From Longman Dictionary of Contemporary Englishtopsy-turvytop‧sy-tur‧vy /ˌtɒpsi ˈtɜːvi◂ $ ˌtɑːpsi ˈtɜːrvi◂/ adjective informal DISORGANIZEDin a state of complete disorder or confusion He left his room all topsy-turvy.
Examples from the Corpus
topsy-turvy• Molly's topsy-turvy bedroom was heaped with toys, clothes, magazines, and books.• The world had gone topsy-turvy ever since he took on this play.• I was quite ignorant of their lifestyle and topsy-turvy habits.• In one topsy-turvy moment, I leaned down to turn Johnny Walker up and nearly ended up upside down.• But things are turned topsy-turvy right enough.• Ball can look back on a topsy-turvy two years as mayor.• They both show us a topsy-turvy world, a world turned inside-out by the particular lens through which it is viewed.• Yahoo! is the rule, not the exception, in the topsy-turvy world of Internet IPOs.• In the topsy-turvy world of teams and teams of teams, economies of scale are giving way to economies of structure.Origin topsy-turvy (1500-1600) Probably from top + terve “to turn upside down” ((14-16 centuries)) 