Monday Morning Bliss

I'm all excited to continue spring cleaning projects this week and read the great articles at Simple Mom on decluttering, decorating, and organizing. I feel a renewed burst of energy to get things done after my weekend away and am ready to tackle the last of my projects. I hope by the end of the week to have:

*Gone through my Tickler File
*Cleaned my closet
*Sorted my important paper file
*Papered my kitchen utensil drawers
*Organized kitchen shelves to make things more efficient
*Straightened my sewing desk drawers


My mom and I went to the "big city" of Cheyenne this weekend for one of my dear friends' weddings. Heather and I have been friends/penpals for 13 years and have shared some of the best times in Christian Youth in Action and Child Evangelism Fellowship work in our teen years. She has always dreamed of marriage and has wanted to be married for years and God wrote her a beautiful love story and an amazing man found her and swept her off her feet! I'm so happy for her, and thankful that I decided to go in spite of the work it was to travel. My mom was feeling kind of sick this week and I had a super busy week and had tons of housework to catch up on and we've had some unexpected expenses come up so I wasn't sure I should spend the time and money to go. But my hubby strongly encouraged me to and said our finances would be fine and my mom and I decided that it would be MORE exhausting to stay home and be bombarded with chores. For a mom of young kids and a schoolteacher in the month of May, sitting in a car for 4-5 hours each way is relaxing!!! We haven't had a lot of time to just visit lately so we talked non-stop the entire way there and back and had a lovely time together at the wedding. It was so nice not to be correcting little ones all the time or to have much responsibility. I went an entire day without hearing whining, crying, fighting, and begging for food and drinks! It was fun to see old CEF friends who are dear to us and to be treated to a wonderful meal at the reception. We found a hotel for $45 and it was very clean and nice and thus we didn't have to try to drive back late into the night, considering we both are horrible night drivers and have night blindness. Justus was his typical angelic self and traveled wonderfully and some friends' parents babysat him for us during the reception since it was an adult-only reception.

I had been feeling overwhelmed with all of the endless household chores a mommy has to do last week and so I had hinted that for Mother's Day, all I wanted was a house that STAYS clean; an impossibility, I know! My hubby decided to bless me bigtime and I returned home to a perfectly spotless, immaculate, straightened, vacuumed and scrubbed home. All the laundry done and folded and put away, all the dishes done and sink scoured, etc. Shiloh would have been proud had she seen it! He also had baked two apple pies from scratch with the kids (said it took 3 hours) and had made me some cute cards for me with the kiddoes. Our lawn had been looking awful all last week and we hadn't had a chance to mow because we had stuff to do every single night of the week. So, when I arrived home the lawn was all trimmed and the weeds and brush were whacked. He had met the neighbors for the first time and worked out a nice agreement with them on lawn mowing details too. My hubby wanted the extra pie to go to bless a mother in need so it was delivered to a Mama who recently lost a baby to premature birth and another baby to miscarriage.


It was quite the dramatic improvement to see all this work done when last week I was feeling like clean and neat was un-attainable!

Because of this marvelous gift from my family, I feel like I have new energy to tackle spring cleaning and now that the usual typical household chores are out of the way, I can spend more time Monday and Tuesday on the things that I never seem to have leftover time for. I must admit, a part of me wonders how King Jo accomplished so much with the little kids around. He's putting me to shame as a homemaker! Either he stayed up half the night cleaning or I'll never measure up to his home-cleaning abilities! I do know he served them PB sandwiches and Ramen, kept them outside a lot and away from the house, and didn't have Justus to care for. Funny thing is that Jer has been wearing undies to church for a few months and has never had an accident in church. The week Daddy is alone with the kids, Jer wet his pants in Sunday School. So King Jo ran home, got him clothes, and came back to church. Then Jer wet them again during the worship service!!! Daddy said being Mr. Mom was fun but he never had a moment's rest!