declutter today? 40 items, 40 bags, or 40 boxes in 40 days. Releasing your clutter is going to open up your home to friends and family.

If you have a testimonial about how you have opened up your home to visitors we want to hear it. Please send it to me FlyLady@flylady.net with OPEN DOOR in the subject line.

Dear FlyLady,

I have been FLYing (and frequently crashing!) for almost 5 years now, but unlike
many of my interrupted organizing projects, I have never stopped reading your mails.
They have kept on dinning your message into my head till I picked up my battered
wings, smoothed them over, and started FLYing again.

My younger DS ( his 2nd birthday in July) has found the kitchen to be his ideal
play area, especially when I am not around. His favorite pastimes are picking things
off the counter to taste them, hiding dirty dishes in the cabinets and taking clean
dishes from the cabinets and throwing them in the kitchen sink. Nothing on the counter
is safe until I push them to the very back. And God knows how many times I’ve had
to wash clean dishes that had fallen into “mystery water” in the sink .

So I started placing the dirty dishes in the sink directly instead of leaving them
all over the place. Then I started washing the dishes in the sink regularly after
each meal so that (a) there would be room for the next batch of dirty dishes and
(b) the clean dishes he wanted to throw in the sink would not become dirty. I also
started putting back everything and clearing the counter so that he couldn’t pull
down anything.

Yesterday, it hit me! He is making me do exactly what you have been telling me to
do all these years!!! He even helps me drink my water in the blazing heat of summer
in North India by asking for water each hour or half hour. Whenever I give him a
drink of water, I drink some too. I can’t tell you how the hydration has helped.
FLYing in India!

P.S. – Other FLYbabies can have him for loan during the daytime if they want. Excellent
for cleaning up whole home in a jiffy!!!

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FlyLady here: We will do things for our children more than we will do them for ourselves.

I am so proud of you for staying hydrated and putting things away as you finish with them.

Drinking our water is a great habit to give us more energy. Do you have a water
bottle that keeps your water cool without dribbling condensation all over your furniture
and car? Our water bottle keeps your water cold!

Dear FlyLady,

I bought your wonderful Rubba Sweepa to help pull stubborn dog hair out of my rugs, which it does marvelously. But now that it’s been in my house for a month, I’m thinking of making mine a superhero cape!

Recently a BO friend of mine mentioned how she really needed to clean behind her refrigerator more often than she does. This sparked some interest in my brain since I’ve had my refrigerator for three years and never once pulled it out to sweep. So, last night I decided to be brave and pulled the refrigerator out from the wall, revealing dirt so thick and mysterious I could not put a name to it. But instead of shuddering and rolling the refrigerator back, or whining for 30 minutes, I heard a television announcers voice say, “This looks like a job for RUBBA SWEEPA!” Five minutes later all the debris was gone, the floor was scrubbed, and the dirty water was squee-gee’d away, allowing me to roll the fridge back, rinse my superhero tool, and smile quietly to myself.

Thank you FlyLady for making such a useful and versatile tool! It’s given me the courage to tackle all kinds of messes without a whimper!

Fluttering Along in Virginia

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FlyLady here; I use mine on my non-skid tile in my bathroom. It has a rough texture and is difficult to clean; my Rubba Sweepa does the job with just soap and water. I do one tile at a time; each time I have to go in there. Let’s just say, I am drinking my water. LOL My bathroom is small. By the end of the day every tile is clean and I am happy.

We also have a package with all our Rubba Tools.

Dear Friends,

We have all been guilty of whining! Me too. It is when we realize we are whining that can stop it.

Whining is an excuse for not doing what needs to be done. We say we don’t have time or that no one else helps me so why should I do it. Then we go on strike! Wow that is an ugly thought.

A strike is something that workers do in order to make working conditions better! That is joke when it comes to our homes. We all know what happens when we don’t do what needs to be done! The house falls apart right around us and it is even worse than it was before.

I know you all don’t believe me, but if you will just do a simple morning routine (3 items) and a simple before bed routine(3 items) you will start building the foundations of a peaceful home. Your routines are not strait jackets! They are the stepping stones that guide you through your day!

I like to think of them as learning a new dance step or aerobic workout! You don’t join a class and know all the steps. You have to put a few steps together in one little section and when those steps become automatic then you add other steps.

I don’t expect you to do my full blown routines. Just use them as a guide. Adapt them to fit your family, but there are some key steps that you can’t leave out!

Laying your clothes out at night
Shining your sink
Go to bed at a decent hour
Getting up and getting dressed to LACE-UP Shoes, Fixing your hair and face
Swishing and swiping the bathroom while you are dressing
Make your bed

All of these things will do one important thing to you! Put a smile on your face. We all need to smile more. Did you know that you are less likely to whine if you are smiling?

Are you ready to dance(FLY) through your day with a smile on your face?

FlyLady

This testimonial was the God Breeze for this Morning Musing:

Dear FlyLady,

I am sorry you are getting flack about your messages. I think you are right. Also, I think that those who criticize are frequently looking for an excuse not to do what needs to be done – ie: sweep the floor and make the dinner, etc.

How often have we gotten mad at our DH and thought “the heck with it, he can make his own dinner for a change?” Often what we’re angry about is trivial, but it’s a good excuse to sulk and lounge around. Likewise, those who criticize your spelling and grammar mistakes are looking for excuses not to follow your program. After all, I wouldn’t make those mistakes, so I’m better than you and don’t have to sweep under the bed, right? It’s a twisted perfectionism. If I concentrate on the mistakes, I can ignore the message. We perfectionists are easily irritated, and love to feel superior as we throw up our hands in disgust and say “well, what does she know?”

Well, I’ll tell you what FlyLady knows – she knows a crummy excuse when she hears it, and is rightly going to tell us to shape up and quit whining. After only two weeks on FlyLady’s program, my house looks better than it has in years, and my English Lit degree had nothing to do with it!

Frankly, Marla, you can make all the mistakes you want – just don’t give up on us.

Thanks for everything.
FLY Baby G in Canada

Hi FlyLady and Crew,

I’ve been FlyWashed! I love the Rubba Scrubba and want more of your products!! What is the difference between dry mopping with the FlyLady Mop and using the Rubba Sweepa?

Thanks so much!

Flybaby LaLa

Dear LaLa,

The biggest difference that I feel is the speed. You can move really fast with the micro-fiber head or the red dust mop head. The rubba sweepa does a great job on carpet and throw rugs. We use it all the time for rugs at our doors.

For my daily dust mop of my floors, I love the red dust mop head. We only have hardwood floors. With three dogs and two cats we have lots of paw prints and dust bunnies. I can do my floors in the time it takes for my coffee to brew! I even did a video of me speeding through my floors because Nikki did not believe me. This was before we had our red dust mop head. Now it is even faster.

The beauty of the red dust mop head is that it like the Hey Tom Car Duster. It is impregnated with wax and it grabs the dirt and dust. Then all you have to do is take it outside and give it a good shake. You don’t have to wash it. You can but I would only do it once a year. Then you wash it alone and in cold water. You will remove the wax if you use warm or hot water. I feel that if you think it needs washed then for only $10:49 just get a new one once a year. This is 88 cents a month!

Our red mop head fits the FlyLady Mop.

Here is my little video of a quick dust mop of my floors. I was using the micro-fiber cloths because we had not developed the red duster head.

Here is our FlyLady Mop Package.

So to answer your question; I use my Rubba Sweepa for my throw rugs and my red dust mop head daily for my floors and I use the micro-fiber pad for my wet mopping of those puppy toe prints.

As I am writing this I did my floors for my weekly home blessing.

I also use my rubba sweepa for my porches and when it snows; it comes into its own!

Having my floor looking nice helps me release stress.