Decluttering – L

Week 13 2025 – Please be aware some links contained within this blog are affiliate links, and I will earn a few pennies for every click, you do not need to purchase the product. Thank you for clicking!

Life update

Amelia had a great time at the birthday party, she wore herself out climbing crawling and walking around. It was so lovely to see her playing with her little friends and meeting some of the other parents.

Sunday was an early start, out for a nice walk with Ted before we hit soft play and headed for lunch with the other “stag-widows” and their kids. By 10am I’d already got petrol and fruit for Amelia, which appears to be gold dust at the moment! Anyone else finding that?! I had a horrific experience in aldi, being accused of stealing TWICE because the staff weren’t paying attention so I raised a complaint and am still waiting to hear back. I’m quite shocked that something so serious is taking so long to resolve. Dan came back from the stag do by lunch time, just in time for cuddles and a nap with Amelia

This week we had visitors at work, so our routine is a little shaken up with me doing different office days so I had to be extra organised. I also did an extra office morning, as I’ve been trying to practice my presentation skills as I’m a bit rusty since maternity leave. I wrote a training and delivered it electronically which has always been my comfort zome, but I decided this year I need to work on my face to face presenting skills and am picking up loads of opportunities at work where I can. I can’t share much about the topic, but building skills amd personal development (as you might be able to tell) is something I’m very passionate about, so this was a nice one to do and it went really well.

Amelia’s had her first ear infection this week and fevers so its been a rough week for all of us, as her sleeps been all over the shop. 

I feel like at the moment I have a to do list the length of my arm… I’m trying to keep ahead of things but we have such a busy 10 weeks ahead of us so I’ve spent a little bit of time this week ordering gifts and cards ready. I’m making a packing list for holiday and ordering all of our final bits so we can get packed. I’ve booked appointments for our service, MOT, pre-holiday appointments, smear, dentist… it’s going to be a BUSY few weeks!

As if I didn’t have enough on my plate haha, we’re switching banks again!! This time for good reason!  Lloyds are offering £175 incentive for switching so we’re on the move again! I think this is the last of the free money for moving as we’ve benefitted from most other switch incentives now. It ends 1st April so if you’re going to move, do it quick. Another good reason for us to move is that we’re headed on holiday soon so its perfectly timed for our travel insurance, with the added benefit of free disney plus.

Alphabet Decluttering

Alphabet Decluttering update, this week is the letter L

Ideas: Livingroom, Lighting, Loft, Larder cupboard

While I would absolutely LOVE to raid my loft again, I’m spinning enough plates at the moment and I’m going to leave that for next time around! But it did get me thinking… I have so many ideas for the space, I’d really like to turn it into an office space eventually as I HATE working in my bedroom. I’m going to start a savings pot to have it properly boarded, add electricity points, proper storage and eventually add a dormer window if we can…. probably need a lotto win!

For now, I’m going to focus on the living room – less of a decluttering project and more unfinished business…. Since I have quite a few ideas, its probably going to take us more than a week to complete:

• Declutter the current storage spaces
• Chase the joiner about the built in shelves
• Have the chimney swept
• Oil the mantel and doors
• Sort the curtains out
• Swap our drawers for a kallax unit for toy storage
• Price built in storage under the tv
• Update the decor for spring
• Full clean, including the radiator
• Spring clean the dog bed
• Put Teds chest back and move baby jail – it’s getting too easy for Amelia to watch tv
• Add finishing touches to the log store – iron on tape, new vinyl, oak lip
• A shelf behind the sofa with built in plugs…
• Sort Amelia’s toys out

Next onto more quick wins… Lighting! A lot of our house has had bare bulbs since the renovation work, and actually Amelia’s room hasn’t had the ceiling rose attached since her room was plastered in the renovations. I’ve ordered a few bits ready to fit when they arrive

• New bathroom pull cords as ours are scruffy from the reno work
• Shades for the stairs – instead of cleaning ours I chucked them away as they were just cheap from ikea and were thick of plaster dust
• Light fitting for Amelia’s room – I’ve not ordered this yet but I’ve got a few LED ceiling fans on my amazon wishlist to ask the electrician about.
• I’ve also spring cleaned our ceiling fan, as they get so filthy!

Meal Planning

Meal planning this week was a bit all over the shop with both Amelia and Dan being off colour but we had quite a variety; salmon and rice, mac and cheese, chicken fajitas to name a few.

We have a busy weekend but I’m hoping to finish typing up our food audits to my file. I’ve also added to the file some meal ideas we enjoy so that AI can use this too.

I’ve written a prompt and tried to test it but it still needs some tweaking, and I noticed that Google Gemini doesn’t allow you to upload excel files so I’ve  tweaked my prompt to accomodate copy paste lists.

Spring Cleaning

This week I’ve done more spring cleaning, washing the dog beds and a spare set of pillows!

Next on the list is the vacuum cleaners ready for a full house deep clean.

Week 13 Round Up

Unlucky for some, but not for us, week 13 has been pretty productive considering how busy it’s been.

Love, Jo-Anne x

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