Enjoy

I don't know who has been loving our sandbox more, me or the kids. :) And no, I don't usually go out and play in the sand, haha! But I enjoy very much this new option I have to send my children outside to play in the sandbox while I make dinner.

Does this ever happen to you? Because it happens to me every year. I can't wait until summer, because we're going to have all this free time, and we'll be able to sit back and relax, blah, blah, blah...and then somehow it just ends up that my summer is more chaotic than the rest of the year. Instead of making an intense schedule like I do Fall-Spring and trying to stick to it, summer just fills up on its own and becomes crazy, but with no rhyme or reason to it. Every day is different, every week is different, and there seems to be too many schedules to coordinate. It's difficult for me to balance the things I feel obligated to do with the things I really want to do...and I suck at saying no...so I end up trying to do everything all the time!

I was feeling a bit overwhelmed today, so I sat down and tried to make some sense of my life. I got on pinterest and searched for house cleaning templates. I found a cute one and printed it out, then I wrote in which household chores I wanted to do on which days (because I feel like house work is out of control lately. I feel like I try to so everything every day and therefore nothing gets done. This needs to change.), and then I hung it up inside my cabinet door. I'm going to try to stick to it as best I can for a couple weeks, to get a feel for it, and then I'll make adjustments as necessary. Today's job was to clean the kids' bathroom. One word. Gross. How three small people can so thoroughly and completely trash a bathroom is beyond my comprehension. But I cleaned it. And now I have a small sense of accomplishment. Yay for me.

I'm also in the process of making a chore chart table for the kids. Ivan and Lincoln fight too much if I try and have them clean their room together, but it's not fair to have Lincoln clean it by himself every day. So I think what I want to do is have them switch, on Mondays Lincoln will clean the bedroom and Ivan will clean the school room, then on Tuesdays Ivan will clean the bedroom and Lincoln will clean the school room, and so on. Same with other chores. I have decided that all three of my oldest children are completely competent at setting the table, and therefore should be given this responsibility. So on my chore chart I've assigned Lincoln to set the table on Monday, Ivan on Tuesdays, and Adelia on Wednesdays. I'd like to do something similar with washing dishes, like maybe assigning one of them to help me wash the dishes each night, or something. Maybe sweeping the floor after dinner too. There is no reason why I should have to be doing all of these things every night alone. I am only 1 of 6 people that eats dinner and makes messes.

We did a couple more experiments out of our acids and bases kit. First we got out strips of red litmus paper and blue litmus paper and used a dropper to drip drops of vinegar, water, lemon juice, baking soda, and cola on them. Acids made blue paper turn red, and bases made red paper turn blue. The next experiment was to observe an acid in action. The boys each went and found their dirtiest pennies and put them in plastic cups. Then we filled the cups with cola, and let them sit for 24 hours. When we dumped out the cola and rinsed of the pennies, wha-la, they were clean(er)! Pretty cool.

In his spare time yesterday, Lincoln wrote a book. The rule at my house is that I only make the kids use correct spelling on a piece of writing I have assigned. If they want to write in their free time for their own enjoyment I only encourage and compliment (unless they ask how to spell a word, then I help them). I want them to be able to write for fun without worry about being wrong, or about me criticizing every sentence. So Lincoln wrote this book of his own accord, it's called Zoo Animals, and I love it. It might be one of those things I keep forever. He was so proud to show it to me when he was all finished, and I never want to forget his beaming eyes and his air of satisfaction as he read it to me and told me about all the pictures. It's nothing over the top, or beyond what you'd expect from a five year old, but to me it is priceless. A mother's treasure.