HUGE POST FULL OF PHOTOS AHOY!

It took me an entire day, and a lot of Adam & The Ants blaring very loudly, but I got the entire house done. Didn’t realise how much work it actually was until I wrote everything down.

I was struck halfway through the day by my washing machine deciding to flood the kitchen, which definitely put a dampener on my spirits (pun intended) and I very nearly gave up. BUT I mopped up the swimming pool  and soldiered on. Aren’t you so proud?

Firstly, I’d just like to point out that most of the mess in the communal areas (bathroom, kitchen, living room) wasn’t even mine. But I cleaned it anyway because I don’t want to live in filth. My housemates are somewhat annoying- they complain about untidiness/uncleanliness, but I’ve yet to see one of them take the bins out, or clean the bath or anything. Mucky fuckers.

But anyway, on with my photos I promised! :D

My bedroom
Okay so this is the only room in which the entirety of the mess was mine. I still hadn’t got around to properly organising everything from when I moved in, which was two months ago now, so it was a pretty mammoth task. Here are some befores:

This was by far the room that took the longest, purely because there’s so much in it. You never truly realise how much crap you own until you’re trying to clean it all up :(
Here is a list of everything I did in my room:

• sorted out the pile of crap on the floor (visible in first photo)
• moved my desk to where the chest of drawers was, and vice versa
• put all my clean laundry away (whilst reorganising and vertically folding my stuff in the chest of drawers)
• organised my shelves
• cleared the rubbish off the windowsill
• dusted my shelves & windowsill
• reorganised my wardrobe
• got some clean sheets on the bed (and made the bed!)
• organised all my hair/makeup stuff
• vacuumed

Took me a good few hours, done in bursts of 45/15, and here is the result :)

Yes it’s still cluttered, but that’s because I own too much stuff with not enough storage space. Can’t be helped!

The bathroom
The bathroom was initially a lot worse than it is in the before photos- everything was grimy as fuck, and I gave it all a good scrub the week I moved in. There were still some persistent marks on the bath, though, and everything just needed a good bleaching.

Rather than posting photos of the entire bathroom, I’ll just post a before and after photo of the bath, along with a list of everything I did in the bathroom. The bath was the biggest task and everything else that needed doing in there was just general tidying, loo scrubbing etc.
Before:

After 15 minutes of sweat and elbow grease:

Bathroom cleaning fun included:

• scrubbing the bath
• unblocking the drain (yum)
• wiping down all the tiles
• scrubbing the sink
• polishing the windowsills
• scrubbing & bleaching the toilet
• vacuuming
• mopping

The living room
My before & afters aren’t brilliant for the living room, because in the after photos there’s two loads of laundry out to dry on clothes horses, but I’m sure you’ll get the general idea!

Before:

Pizza boxes, mugs, ashtrays, dirty plates- general student mess really.

After:

Like I said, laundry taking up half the room (proof I did laundry, woo!) but you see the general idea.

Living room antics:

• tidied the general student mess
• febreezed the curtains & sofas
• polished the treadmill (can’t see it in the photo but I promise there’s one in the corner), shelves, windowsills etc
• vacuumed
• tidied the weights
• polished the table

And finally, the kitchen
The kitchen was a pretty big task too, not gonna lie. My housemates are super fucking shitty when it comes to the kitchen. In first year, Holly always used to complain about people putting food in the sink because it blocks the plughole. So what did she do the morning she went back to her parents? Emptied her cereal bowl down the sink. Thanks Holly.

My other housemate, Laura, likes to experiment with cooking. She doesn’t, however, like to experiment with cleaning. So that was fun.

So here’s a before.

I took this before I tidied the other rooms, so unseen here is the mountain of dishes I had to get through. Also unseen is the general untidiness of our utility room, and all the mess on the table (old tenants’ post, pizza leaflets, empty boxes etc)

This was the second largest job, including doing the washing up took me probably 2 or 3 hours.

After:

Kitchen wizarding:

• unblocked & cleaned sink (thanks, Holly)
• washed dishes
• took the bin out
• washed the bin (Laura had left some weird coloured stuff all over it)
• wiped worktops
• cleaned microwave
• organised the food cupboard (bonus picture at the end of the list!)
• tidied the tupperware corner
• cleaned the oven
• put away/tidied appliances
• vacuumed
• mopped

BONUS FOOD CUPBOARD FUN!

So er, yeah. Here’s some other stuff I did that I have filed under ‘misc’:
vacuumed and mopped the utility room, organised all the laundry stuff, did two loads of laundry, vacuumed the stairs & upstairs landing and organised the communal noticeboard.

There’s still a lot more that needs doing but I think this is a pretty good start :)