I love the smell of bleach in the morning

There is an extremely short list of things that could make me happier than having a sparkling clean house BEFORE spring break even starts. I announced last night that the next day I was going to clean, and that I needed everyone out of the house while I did it. I've never seen a group of people so happy to comply.

I had three uninterrupted hours of cleaning time. It was great. Don't get me wrong, I would certainly prefer not to have to clean the house, but the result is SO satisfying. Where is the line drawn on OCD with regard to cleaning? Do I have tendencies? Possibly. One of my sister's nicknames for me is Monica. (Thanks to all of you who get the reference.) But am I a nut? I don't think so. The house can get pretty dirty. It's just that I get all out of sorts when it's like that. The sun shines directly through our kitchen/living room windows in the late afternoon, and I just get so creeped out the way it highlights every fleck of dust in the air, not to mention the junk on the floor. It puts me in a bad mood. It's not that I'm obsessed with cleaning. I have three children, a husband and a dog running around. I don't have time to be obsessed. I just REALLY REALLY REALLY would prefer for things to be clean. This is just making me sound crazier, right? Even in high school, I was kind of nutty about making my bed, and keeping my bathroom clean. My sweet sister, in protest, would refuse to let me clean her half of the bathroom, and I'm pretty sure she kept it extra messy on purpose just to bother me. Same way with my wonderful husband, who just can't manage to rinse out the sink after he brushes his teeth, or get his dirty clothes in the hamper, even if I put it right where he likes to pile things. When Mary Grace was very small, she was talking to me about how Daddy teaches the band kids. I asked her, "And what does Mommy do?" No hesitation - "Mommy cleans up our messes."

I guess the question of whether or not I have a disorder doesn't matter nearly as much as how happy I am right now sitting in my nice clean house.

Cheese

If the first three ingredients are water, oil and corn starch, it
isn't cheese.

Choices

I had a great conversation one morning this week with Mary Grace. I
told her that at every moment of every day you are spreading either
peace or chaos in the world. She tried hard to come up with a
scenario in which that wasn't true, but couldn't come up with one. I
can't come up with one either. I also told her that the world is
full of chaos and sadness, and we should always be trying hard not to
add to it. One of my main goals with my children is to teach them
personal responsibility for their choices and actions. Mary Grace
came home from school and proudly told me that she spread peace in
her classroom all day. Who could ask for more from a child? I guess
now I have to live up to her example and do the same.

The Christmas Blog

We celebrated what seemed like the 12 Days of Christmas this year.
We had Christmas Day in Georgetown, Christmas in Dallas a few days
later, then the twins' birthday in Dallas, then Christmas and
birthdays in Houston at New Years! But instead of partridges, golden
rings (that would've been nice) and lords a leaping (that would've
been weird) we had:

On the first day of Christmas, my true love gave to me, some Tamiflu
in a pear tree. Not really in a pear tree, but I couldn't come up
with another rhyme. Willa got the flu three days before Christmas,
but recovered quickly. We sent the other two girls to Granny's,
everyone stayed healthy and we were back on track by Christmas Eve.
On the second day of Christmas, my true love gave to me, two princess
ariel dolls. This is so that Evelyn & Willa wouldn't fight over
them...too much. Any gift that had anything to do with Ariel had to
be a double gift with one for Evelyn and one for Willa. Any other
type of gift could be doubled or not, it didn't seem to matter. They
are fine sharing anything but their precious Ariels.
On the third day of Christmas, my true love gave to me, three million
craft projects. Mary Grace got tons of craft stuff. She has
knitting, sewing, painting, drawing, paper folding, weaving, and
cooking just to name a few. She also got a couple of video games,
but has logged way more time knitting and painting.
On the fourth day of Christmas, my true love gave to me four nieces
and nephews. We loved playing with Julia in Dallas. She smiles ALL
the time, and is so sweet and easy going. In Houston, Mary Grace got
her playtime in with Daniel and Avery doing all kinds of "projects"
around Granny's house. Brandon is another baby who smiles
constantly...unless he's being fed baby food bananas, which might as
well be lemons as far as he's concerned.
On the fifth day of Christmas, my true love gave to me, FIVE HAPPY
SCHAYOTS! It was a great two weeks. We feel really blessed to have
such amazing families who we love to hang out with.
On the sixth day of Christmas, my true love gave to me...just
kidding. I'm done. Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to all!!!

To Santa Or Not To Santa

We went on our annual Santa trip this past weekend. My strategy
(yes, I needed a strategy) was to not mention it to Evelyn and Willa
until we got to the mall. That way, they wouldn't have time to work
up a scary scenario in their heads. Evelyn has pretty intense
stranger anxiety that was only heightened and cemented during the
most recent Halloween season. Willa would be fine, but if Evelyn is
worried, Willa figures she probably ought to be worried as well.
Another part of my strategy was to feed them lots of mexican food
after Church so that they would nap in the car on the way there, thus
putting them in an awesome mood. This part of my strategy did not
take into account the broken windshield wiper on the van, and (of
course) the subsequent rain. So we drove around all day in Jason's
XTerra with all three girls squished together on the back seat. No
nap. Lots of touching, kicking, tickling, smacking, and
screaming...but no napping.

By the time we get to the mall, Mary Grace has figured out what's
going on, and very helpfully announces this to Evelyn and Willa. To
my surprise, Mary Grace gets them all excited about seeing Santa.
Fantastic! We get in the mall, find Santa and his very long line,
and everyone is still in great spirits. We watch Santa for a long
time, and, thankfully, no screaming children are forced to sit on his
lap while we're watching. This would be an instant deal breaker.
Santa goes on a break. Santa comes back. Mary Grace has several
very intense and nervous conversations with me about what she might
or might not ask for. Willa keeps telling me she's going to ask for
a "brown Daddy present," whatever the heck that is. Mary Grace is
now having some very intense conversations with the older boy in line
in front of us, and he's showing her a picture he cut out of a
magazine of some video game machine. Wait, what the heck? Why is
she having very intense conversations with the older boy in line in
front of us???

Anyway, everyone is still doing great, and we're next. Evelyn, at
this point has asked to be picked up a couple of times (the only sign
that she's a little nervous). My strategy (yes, still strategizing)
was to not pick her up because then I would have to extricate her
from my body in order to put her down with Santa. In situations with
strangers, this is often physically impossible, so I don't pick her
up at all right now. Jason is ready to take video and pictures of
the entire event.

Ok, we're next! Mary Grace walks right up. I have Willa's hand in
one hand and Evelyn's hand in the other. I pull Willa a little and
show her that Santa has candy canes. That does the trick, and she's
up in Santa's lap. I turn to pull Evelyn along, and she's gone
behind the little white fence that surrounds Santa Land. She just
looks at me very plainly with her thumb in her mouth, shakes her head
NO and grabs the fence, as if to say, "You can try and make me, but
it won't be pretty." The picture girl looks at me with raised
eyebrows. I know she's thinking, "Are you one of the Moms who puts
the screaming child on Santa's lap?" I'm not. I give her a nod and
we have a lovely Santa picture of Mary Grace and Willa smiling ear to
ear.