cleaning in the kitchen...

today's entry in my journal :

Today I cleaned the popcorn cupboard above the fridge. The floor of the cupboard was stained with ooey, sticky old grease from years of storing the old popper up there, putting it away and having the warm oil drip out when I didn’t realize it.

I used goo-gone, which cut through the yuck with a little time and a scrubby sponge. It smelled up the house like citrus -- strong -- but we opened the slider door to let fresh air in and cleaned away. The cupboard is clean now, and it feels so good to have that done!

While I was up there, I figured I might as well clean the top of the fridge… and in order to access the back part of that, I had to pull it away from the wall. When we did, I found a really gross mess on the floor that I had to deal with!

So - instead of a quick one cupboard job, I ended up cleaning out the popcorn cupboard, the whole top of the fridge (which was dust-encrusted and desperately wicked!), and the floor under the fridge. Wow - More than I intended, but it’s so good to be able to do it. We’ll put it all back later, after I have help cleaning off the side of the fridge, which has spills dried on it. But right now I am taking a break and that’s final.

The weather is gorgeous today, sunny and warm - high in the upper 60s! The kids are convinced that schoolwork should be banned on days like this and I had a hard time getting them to finish the Weekend Kitchen Recovery in a timely manner anyway, what with breaks for squirt gun fights in and outside the house, playing in the sandbox, chasing each other, etc. Getting them to turn to schoolwork after that was difficult. But they are now upstairs doing just that. Ostensibly. We’ll see.