Spinning My Wheels
I have to say, lately I feel as though I'm spinning my wheels in regards to housework. On my list of Things To Do, I have put simply, "A place for everything", meaning I need to find a place for everything and then work on keeping it there.
This becomes difficult when you have a two-foot-tall wrecking ball following you around, determined to touch everything you touch and leave it worse off than when he found it. Yesterday for example, I must have picked up the dishtowels off the floor and hung them back on the oven handle about 65 times. Seriously. I gave up trying to fold the 4 loads of laundry I had done the day before, and finally just shut the laundry in the guest room until Noah went down for his nap. I'm glad I did! It took me over an hour to fold it all and put it away, and I can't imagine how long it would have taken had I tried to do it while Noah was awake.
I get very frustrated when I look back over a day's events and remember being busy all day, but not really having anything concrete to point to and say "This is what I got done today!" There are times when Josh comes home and recounts his day, which includes reports of building this or moving that or tearing down this other thing, and sometimes over multiple job sites in one day! Then he says innocently, "So what did you do today?" And I look back at him blankly while I cast about for something tangible. "Well, I...uh... I cleaned up the kitchen..." I look at the kitchen to see a disaster area. No sign that I ever cleaned it. ".....and I cleaned up around the house." Again, I glance around and this time see an odd mix of things scattered about as though they had been swirling around in the ocean and then washed up in my living room: Random single shoes with their mates nowhere to be seen, a slingshot (?), an abandoned sippy cup, a cell phone charger, a shredded kleenex, a couple packing peanuts, a dish towel, a bottle of shampoo, a remote control. "And I mopped the floor!" I say proudly, satisfied that I had come up with something substantial, something lasting. I get up to clear the dishes and my foot sticks to something on the floor~a smooshed piece of fig newton, plastered to the tile, ground in and sticky. Lovely.
Understand, I'm not complaining! I love being a mom! But I have many days where I feel as though nothing got done, where I actually went backward instead of forward. These are the days that I laugh to keep from crying when I come into the kitchen and those dish towels are staring up at me from the floor. Again.
This becomes difficult when you have a two-foot-tall wrecking ball following you around, determined to touch everything you touch and leave it worse off than when he found it. Yesterday for example, I must have picked up the dishtowels off the floor and hung them back on the oven handle about 65 times. Seriously. I gave up trying to fold the 4 loads of laundry I had done the day before, and finally just shut the laundry in the guest room until Noah went down for his nap. I'm glad I did! It took me over an hour to fold it all and put it away, and I can't imagine how long it would have taken had I tried to do it while Noah was awake.
I get very frustrated when I look back over a day's events and remember being busy all day, but not really having anything concrete to point to and say "This is what I got done today!" There are times when Josh comes home and recounts his day, which includes reports of building this or moving that or tearing down this other thing, and sometimes over multiple job sites in one day! Then he says innocently, "So what did you do today?" And I look back at him blankly while I cast about for something tangible. "Well, I...uh... I cleaned up the kitchen..." I look at the kitchen to see a disaster area. No sign that I ever cleaned it. ".....and I cleaned up around the house." Again, I glance around and this time see an odd mix of things scattered about as though they had been swirling around in the ocean and then washed up in my living room: Random single shoes with their mates nowhere to be seen, a slingshot (?), an abandoned sippy cup, a cell phone charger, a shredded kleenex, a couple packing peanuts, a dish towel, a bottle of shampoo, a remote control. "And I mopped the floor!" I say proudly, satisfied that I had come up with something substantial, something lasting. I get up to clear the dishes and my foot sticks to something on the floor~a smooshed piece of fig newton, plastered to the tile, ground in and sticky. Lovely.
Understand, I'm not complaining! I love being a mom! But I have many days where I feel as though nothing got done, where I actually went backward instead of forward. These are the days that I laugh to keep from crying when I come into the kitchen and those dish towels are staring up at me from the floor. Again.
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