Do you have an unbelievable amount of renewed energy to clean and organise your house when you arrive home from a vacation? For me, the first days after returning home from a long trip away is really the most efficient time to get the house scoured clean and all those nagging little house jobs done. It usually starts within an hour of opening our front door and lasts anywhere from 2-3 days.
Shortly after arriving home from Belgium last week I could be found re-organising and scrubbing inside kitchen cupboards which haven’t been touched since, well, I don’t even want to say.
In the following days I emptied the fridge of all the out-of-date salsa and chutney. I organised and classified the entire book shelf. I swept the ceilings of all the cobwebs and who knows what. I even hand washed the pot holders. And it felt so so good.
I can’t really explain why I do all this but I’m happy I do. At no other time do I have the motivation and physical energy to scrub bathroom grouting with a toothbrush or re-fold my entire linen cupboard. Sometimes I even think about planning a trip just for the return and the rampant cleaning of my house.
So here I am at home for the rest of the summer in a beautifully clutter-free and sparkling clean space (should last a few minutes, no?) and ready to pass the next month with my three children at the lake, on the forest trails or simply lounging around at home reading or baking or sewing. Oh, and drinking LOTS of cold lemonade…
Jillian In Italy 
I understand what you mean. Some R&R renews the surge in energy!
Now only if it could last more than a few days….
I am the same way! Luckily my husband “gets” how I need to unpack as soon as we arrive home. He’s right there pitching in. And yes to the cleaning and sorting.
I think that it’s an end of summer thing too – September is around the corner. It always feels like a fresh start for me, even more so than January.
I’ve taken a bit of a blogging break and it’s been quite rejuvenating. It’ll feel good to get back at it after a few weeks in a tiny cottage on an island on a lake two hours from Toronto.
I must say that you are inspiring me to move overseas again. When single I lived in South Africa for two years and now with the man and the girl (she’s six), I’m thinking it would be amazing to do it again. Perhaps Europe this time.
Your cottage vacation sounds so dreamy. Hope you are having a great and relaxing time.
I think you should do the year abroad. What an experience it would be for all of you! Come on over to Italy…I’m always here to help with anything.
I have that experience before I leave for vacation. Is that strange? Before we left for our summer trip, I had emptied two kitchen cabinets, the refrigerator and cleared our basement of old items. I ended up taking something like 5 bags of trash, 3 bags of donations and 3 bags of recycling out.
Before? Wow. My house looks like a bomb went off right before we leave on vacation. And I too have the trunk of my car full of bags of clothes and toys for the local charity. It does feel good to empty out the house a bit…
Please come over and do the same for my house!!! I am so big now that I can hardly move in my oh so cluttered little house!!!
Oh and bring some of that cold lemonade with you, will you! 🙂