Making the bed

I wonder what is special about making the bed that makes me feel so well.

I feel acomplished, I feel whole, balanced, normal, powerful.

I feel that I can do all things.

I've been reading about it and I found this, taken from a video, about the benefits of making the bed:

• Boosts Mental Well-being & Productivity: Starting the day with a completed task provides a "small win" that can trigger a domino effect of other productive behaviors.
• Reduces Stress & Creates Calm: An unmade bed can feel chaotic; making it creates a sense of order and calm, improving your mood and reducing anxiety.
• Improves Sleep Quality: A neat, organized bedroom environment promotes better sleep hygiene.
• Encourages Better Habits: Making the bed acts as a "keystone habit," often leading to higher self-discipline and better organization in other areas of life.
• Hygiene & Maintenance: It allows bedding to air out and, by covering sheets, reduces the amount of dust that settles on them. 
• Making the bed is viewed as a foundational act of self-care, demonstrating to oneself that they are worth the effort of creating a calm, orderly space.

 Also:

• Starts Your Day with Discipline- we all fight the uphill battle of being disciplined. When you do something simple like make your bed every day it bolsters your ability to make the tough decisions in other areas you are trying to being disciplined. It says to yourself, “I am and will be a disciplined person today.”
• Sends a Message to Your Life- Nothing sends a signal to your life that you are an orderly person that leaves things better than they were before like making your bed. I’ve even become so convinced of the power in this that I make my bed when staying at hotels (which I do quite too often).
• Kickstarts a Sense of Accomplishment- By making your bed you will feel as if you already crossed something off your to-do list before you even get dressed! Can’t beat that! For those compulsive to-do listers (like myself) you can always write it down and then cross off at the top your list when making your list for the day. Score one for me! (told you I was a sick man)
• Helps Initiate Your Bedtime Routine- The final thought is in regards to your evening bedtime routine. Pulling down the sheets does something powerful to your mind and body by sending the vibe that bedtime has come. There is a reason they pull down the sheets at a luxury hotel. Build your own luxury feel and prepare yourself for bed by putting down the sheets and getting into an organized and comfy bed.(https://medium.com/@joelstockstill/6-reasons-why-making-your-bed-is-so-important-a1cd22b0c005)

And now all this takes us to an important detail: 

• to make the bed as soon as our feet touch the floor, as Flylady says, or to wait a bit so tha bed can be aired?

As for me it's impossible to make it when it's still hot, I must air it and only after that I make it, unless I'm going to travel and there's no time to wait.

I found an article defending my point of view and I was very pleased with that.

What's your take on that ? Immediately or minutes later?

And is it important to you to make the bed in the morning? Why?

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Laundry Day

Don't be deceived by the title, I don't think it's the best system to have a day to do all the laundry from the beginnig to the end.

Well, for some people it's the best way of doing it and that is right, if for you it works like that, the better, carry on doing it that way, it's just that for me it doesn't work at all.

So, I try to wash a load every day, usually in the night, unless it's Saturday or it's an off work day that I try to have each month.

Now I hear the chorus of people saying: what, to wash in the night? Yes, and now I will hear even more people disagreeing when I say that  I wash in the night, most days - safe saturdays and the aforementioned off work days - and I only dry it in the morning.

Yes, it's my way of doing it: to wash in the night and put on line in the morning before going to work.

In the evening when I come home I take them from the line. If it's something that not needs ironing I fold and put in their places, if it needs it, it will wait till Saturday for ironing. It will wait very cosy in the basket.

Now things have been very bad in that matter because the rain doesn't stop for a moment and if it does and people feel the tempation of placing the washed clothes on the line, it will take just the time for us to finish and the rain will begin falling again.

In my life I had two driers, one each time, 😀 but now I haven't, I decided that there's no better way to dry than putting the clothes on the line.

Ah and when it rains too much ? Patience, we have enough clothes to wait till the rain stops. Only little things will  be washed and dried in small hanging things inside the  balcony.

Better days will come. I can't wait to put our clothes on the line.

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Tuesday Turn About #343 Spring Fling at My Wee Abode

Homestead Blog Hop at Ridge Haven Homestead

Restart

I read at the Afternoon Coffe and Evening Tea a sentence that I agree the most and that I will remember as it is so inspiring:

The beginning is always today

That reminds me what Flylady says:

What's wrong with now?

and

Jump in where you are

Those two last sentences have been helping me for ages and now I will add the first one that says that the beginning is today. Always.

Truly we need to not beat ourselves each time we fall off the wagon because, as Flylady says, there is no wagon, you just jump in where you are.

And I keep doing that, jumping in. Restarting.

Maybe someone who reads this is thinking about times that it happened to her. Maybe it happens often. Never mind, never give up on you. Get up, trust, life is not a reaching point, it's a way of traveling, sometimes we are better, sometimes not so good but after each fall, rise up.

As for me I'm having the intention of getting better in many things and I will do what I can to be like that, even if some days are not so sucessful, there are other that are better.

And one of the things that I want to do is to take Flylady more serious again, even if I do it my way.

Her teachings are not the Sacred Scriptures, we can disagree in some things and want to do differently, but in the whole, it's a good system that I discovered in 2001.

So, what are you waiting for? Just start.

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Tuesday Turn About #343 Spring Fling at My Wee Abode

Homestead Blog Hop at Ridge Haven Homestead

Identity

I just can't find the will to change my blog header because it shows so well what I truly am, what I like. 

This painting reminds me my childhood when my grandmother, the one who knew how to do everything and did it so well, would seat at the sewing machine, in front of the window, which had plants on the windowsill, and made all sorts of sewing, from just simple repairs to clothes to very elaborated and difficult dresses and all kind of things.

Not that we hadn't shop bought clothes, my parents quite often traveled abroad and my mother bought ready made dresses and all kind of clothes, but the ones made by my grandmother were rather special.

I have, from my grandmother, the liking of working with the sewing machine but not her ability but I'm decided to try hard to increase my work at the machine by quantity and quality so I will be more able to make nice things. I  know I will never, ever reach her level, not at all, but I truly want to be better in that.

To be better was the idea I had in my mind in the  begining of last year and in this one I have it again in the sense of going the extra mile.

Not to be better as to be a good person, or a better one, I mean to be better as to have more quality in those things that I know how to do it and how to be it, to be even better than I am. So with this I'm not saying that I am not good, just that I want to be even better - and really much better.

So, if someone is reading this, please remind yourself that you are good enough in many things, don't put yourserlf down, because for sure you are good in many things but you may and you should, if you want, to be even better.

On the header of my blog, if someone remembers, the one before the present one, I used to have lavender in it because it's a kind of flag to me, a symbol of me, as I am traditional, I like the old ways, I have an inclination for things past and I relate lavender with all that, in true elegance, simple and sober, in me and in the house and in mentality.

“So strong is Tradition that later generations will dream of what they have never seen.”

 G.K. Chesterton

Even the name of my blog means that: Alfazema = Lavender.

It's what I am.

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Talking about it Tuesday at Slices of Life

Saturday

Tomorrow it will be Saturday. Oh blessed day, I do like Saturdays.

Now I will tell you why. I work full time but I am an homemaker. So, in the week days I do less work but obviously I must do a lot of it,it's just that just I can't savour it properly because either I am in the morning rushing or in the evening already tired.

But not on Saturdays!

So, I awake up early and I go wild doing things !

I do my morning routine: me time (washing and dressing, etc), I do a quick tidying all around, including living room and kitchen, bedroom, and everything, as I am not at all a night woman, I am very much a morning person, I do like to awake up early and listen to the birds and watching the day being born.

In the morning, quite early, I go shopping. I do like to do it when the shop is opening and there are just a few people there. Such calm. The produce is all there and not chosen yet by the customers, everything is nice and tidy. It's a pleasure.

Then I go home and there I go and do what I want in my homemaker realm, being laundry one of my favourite activities.

So, after washing, I put them on the line to dry with the sun, which gives it such a nice smell.

Ironing is a good thing too. I do it in front of the television and I either watch the news or a video on youtube, being the subject homemaking or doctrine and eschatology.

I hoover too, I dust, I wash the floors, I do a lot of cleaning and tidying, I cook and I do some declutter in my bedroom which makes me find always something that I forgot, which I call " go shopping" inside my house.

Oh hapiness !

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Home Matters Linky Party #562

Ridge haven Homestead  for  Homestead Blog Hope

Catherines Corner  for The First TFT Blog Hop 2026

Tuesday Turn About #343 Spring Fling at My Wee Abode

I'm not modern

 No, I'm not modern, I don't want to be.

It's not that I want to live in the past, it's just that I feel that the revolution of the 60' robeded us from so many good things.

The tendencies were not nice, in the mental field and in aestethics.

                         

Look at the clothes, for instance. Remember how people had nice clothes till the middle of the sixties.

Remember the 30's, the 40's.

 And the 50's. And the begining of the 60's.

From there things went down.

I know we had some things nice in the end of the 80' and on the 90', some very nice, but in the whole, we lost so much.

The mentality. From being a good thing for women to stay at home, people, most of them, began thinking that it would be best towork outside.

I'm not saying that is wrong to do it, I always did, it's just that I don't think that staying at home women are less interesting than the ones who work, most time is quite the opposite.

The morals. With the passing decades things got lost, even if there is still a remnant who follow God sent rules.

I long for a return to the good times and I do believe that it will happen.

But for now, I prefer to do what I can and I try to live in the old ways. I don't mean renouncing to techologic advances, that is a thing that I like. Why not? But I am old fashioned and I like so much to be that way.

Partying at

Costal Bohemian

A mess in the kitchen ?

Just look to that image. Don't we feel like that, in the end of the day, so many times?

We make dinner, everybody eats and then rests and we look at all the mess and feel so tired to take care of the kitchen.

Never mind. You would expect me to say now: 

- just engage everybody to help because you are not a slave; 

- you did already all that work making the dinner, now it's time to rest and let them do the cleaning;

- you can't let the kitchen like that, if they don't help, do it yourself

- don't go to bed with a messy kitchen

- God forbid to have a house like that

- and so on.

But now let's think: it's just to put things in the washer, so why to have a war because nobody helps? It's better to do it ourseves and in a minute it's done and everybody will be happy. Then you will have a tidy and clean kitchen, a happy faced family and you too will have some rest.

We must give thanks for having a house with a kitchen and food and family and a living room where to go and talk with your family and watch some television or a film or series.

- But I haven't a washer (for several reasons) and it's so much work.

Ok, then you begin, wash everything and let it to dry. Then you have two choices: either you put it way in the morning after being drying all night, which is ok, or someone will help you.

And clean the countertops, for some the sink it's everything, for me it's the countertops.

We don't need to be perfect, what we need is to live in peace. Do what you feel it's better and remember that you haven't to prove anything to anybody, just do what is needed for you to feel well.

- Oh, well, I have no energy at all in the evening, I just can drag myself to the sofa and rest. 

Well, now I will give you an advice that will raise a lot of eyebrows: do it in the morning if you know that you will have lots of energy then. Never mind what other people think and say.

Wake up earlier, go to the kitchen, shut the door so nobody will hear the noises. Put things in the dish washer or wash it by hand. Dry it and put it in the cup board. Clean the countertops. Sweep the floor.

Now look: isn't your kitchen so nice? Don't you feel well and victorious? And powerful? And full of energy !

And the day is beginning, the morning is such a wonderful time. And you have a nice, clean kitchen.

Now you begin to hear you children and husband waking up to a nice and tidy house. And all that begins with a tidy kitchen.

It's so good to have a home and a family. Thanks be to God.

Partying at Homestead Blog Hop, County Road and Modern on Monticello

You are not behind

Talking of homemaking I had been in a roller coaster for years: sometimes things went well, sometimes they didn't.

Even being a working outside woman with four children everything went well - or pretty close - till I had a change in my working times and everything went down the drain.

Add to the mixture several depressions along the years. Do I need to say that I still struggle ? But I have good news, I'm getting better and better.

Now I try to remember several times a day that Flylady says that there is no such thing as falling off the wagon. Jump in where you are, she says, you are not behind ! And do you know something ? She is right.

My house is getting better and better and I am too.

If this house - that is your real house and your body, in and out - is in need of a good tidying, don't feel down, just jump in. You are not behind !

I saw a post I did years ago when I was looking back to some goals and difficulties I had and I must say some are done and others I still struggle with.

Let's see them:

- To get up at 6.15

Oh, well, I don't need it anymore now that the girls have grown, no babies anymore and they help with their clothes and all so I don't need to get up that early.

Don't I ? That's why the clothes are piling to be folded and put away, not to mention other chores in the house.

So I will now have again that goal of getting up early and have some work done before going to work.

Maybe not waking up at 6.15 for now, later but not late and trying to get up a little earlier bit by bit till reaching the most convenient hour - and maybe that hour is not 6.15.

Even so, the "she rises when is still night" is still very important to me.

- To fold 40 pieces of clothing everyday

Just let us aim to 20 and we will see how things go.

- To put away those folded clothes everyday instead of leaving it in the basket.

Very good goal, I must say. I do like to do the laundry, to wash it, to put it on the line, to pick it up and, sometimes, to fold it. To put away is my struggle. I must work on it. Again.

-Declutter the Laundryroom everyday a little bit.

Major problem, the laundryroom, for years. Some time ago, and I mean just months ago, I managed with the help of my eldest, to have the dreaded laundryroom done. But you know what? Things are not anymore as good as they were. I really must do some work there. Again.

- Pray the Rosary everyday

That is very important ! I always prayed the Rosary but I must say that some days went on without it. Not good as Our Lady in Fátima said to pray it everyday.

Do you know what? I now pray the Rosary everyday without failing a single day ! This is going for months and months now ! And I can see the results. Do you doubt it ? Ok, just try it and you will see.

Most people just have things for granted and there is no much prayer in their life. I always had and I'm having more and more prayer in my life, thanks God.

I can see that I still struggle with some of those problems but I'm very pleased to see that on some others I am better.

And what about the others that I didn't mention here ? I jumped in and I'm getting better and better.

Yes, I'm not behind !

Partying at :
Dishing it & Digging it at Angie the Freckled Rose
Amaze me Monday at Dwellings
Inspiration Monday at Refresh Restyle
Inspire me Tuesday at A Stroll Thru Life
Home and Garden Thursday at A Delightsome Life

A fridge story

So now I will tell you about my fridge, or I should say fridges.

Years ago we moved. Our fridge was old and small and we needed a new one.
There I went to chose one and I came home very happy with a nice fridge that was much bigger, pretty and new. And it worked very well.

Years later, not many, we moved again and the new house had a fridge already, the kind that we look at it and it sembles a armário but we open it and it's a fridge and a freezer.
I didn't want at all to loose my old new fridge and my husband said that we should keep it because in a big family two fridges and two freezers would not be too much. And he was right.

Now, many years later, the one that was already in the house decided to not be cold inside at all. A man to fix it was called and he proclaimed that the money to make an old fridge and freezer work would be better spent in a new one. We agreed.

Now enters the one that we brough with us. He still works well but we made a big decision and some not yet done decisions are to be made.
I will explain.
We went to the shop to see new fridges as the one that stopped working and realized that for the price of one like that we would have another very good, big and not so expensive that would not be inside a armário. We decided then to buy a normal one -we stil didn't do it - and transform the armário where is the old one that must go to the rabbish. It wil be a proper armário. Yay ! I'm really happy with my decision.
We will keep the old one and buy a new one just not one inside a armário. Ah, that empty space transformed in a armário. I'm already thinking on the big help it will be because it will be a place, as Winnie the Pooh said, to put things in.

Then I began thinking: what about, instead of having two fridges, if we had just one but big ?

Oh, well, I couldn't decide yet. I will tell you when I do.

Adventures in the laundry room

This is my old washer and I will tell you her story.

When we married and later when we had our older children in their younger years, we had a washer, as everybody does, no big deal in that. The problem is that with time she became making frequent visits to the man who repaired washers.

Then, tired of those visits, we decided that was time to buy a new one. My husband decided that we had to have one that was a dryer at the same time as it would save space. So we bought two in one.

It has quite a lot of years now and we had to call the repair man some four times and another: the first ones were because with the years going by either was the dryer that didn't dry ( it happened only once), or that the tube where the water went to the washer was dry and the other was that it was the tube where the water went out, which it happened the same thing to the other one. Another time was that the rubber in the oppening was too dry already and leaked a little water.
Then, and this time was much worse, the mecanism that was the heart of the machine decisions and programs was tired and stopped to work - which I understood as it was already getting old.
The repair man was called and he deliberated that it was such a good machine, a good brand (Zanussi) and we should repair it instead of thinking on buying a new one. Well, ok, we accepted.

Now, some two or three years past, it stopped working. It began with a big bang and the basket was a bit loose but it still worked. Now it stopped.
The repair man was called again and he said that, to be honest, he had to tell me that it's better to buy a new one because that repair would be too expensive to an old washer.

Now that I must buy a new one I decided that I don't want a special brand at all, I only want one that works and is not fussy and no way of buying a dryer at all as we have plenty of sun and we hardly use the drier. That's final !

I will keep you posted on next episodes.

Ah, Saturday...

If you read my blog you know that I keep talking about Saturdays. A good deal of posts are about that blessed day of the week.

Days in the week I like most:

Monday.
Why ? - are you wondering. Is that I like so much to work outside that I'm happy to go back to the stress of getting ready in the morning, do lunch boxes, yell at the children to be ready and fly off the door so we will not be late ? No. It's because it's a new beginning and I feel the hope of being better this time.

Wednesday.
Ah, it's the middle of the week, such a good time, when I go home in the end of the day I know that the following day will be so close to the weekend.

Friday
Ah, Friday!... The day after is Saturday, I will not go to work, I will be home with my family, I will delight myself with the pleasure that is to stay at home. I will... Yes, all the world will be in my reach when it's Saturday because I will not go to work.
And I wonder and dream and plan...As if would be no end for Saturday.

Saturday
At last ! At last ! Ah, blessed day !
In the early morning I will get up and spend a good time flying the internet, I will be on Flickr a good deal of time, I will spy what is going on in Facebook and if I can I will even go to Pinterest.
Then I will get ready for the day. Oh, the endless possibilities that lie ahead. Not to be outside, mind you, I am outside my home all week long, Saturday is the day to celebrate domesticity, to be happy at home and pretend I am a stay at home woman. And I am, at least for this day and next one.

Sunday
It's the truly blessed day. Day to go to Mass and not to work much in the house because it's rest day, Our Lord's day. I can just stay in the sofa and read, watch movies - notice the plural, movies. Or series.
Life is good.
The problem is that the day after I must go back to work and that part is not so good - even if that work is good but not so much good as staying at home.
Never mind, Monday is good to make plans and try to be better - a week at a time.

On Kitchens

One thing I am sure, I know what I want and I like about kitchens. Each person has his own style and likes so this is not a critic to anybody. At all. Each person has the right to like what they like and want what they want. It's their house and it's their kitchen. But today I will talk about mine. The kitchen, I mean, the one I have and the one I dream about, the one I want to have.

First. I don't like soft lines in the kitchen, you know those floating lines like someone in a painting of Chagal, as if they were a kind of ghost or smoke. I like sturdy kitchens. I like a kitchen that we look at and feel safe, we feel strong - the kitchen and us. Well, that doesn't mean I must have a farm, a country kitchen, those really sturdy, I just don't want cupboards and countertops with soft lines, I want to look at them and feel strength. 

Then I need life in the kitchen. I keep seeing wonderful, beautiful kitchens all over the internet who are so nice and tidy they look they are in display in a shop to be sold. No one lives there. No, my kitchen has to be lived in, with signs of people, even if they are not absolutely tidy. I don't mean messy, just lived.

So I like strong lines on the doors of the cupboards, granite or marble countertops. I like wooden colour doors but I accept that a white kitchen lights up my soul and makes me feel well, wanting to live.

I need some strong colours to complement the white: greens, oranges and yellows. Or maybe red and yellow - even more lively, a kind of vintage even. Or blue and pink. Colours.

And wood accents, no doubt.

I do like my kitchen but it needs some improvement, I don't want to change it, just to make it better.
As I'm getting more and more out of my depression, I feel the need and the strength to live, to really live and my house is my world where I want to live fully.

Oh, life is good, let's live it !

...

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Share Your Style @ Northern Nesting
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Cleaning fridges

Oh, well, my fridges were in good and overdue need of a good cleaning and the freezer of defrosting.

Yes, I have two because when we bought this house there was already a big, for European standards, fridge in the house but I had bough one, in the previous house, some time before.

What to do, I thought and asked my husband, very sad with the idea of getting rid of my new fridge. Oh, we will keep both , he said, as we are a big family - again, for European standards, mainly for this corner of Europe.

So we kept them both.

I like that idea very much because it's so good to have plenty of room for everything. The problem is when the time to defrost arrives. So I delay it. Procrastinator as I am I always find a good way to procrastinate about it the most I can - till the days when we can hardly close it because we have so much ice in it that is more a box of ice than a freezer and it's difficult to keep things in and close the door.

So...we abstained to buy fridge food the most we could so it was possible to move everything from one to the other and clean it.

So I did it and also the fridge. Everything clean.

But then... I though, oh, no, it's not at all like so many people in those blogs I see where fridges are so neat and beautiful with everything so well organised in pretty containers.

Ok, never mind, it's clean and nice with some containers I had previously.

I will not give my fridges as an example on how to keep a perfectly organised fridge and freezer. But mine are clean and tidy and that is good enough.

Did I say I cleaned both fridges and both freezers? Well, I did and I am very happy about it.

I know my blog will never be an inspiration for people who want to have a perfect home but it will be good enough to inspire people to cope with a non perfect home.

Still, it's my home and for me it's the best place on earth !

...

And now I'm going to this Party:

Amaze Me Monday@Dwellings The Heart of Your Home

The bliss of Saturdays

There's a thing on Saturdays that make me feel happy.

I work full time and even if it's a good, peaceful job, it doesn't compare to being at home. To be a stay at home woman is the dream of my life - well, one of them.

Most of my dreams have come true: to grow up and being a wife and mother, to have my own grown up home (being married) are some of my dreams and truly the most important ones.
But living here it means to work full time and I did.Not because what the others would say if I didn't, it's just a normal thing that grows with us and it's so normal as going to school.

But  don't want it anymore. I had enough. So I dream on having an earlier retirement. This moment it looks like to wanting the moon but I will not despair because one of these days ( years) it will  come a law that will allow me to retire before the extreme date of retirement. It must be !

Meanwhile I play the full time housewife on Saturdays and Sundays and on holidays. I even can have a free day each month providing I do those hours through the month. Ah, on those days I do play house.

Today is Saturday and I can't stop dreaming about all those chores I will do in the house.
I can already feel the smell of those clothes freshly ironed, the light of the morning sun through the kitchen window and the voice of my children waking up happy because it's not school day and they can stay at home - like their mother, they like to stay at home.

The blessing of having a house and being able of giving thanks for it.
Thanks God for everything He gives us.

All clean and tidy

I wish...(sigh)

All clean and tidy is the title of this picture and the dream I have for my home.

I work all day long, all week so I keep dreaming about Saturday, the wonder day when I will, at last, clean and tidy.
In the week days, as I arrive so tired of body and mind, I just do the bare things and look for inspiration for that wonderful day when I will be a stay at home wife and mom... And that day is Saturday.

So, to keep my spirit up, in the week I look for inspiration in those beautiful blogs written by amazing homemakers who can have their houses so clean and tidy, organized and beautiful.

I add blogs and blog to my ever growing list and when I am reading them I feel happy because I feel encouraged. I feel that even if I can't be as god as them, for sure I can be better than now.

I was thinking on add here a tiny list of my favourites on homemaking and organizing, but I can't. There are so many good ones.

If someone knows about a really good blog on organizing and/ or homemaking - one that is not in my list, that is - please tell me.

A site I follow, not a blog, is Flylady, I wonder if someone here knows her.
I found her years ago and things were going pretty well but I fell of the wagon twice and the second time it was a very big fall. First time it was when we moved, years ago. I recovered quite well after that and everything was getting better and better. Then...I had a depression and only now I'm having the strenght to go back to normality. It has been a slow wagon but each year has been better than the previous one. Last October I felt I really should try harder - and I am.
Some days are just a big fall, others go better.

I think now I'm ready to go (almost) in full steam.