We have ourselves a situation

I've had the sense over the last month or so that things in my house are going missing.

Nothing big, but things like a spoon, that kind of thing.

I mentioned this to Julia last night when we were emailing each other and she said something like "trust your instincts; that's what they're there for". Good advice.

This week I asked N (cleaning lady) to change the bedding to winter sheets (I bought a new duvet and pillows on the weekend) and to put on the green winter continental pillowcases.

When I got home on Tuesday, there were white pillowcases with green trim (summer cotton ones).

I thought, "obviously she misunderstood" and so this evening I got up in my cupboard to get the correct ones so I could change them.

They weren't in the spot I'd last seen them.

I bought new, moss-green winter ones at the end of winter last year and so they haven't been used yet and are/ were still in their plastic cases from Mr P Home.

About 6 - 8 weeks ago, I climbed up in that same cupboard to "straighten it out" as it was a mess (for me) and saw them there, still in their cases.

So when I couldn't find them tonight, I went berserk (do you also go crazy if you can't find something?) and ripped EVERYthing out of the cupboard so my bed was FULL of sheets, duvets, etc.

BEFORE

AFTER

this is how I took the pics - hanging on with one hand and leaning back

bit of a close-up

It is now beautifully organised but still those things are nowhere to be found.

Then I thought, maybe I'm in fact going mad (I hate this feeling) and so I went berserk again.

I went through every drawer and cupboard that houses linen in this whole house looking for those green pillowcases.

Nothing.

Again, everything else is decluttered and tidied but no pillowcases.

I also have a sneaking suspician about a duvet cover but I may have given that one to my mother so I will check first. Still it's strange I have the pillowcases and continental pillowcases for that set but no duvet. Hmmm.

So now what do I do?

I am so not in the mood for firing and rehiring people although I promised myself the last time (2009) that I would not be a softie next time around.

It's not the value of the pillowcases (R80 each) but the principle behind the whole thing.

I asked D and he says, "do you really want to make a big deal about this? maybe it's your memory?" until I explained that I have searched EVERYWHERE.

And he knows when I go wild, I go WILD!

The only thing I did tonight was cook, have 1 30-minute coaching session, eat and look for these darn things/ organise linen.

Which is two wasted hours of my life I can never get back.

LOL and now I'm blogging about it.

I will ask V tomorrow if she knows anything. I don't think she's taken them but maybe she'll have seen something? And she's scared to say but if I ask her outright she'll tell me???

In 2009 our cleaning lady P helped herself to lots of things. I was in the crazy newborn stage and thought I was SERIOUSLY sleep deprived because I could swear I had tops in orange and purple but yet there was only one colour. Many such incidents.

Once I sent her a text and said, "P, when you come on Sat please will you remember to look for my silver ring. I can't think where I might have put it but it means SUCH a lot to me" and then on the Sat we left and went to coffee or something.

When I got back, she'd "found" it fallen down the side of the bed. Of course I knew it wasn't there but I wanted my ring back and if she had taken it, I wanted her to know to bring it back.

I don't want all these games.

For the moment I'm going to pray and ask God to please please please show me if they're in the house so I can stop going crazy.

And this, people, is why I'm organised. I just don't have hours and hours to indulge my crazy tendencies and look for things.

What do you think I should do? What would you do?