Random Photo Of Cuteness
I’ve noticed something lately as the cleanliness of the house goes the way of the pooper. (I have no idea what that even means, it just sounds funny.) I’m a big fan of the Put It In A Pile method of cleaning. And I probably should have put cleaning in quotes there, since I don’t know if the Put It In A Pile method qualifies as cleaning, but for the sake of argument we’ll leave it without the quotes. I like to pretend it counts as cleaning.
What I mean is, I only have – let’s say – seven minutes to clean the house. On a normal day, before I go to bed, I like to do that. Quickly pick up the crap around the house to make it look nicer so when I wake up in the morning I’m not so disgusted with my home that I just crawl back into bed. (Trust me, it’s a possibility, I’ve done it before.) Since I obviously don’t have time to really clean, I just implement the Put It In A Pile method.
I choose an area that is cluttered, like the kitchen counter, and just find ways to take what is out on the counter and Put It In A Pile. Now, if it’s something is really foreign to the counter, like a shoe, I’ll put that somewhere closer to where it actually belongs. Like, I’ll throw it in the bedroom of the person who normally wears it. And possibly yell, “Why the Hell did you put your shoe on the counter?” But that’s part of my Yelling All The Time parenting technique, we’ll discuss that some other day.
But the general clutter on the counter? I’ll just scoot it all into a pile. Coupons, keys, pacifiers, stickers. Push it all in a pile and leave that pile somewhere kinda hidden. Like in front of the recipe box on the side counter you don’t always notice. This way, when I walk in the kitchen in the morning I’m all “Oh! Clean kitchen!” But really? The shit has been put in a pile and scooted out of sight.
Many of these piles in my house are disguised and hidden better than others. Like, we have a huge bin in the living room for toys. Throwing everything in that bin (toys, books, crayons, children) is part of the Put It In A Pile method, the bin is just a way to contain and hide the pile. We have bins for art supplies and toy kitchen paraphernalia as well. Essentially we just put it in a pile, the pile just happens to have a container to live in.
It really works for our family on surfaces like the desk and the bathroom counters as well. Every flat work area in our home has a small pile o’ random shit somewhere on it. Usually in a back corner, maybe hidden behind a pen jar, or a candle. Just look closely and you’ll find it. NikkiZ’s room has several piles of randomness because if I tried to actually put all of her hair clips and bracelets and ribbons up every time I found one on the floor? I’d spend my entire life in her room. Instead? There’s just The Pile. It is in her room and it has everything from rings to lotion to hairclips.
And then, a few times a year (usually before we’re expecting out of town guests) I’ll actually sort through the piles and put the things where they actually belong.
And that last for about 36 hours. Then the Piles return.
Anyone else use this method? If you don’t – you should. It gives the illusion of organized and clean with only about 1/10th of the workload. Giving you more time to be lazy. And that is my goal in life: Maximum Laziness. I’m driven, you know.
clean? what is this clean you speak of? my roomie is big on the pile method. I guess now so am I. I do have random piles o crap in my room….one day I will get to cleaning it all up.
I love to Put it in a Pile! My house is always plagued by pieces of random junk on my coffee table (since that is where I usually eat, use my laptop, read, watch TV, etc –it’s the center of my home, basically), so I implemented that same method. I call it the Junk Bowl method. There’s a “decorative” bowl on the shelf under the coffee table full of all my junk: remotes, iPod cords and headphones, pens, pencils, little notebooks, discarded jewelry, coasters, matchbooks, and so on. It keeps the table looking much cleaner, especially since no one can see into that bowl. My secret is safe (except from readers of misszoot.com)!
I do piles too.
But more importantly, I just wanted to say that the pic above of AndyZ is one of The. Cutest. Pictures. Ever.
Amen.
I cannot wait to hear about the search strings coming your way. What, with all the talk of “pooper” and “piles” and “shit”. Hee!
I am a Piler, too.
Oh yes I do the Put it in a Pile method along with the Junk Bowl method of Vague. Someone once told me that it’s not really cleaning if you are just moving a pile from one place to another. I’ve since blacklisted that person.
It is good to have a nice solid goal, you know!?!? I like to maximize my laziness as well – generally I find a nice (hidden) room to pile things. Closets tend to be the scariest… like those cartoons where the door to the closet opens and everything falls out? That is my house!
I was laughing and nodding my head reading this post. So yes, I use this method often. Especially over the last six months. I used to have a clean house. Now I don’t. If anyone comes in and complains, let them clean it up. That’s my theory.
I use that same method! The piles get moved fairly often around and around the house until they finally get put where they belong after a few weeks (months, whatever).
That reminds me of a story my mom loves to tell about my older brother Matt. When he was a toddler, they were playing with his blocks and mom told him to put all his blocks in a pile. He burst out into tears and sobbed, “But I don’t have a pile!”
He’s 35 now and every once in a while I still mock him for not having a pile.
Finally! I don’t feel so alone! I am a Put-It-In-A-Pile girl, too! Sometimes, it’s the only thing that can be done, as you mentioned, in the extra 7 minutes there are per day to ‘clean.’
My husband does it too, but he doesn’t do it RIGHT. That is very frustrating because then I don’t know what is in which pile!
I have this one pile on my kitchen counter that just NEVER goes away. But I have a theory that if you leave something in the pile long enough, it turns into trash and you can just toss it in the recycle bin.
My husband is a put it in a pile type of cleaner, and it drives me crazy! Oddly enough, the putting all the somewhat related items in a container method doesn’t bother me at all. As a matter of fact, I used it a lot when my son was younger. My theory is that a container can easily be picked up and moved to a cabinet or closet, thus being out of sight and, at least to my way of thinking, clean, while a pile is just a pain in the ass to move. Also, we tend to loose things quite frequently to the pile system, which is very frustrating.
Love AndyZ’s picture!
On house cleaning-have you heard of flylady? I don’t do a lot of the stuff like they suggest, but have used some of their ideas and done them lwith the way that works for me. Here is a link to find out more info: http://flylady.net/
Cute picture! We have a baby tub just like that, but unfortunately Henry has it confused with a toilet. The ONLY times he poops now are in the bathtub, gah.
I am totally a Put it in a Pile cleaner. I buy containers for every room, so that I can pile stuff up into it and close it off to give the illusion of clean. It honestly helps maintain my sanity because I cannot function when surrounded by messiness.
I throw it all away. Not my kids toys but all the stray crap from my husbands pockets and anything that gets left on the table too long. Trash. I hate clutter and we live in a pretty small apartment. My husband is finally learning that if he wants it, he better not leave it out or it will go in the trash.
Ha, I loved this post AND the comments! I am not alone! I am a firm subscriber to both the Put it in a Pile method and the Junk Bowl Method. And also sometimes I just throw things in the closet to put them out of sight. My entry closet/pantry isn’t so bad…because you know, I have to be able to get to the food. But the hall closet? Gah, scary.
And yes, the picture totally made my day. He’s so happy!
I employ this method. My husband, however, forgets that I employ this method on a thrice-daily basis.
He employs the “Where in the hell did you put my [insert random object here]?” method at this time.
I am jealous. My undiagnosed OCD does not permit the use of piles. I’ve tried piling, and instead of giving the illusion of tidiness, I think about the pile as I lay in bed and eventually I have to get up and deal with it. So that I can sleep. I think it’s clear which one of us has the problem.
OH! And the picture? I squealed aloud.
I, too, am a put it in a pile type. The piles usually get out of hand quickly so I need bins to hold them. I like the contents to be somewhat related. I don’t consider the stuff tossed in bins to be organized or cleaned up. It drives me crazy feeling that we’re living in such chaos, but at the end of the day there just isn’t enough time or energy to do much about it.
This definitely counts as cleaning. I do it all the time at work and at home.
oh yeah..i have piles…and don’t touch or move my piles because i know what is in each and every one of them and i’ll get confused if they get moved.
That is TOTALLY how I clean- piles o shit, shoved to the side. As long as I have cleared off the surface areas, it’s clean. Until I have a freak out and then hell breaks loose and I bitch about the piles that I created. Sigh. And I married a slob and managed to give birth to 3 slobs so it’s really cluttered at our house.
Sounds like my house then.
I live by myself and still manage to not have enough time to clean, so I do the pile method, too.
There’s a pile on my kitchen counter: Bills, unread mail, instructions for countertop appliances (like my ice cream maker that was purchased in July), Chinese take-out menus
Pile on my coffee table: Work folders, magazines, bills that have been paid, studio info, books, and the occasional napkin
Pile on my short dresser: Clean clothes, dry cleaning, clothes that need to be taken back
Pile on my nightstand: Books, chapstick, 3 bottles of lotion, hairclips, a glass, and my cellphone charger.
OY.
I am totally a Put it in a Pile person. My dining room table is generally my catch all for any random items that come into the house. Every few days I “straighten up” which consists entirely of throwing away any trash, and putting the rest of the stuff in a neat pile. I have one pile that’s currently 12″ high and growing. Lazy is an art, and I’m becoming a master artist!
My Mum would make piles of stuff at the bottom of the stairs and then we had to clear our own pile to our room – unfortunately I adopted this and ended up with a pile of books next to my bed and a pile of clothes next to the wardrobe then a pile of dirty clothes in the other corner until the piles would fall over and make a mess – this annoys the heck out of CJ so i have my craft/study room/ spare bedroom which is a bomb site – I am supposed to be tidying it as we speak but I am reading and commenting on blogs!
Dude…I am the queen of piles!
This is my method, too! I combine it with an annual “Go Batshit Crazy and Do Some Serious Cleaning While My Family Hides in Fear” and everything stays pretty good.
Looks like we’re all Put it in a Pile People. Wow. We are so lazy. But who cares? Obama won. Piles be damned.
Right now I am literally in the middle of cleaning up the 2nd of 2 piles. The 1st was the kitchen counter pile and the 2nd the computer desk pile. The reason – someone is here to work on the kitchen. Otherwise, it would not have happened until right before Thanksgiving. Of course it will probably need to be done then too. I just am happy I don’t use the put it in a box or grocery bag method of my father and sister. Things are lost for years with that method. Although I must admit I did that this past Christmas when my in-laws were coming over and the piles were to great to go through right then.
Delurking here! For the last few months, whenever we are expecting guests I throw all the random stuff around the house (which is worst in the dining room, because the front door opens into it, which is also why it most needs to be clean-ish before guests come, and also in case we want to feed the guests) into a filing cabinet that we keep in the corner of that same dining room (because we have no better place for it). Well, my husband had been missing his videocamera for about two months and guess where he just found it.
I’m with you on the Put it in a Pile and will second Gigi– if it lives in a pile for too long, it dies. Or gets recycled. … eventually. When we have immanent company.
I’m a huge believer in the Put it in a Pile method. My husband cannot stand clutter, and I’m someone who accumulates stuff. Fine, I’m a packrat. Put it in Pile is an easy way to keep the stuff under control so he doesn’t start pulling his hair out.
Hey, we clearly studied at the same ‘Cleanliness Academy’. I use the put-it-in-a-pile theory and try to hide the pile in a box. Then eventually sort said piles, into more piles with specific destinations in mind and hope they will transport themselves to their appropriate homes. Unfortunately part 2 of my cleaning process rarely happens and as a result we have dozens of boxes that require sorting. Now apparently we have to sort boxes prior to having our new bed delivered at some time in the near future. HELP!
If you ever need a pony tail holder for yourself or your child I’m your girl. That’s because I’m constantly finding them on random surfaces and tucking them into the pocket of whatever I’m wearing. I’d be willing to bet that I have at least one in a pocket of each of my coats, and at least one in my purse…and in the bag my youngest uses to carry her Epi-pen.
I am, most definitely, a piler. And piler is not a word. Anyway. Especially when it comes to papers. I love to stack papers, even when they have NOTHING to do with each other.
I do piles in boxes in closets. Mostly in the kids rooms, and that is where all those little toys that don’t belong to a set and get left on the floor end up. Then every few months we pull a box out and rediscover all the junk.
I got into trouble with the pile method a few months back. I was in a hurry and the “bills to be paid” pile somehow got mixed up with the “bills to be filed” pile. I learned my lesson…
I had a different form of pile…I used to choose an area of messiness, then put things in piles like hair ties, lip gloss, rubbish, whatever…seeing I had no designated storage areas for those things, I attempted to make them, but that didn’t work ’cause the house was always too messy to find something to STORE the new piles in. *sigh* I’m working on it…
I usually just lurk here and enjoy hearing your take on life, but I had to comment today, this entry just made me laugh so much. I LOVE the Put It In A Pile & Hide the Pile in A Bin method, its the only thing saving us from having to burrow our way through our house. My husband’s a big fan of hiding his ‘tidied’ piles too – we live in fear of an avalanche from the cupboard under the stairs, its been declared a no-go area for our 18 month old son! So glad to hear that we’re not the only ones with the desire to be clean AND lazy!
I always end up screwing myself when I use the pile method…I inevitably put something in the pile that I need and then can’t remember where it is. ALWAYS happens that way.
My cleaning method usually goes like this:
I start in…say the living room, and pick up a shoe that goes in my closet…so I take that shoe to my bedroom and find…a glass that goes in the kitchen…so I take said glass to the kitchen and put in the dishwasher, and then I’ll find the dog leash, etc…
Somehow this works for me, even though it probably takes WAAAAAAAAAAAAY longer than if I just stayed in one room and finished.
I am totally with you . One of my aims in life is to get all the heap of stuff I have cluttering up my small flat into boxes of some sort. Preferably labled as well but that might be going a wee bit too far.
I am also a basket lady. I love wicker baskets and have several containing medicines ( no kids) toiletries, craft stuff, magazines and I have a few painted plant pots around the house with random flotsom and jetsom.
May I say your young son is getting to look exceptionally handsome (both of em)
Oh my gosh, I am totally a stacker upper. I do it all the time then like once every two weeks I get all crazy and freaked and try to actually take care of the piles. There’s always at least one left in the end though.
At least you move your piles. My piles…just pile up.
But at least you have the excuse of two small children that keep you busy. Me, I have no excuse. Just laziness. Although it is fun watching my dog trying to wend her way through the obstacle course that is my room.
And allow me to remind you of this pre-toddler/baby blog that I randomly found in the archives…
Its that time of year for my house, when I go through all of the “storage” and purge it of items that I forgot we had or that we havent used in more than an year. I mean, I am a one-woman “Clean Sweep Team”.
I have a huge pile of garbage growing in the spare bedroom/study/junk room. I think this morning it actually grew to take up more space than the stuff in the room that BELONGS there. When I throw that pile away? Now THAT will be the epitome of ectasy for an anal-retentive, obsessive compulsive, perpetual organizer like me. Try it, seriously.
I mean – I go to friends or family’s house who may not be as obsessed with compartmentalization as I am, and I stare at their closets, or piles of “stuff” and dream about taking care of it myself.
Iif you need a closet organized or a basement cleaned – call me – I’d probably pay YOU for the entertainment.
But seriously, it was random. I saw those terrific wedding pics on the flickr feed and wanted to see if you talked about the wedding.