It’s a Whole New Year!

I’m the Dad to seven 90’s kids. Essentially I spent my early parenting years listening to 90’s music and watching 90’s kids movies. I distinctly remember the Hectic Kids rambling about the house singing A Whole New World. Songs like that get stuck in your head. With the dawning of a new year that danged song got stuck in my head again! It’s a Whole New Year, where everything is brand new. But let’s face it, all the baggage from the prior year is still in our trunks. We’re still hauling around all the accumulated stuff we never really get rid of. Be it emotional or physical, our lives and our kitchens are cluttered with things from the past that have no business being there.

The problem is…what should I get rid of? More importantly, I’m faced with the reality that unless I actively make the time to figure it out, I’ll end the year exactly like this one. Fortunately, as I’m wrapping up 2017 I feel like I’ve made some progress in dumping some stuff, both emotional and physical.

2017 started off on a rough note for me; I was two days out of knee surgery. Fortunately, I wasn’t in too much pain, so I was able to think pretty clearly. And since walking was really hard, I had a lot of time to sit and think. That gave me a rare opportunity to actually assess the upcoming year and make concrete plans. I outlined my plan on the Hectic-Dad blog. My aim was to write a series of posts about how making tiny changes would lead to massive results. The irony is that most of the plans caused me to change my direction for the year. So on February 17^th I wrote about how I’d fallen off the blogging wagon.

The flip side is that I really got moving on the tasks that had languished here at Hectic-Kitchen. It took me an entire year, but we’re starting to see the fruits of that labor. Hectic-Meals is the first product to come out of that toil. There are more things in the pipeline, but nothing ever happens as quickly as I’d like it to. Is that true for you too? No sense beating ourselves up about it…we need to face the fact that there’s never enough time, energy, or money. But hacking away is still a worthwhile endeavor.

This past year was also full of successes in my personal kitchen. The preparation, cooking, and storage area at Hectic Manor is enormous. When we remodeled the kitchen from it’s minuscule, crowded format to it’s current size, Hectic Mom & I insisted on installing more storage than we could ever need. Quit snickering, we really thought we’d have these half-filled cabinets, neatly organized drawers, and gobs of room. Parkinson’s Law definitely came into play and our stuff expanded to fill all the space we had available. Because of my lack of discipline the stuff overflowed to consume all the counter space. It’s a constant battle to keep things organized. It’s been 13 years since we remodeled the kitchen, and I’ve been fighting the battle of overcrowding from too much stuff every day since we moved into the renovated space.

But 2017 was the year I vowed to turn things around. I started to work through one cabinet at a time, eradicating things I didn’t need: Donating what I could, recycling others, and pitching objects of no value. I made a concious plan for where things would be stored. I thought about how we really use our kitchen, and I reorganized the storage space to reflect how we function daily. Honestly, I’m a long way from finished, and will likely spend much of 2018 continuing the process, nevertheless we’re beginning to see benefits. I scramble around a lot less desperately searching for things. When I do have to search for something, I think about where it should’ve been and relocate it to a more sensible place. It only takes a minute, but those minutes spent organizing have added up.

Coupled with the success of my kitchen reorganization is the stark reality that this process takes time. For much of the year I was frustrated with how slowly I was progressing. I would dedicate a day to work on the project…and life would get in the way. I lost my composure far too often when that happened. Then I would feel like crap for yelling at the family. And that awful downward spiral of feeling bad would make me feel worse and I’d tumble down the stairs of despair. Right now, as I look into the kitchen it’s a disaster. We’re in the midst of the end of year holidays. The kids have come home for Christmas, so we have a joyfully full house. But that means the poor dishwasher is running 24×7. The washer & dryer are tumbling about on the same schedule. With more people in the house, we’re using all dishes daily. Yet cleaning up simply isn’t a priority. It’s too fun to sit around and chat, so why do the dishes? We all know better, but that doesn’t change anything. The kitchen is still a mess.

I’d love to report that this state of disorder only happens at this time of year, but who am I kidding? I’m able to fabricate excuses every week. High School graduation approaching? We’re a mess. Kids coming home from school at the end of the semester…mess. Birthdays (we’re got 13+ at Hectic Manor every year) engender kitchen disasters every time.

We definitely lost the battle of cleanliness and orderliness more times in 2017 that I can count.

Yet looking back I believe 2017 was overall a winning year in the kitchen. I may be deluding myself (too much liquor-infused Eggnog and Fruitcake? I think not!), but I really feel like we’re better off at Hectic Manor entering 2018 than we were going into 2017. It all boils down to the small things that I did right. I certainly didn’t bat 1,000, but I think I had more days when I made progress than days when I lagged behind. Each day, as the year marched on, I felt a little more in control. Those accumulated minuscule wins felt pretty good.

So I’m sitting here offering you a sliver of hope. Let’s face it, none of us are going to make huge changes, all at once. No bolt of lightning will strike and suddenly make everything completely organized in your kitchen. But if you focus on one small area and get it under control…guess what? That area won’t nag you daily. You’ll have one less worry. While you might still have 99 problems, you won’t have 100! Then you can start on the next spot and eventually you’ll have made gigantic progress by taking one small step at a time. The trick is to stick with it.

And when you’re feeling crushed by the mess, pop back over here to read this blog. Trust me, I’m living the Hectic Life just like you are. No matter what time of year, how many kids are at home, or what activities we have going on…it’s always more than I think I can handle. But somehow I get through it. You can too!

Make it a great day in the kitchen!

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