The Puddles

I am exhausted from the weekend.  I actually went to bed at 9:30pm.  That is unheard of in my world.  Usually my evening doesn’t start until at least 10:00pm.  But the weekend caught up with me.  I am actually grateful for Monday and the routine that comes with it.  School, scouts, bell choir, chores.

There are so many chores to catch up on.  Last week and this weekend were so full, that I kept putting off laundry, cleaning, decent cooking, and most other things considered normal.  My usual cleaning/catchup day is Thursday and Friday and  I spent those days getting ready for the lockin.  My thoughts were . . . be prepared for 20 girls for an overnight or have a clean house.  Well I think we know which thought won out.

The lockin was so much fun.  The girls had a blast and I did too.  I think I completely wore out my other moms and one dad.  They were pretty excited about going home.  In fact, I am so proud of the fact that my troop cleaned the entire Fellowship Hall (except the few rooms that we didn’t use).  They scrubbed toilets, swept and mopped floors, and took out the trash.  And . . . they were excited about it.  That’s right. They woke up at 6:30am and started asking where the brooms were.  Yeah!  I had parents asking that I teach their daughters how to scrub toilets too.  Don’t worry.  Everyone will get an opportunity to scrub!

I came home from the lockin and still had so much energy that I went back out and ran errands while Chris was still home.  Then I came home and Chris left.  Then I made a poor choice.  I sat down.  I know that it sounds innocent.  But after pushing it for 24 hours, sleeping on the floor, and worrying about the safety of all of those girls exhausted me.  I didn’t get off the couch for another two hours.  There was sleep involved on occasion. The rest of the day was spent trying to clean up and recuperate.

After finally deciding (out loud, in fact.) to rejoin society, I served up dinner, put kids to bed, and got to work on preparing for Sunday.  I finished up writing the Christmas program, prepared for Sunday school and packed the car for the day.  Sunday was another busy day with church, meeting after church, another shopping trip for a birthday present, dropping two kids off at Aunt Debra’s while I took Miss A to a birthday party, and then finally coming home at 8:00 to get ready for bed.

And to top off the weekend, my car battery is dead.  So every time, I have to go any where I have to jump the car.  Luckily, I have a quick start jumper in the car.  But I jumped the car 4 times yesterday.  That stunk!  Didn’t have time to deal with it yet, so I haven’t.

So this week will be catch up.  Must work and reclaim.  The car is full. The house is full. The laundry is full. The sink is full. It will probably take me all week to catch up.  It is a good thing that I went to bed at 9:30 last night.  I needed the extra sleep.

So make more coffee!  It is time to start the week!

We had so much fun Halloween.  Chris joined us for the evening.  I think he had more fun than the kids.  It is one of the only nights of the year that we get to meet all of the neighbors.  He scored a hotdog at one house and a beer at another.  It was good to be him.  He didn’t even need candy after that.  We had some dilemmas that afternoon before we went trick-or-treating.  Ainsley decided that she wanted to be Princess Leia also.  In reality, she wanted to be a princess named Leia. She doesn’t even know who Princess Leia is! So it took some convincing, but she decided to wear the really cool red glitter shoes that goes with the Dorothy costume.   I made that Dorothy costume for Madie when she was three.  Ainsley is getting to wear it now.  I used to make all of their costumes.  This is the first year that I bought some costumes.  But I was so glad that the wee one got to wear one that I made.

I went to go find photos from 2004 when Madie wore the costume.  I also found photos of what Ben wore.  Chris made so much fun of the lamb costume that I made for Ben.  I thought it was cute.  Chris thinks that this will be one of those photos that we can use as blackmail photos when he is 18.  I still think he is adorable!

I finally put all of the pictures up.  Family kept asking when was I going to get all of the pictures up.  We want to see the grandchildren, cousins, nieces, and nephew on Halloween night. I am the last one apparently to post pictures.  I am sorry that I am behind.  But I am swamped.  Swamped. Swamped. My list is long and my time is short. But it is up.  I put tons of photos up. Hopefully that will put me on the top of the list again.  I’ve got some serious competition.  Debra is a photographer so she has awesome photos and Will married Michele who is great about getting photos out quickly and who does all things stellar.  I’ve got an uphill battle!!!

I went last week with Ben on his field trip.  It was so much fun!  Hanging out with him is a riot.  I had just him and one other student who happened to be in our group on the last field trip that I went on with Ben in kindergarten.  So it was a great day.  The weather was awesome.  The day was good.

Miss A finally has her own troop.  She is so excited to finally get a uniform and to be in a troop on her own.  We have a cute little troop of six.  It is sweet.  It is so different being a leader of a troop of six and a troop of twenty.  I love it both.  Madie loves being an older scout in Ainsley’s troop.  Helping out and showing off her vest.  Ainsley loves having her there.

To give our little troop an opportunity to meet other scouts, we met with another troop for Juliette Lowe’s 150 birthday celebration.  It was great.  They loved hanging out with other girls and learning about Juliette Lowe.   It was quiet at our meeting this week when we met without the other troop.  It was a nice quiet, but we will certainly do something like this again.  Until then, we will enjoy our little group of great girls.

“Ben, there is a dead bug over here.  Will you please pick it up for me?”  begs Mom.

“That’s why I was put on this earth, Mom.  To take care of you and pick up the nasty dead bugs for you” declares Ben.

Thank you God for sending me my boy.

For elementary school students, my two oldest have boatloads of homework, but they approach it totally different.  Ben struggles, is distracted easily and has to be reminded to get going on it constantly.  He is a smart kid, but paper homework is not his thing.  He would do better if we could let him do 15 minutes of homework at a time with a 15 minutes break in between.  But we don’t have time for that with all of our evening and afterschool activities. So we do the best we can.  Then there is Madie.  I wish that all could be like her.  She immediately comes home to get her work done.  Then she works on extra projects that either the school has sent home or she has made up.  When it comes to the homework department, Madie rocks.  But Ben will be the one who will put together the Eiffel Tower out of toothpicks and take my vacuum apart just to figure out how it works.  That is a blessing too!  They all have their gifts.  Thank God for that.

One official class party. One class celebration without the party. Two meetings. Still must purchase part of the items required for celebration/party. Weekly volunteering obligation in one class. Grocery shopping.  Preparing for an evening gathering of friends.  Spend some time working. One afternoon doctor’s appointment for one child. Cleaning the house.  Delivering snacks to school for another occasion.  Work some more. And I must appear relaxed for an evening dinner that I must fixed for ten people.  All of this must be done tomorrow.  Tomorrow.  I swear if Chris asks me to wear pearls and high heels while wearing a perfectly starched dress during our evening dinner I will scream and then kill him.  Someone should warn him.