What I Haven't Been Doing. . .

My cell phone rang the other day, and there was a sweet surprise wrapped up in a sweet little voice on the other end of the line! My friend, Sarah, called, and I love her, love her, love her. We chit chatted for a minute or two before our conversation turned to how busy we both are! I read her blog, so she can't hide the fact that she gets more done in a week than I do in an entire year. So, I had to add a comment about the fact that she somehow manages to make quilts, homeschool, and decorate her house while I feel like I am drowning in my everyday chores. She laughed at this and added that we don't post about the things that we don't accomplish ~ we post about all the things that we do accomplish. She said I didn't know all the things that she wasn't doing in order to finish her projects.

And, I agreed. My boys may have fresh, made from scratch cookies to eat, but they are lucky if they can find a clean plate to eat them on! :-) Priorities, people.

So, in honor of our conversation, I decided to post pictures of a few of the things I am not getting done around my house. Here goes. . .

My laundry room counter. . .

Every single time I do laundry, I wish that I had clear counters to fold and sort my clean laundry on, but it never happens. They remain full of clutter even though I feel as if I might die of claustrophobia every time I go in that silly room. Oh, and to be perfectly honest with you, opposite the counters sit my washer and dryer on pedestals. And, atop those wonderfully useful machines sit two baskets overflowing with junk mail and a basket of clothes to be ironed. . . sometime in the next decade. All that to say, it isn't just the counters that are cluttered ~ the whole room is pretty much, for a lack of better words, junked.

This is a little corner of our living room that I keep telling myself that I want to work on ~ only I never get to it! I need to go through the baskets of kids books and take some to the boys' bookshelf upstairs. And, the basket under the table, yeah, I need to go through those magazines and recycle the ones that I don't want. One day, I'll sift through them. . . one day. . . But, somehow the pile of magazines keeps getting higher and higher. You can't see it in this picture, but the poor basket is actually sagging under the weight!!!

Moving on. . .

My baseboards. . .

Enough said.

Let's go outside and play pretend! Let's pretend you were coming over to my home for a fun little visit. We could sit comfortably, talk deeply, and sip savoringly ~ from steaming hot cups of Bifferdoodle Decaf, of course! And I won't forget to offer you some French Vanilla Creamer! :-)

Well, I have two pots that look like this to greet you at the back door. . .

And, you would come to the backdoor because backdoor guests are best!!!! The pansies have gone to be with Jesus ~ God rest their souls. And, I have some boxwoods and some begonias to put around them. They have been ready to plant for about 3 weeks now. Oh, wait! No, it has been more like 9 weeks because we bought them before Erik's parents' accident. Pitiful. But, please come visit me, anyway! The coffee and conversation will make up for the lack of beauty. I promise!!!





Now, if you were standing in the breezeway waiting for me to open the door to you, you might turn to the right to look out at our backyard and if you did you, I would hope that you would stare at the sunlight dancing on the pond's water instead of being distracted by this. . .

our beautiful, fragrant gardenia bushes completely smothered in weeds ~ not to mention all the weeds pushing their way up through the cracks in our brick walkway. . .

And, lastly, let me welcome you to our garage. . .

a.k.a. the place where riding toys come to die. Now, in our defense, we actually clean our garage out every 6 months or so, but it only takes about 2 weeks before it looks like this again!!!

I could go on and on and on, but I have to stop somewhere. I'd post a picture of my closet, the place where wire hangers come to die, but, thankfully, Erik Daniel is asleep in there ~ so I have a good excuse to keep that part of my life hidden!! :-)

My boys may not have a perfectly clean or organized home, but somehow they still manage to be happy and have a lot of fun ~ go figure!!! :-) Now let me show you some pictures of what I have been doing. . .

Building forts. . .

Keeping this little turned down ear guy company while he watches his big brothers play. . .

Serving snacks. . .

Protecting basket-head here from incoming balls. . . :-)

Reffing bubble wand sword fights. . .

These are the things that keep me busy, and I am so happy to do them!!

I'm not sure by what standards you rate a successful day. But, I rate a successful day by how many kids fall asleep before dinner.


I mean, really, if they have had so much fun, spent so much energy, and had the sun and the pool suck so much life out of them that they fall asleep while sitting up at the bar ~ that constitutes a good day in my book. Nothing feels better to me than completely exhausting my children with a day of fun out in the sunshine ~ nothing, not even a completely organized laundry room or a beautifully landscaped yard. Although, I must admit, those things would be nice. But, I have faith that we will have an organized home and a landscaped yard again one day. Just not this year, and I am okay with that! In the meantime, I am enjoying the ride of my life with these lively little men! And, I wouldn't trade them for a clean house any day.