Homemade Mondays ...

I am trying my best to keep a general schedule of things to be done around the house so that important things get attended to and that the kids have an idea of what to expect. Mondays used to be "Cleaning Mondays" ... but not too much cleaning has been getting done lately asthey've now morphed into "Homemade Mondays" where I try to get most of the baking, etc. done for the week (there are also "Tiffany Tuesdays" when I head down to my office to work, "Fun Fridays", Sabbath Sundays, Daddy Saturdays ... keeping Wed/Thur for catchup and work at home days).

My goal for Mondays is to get all the baking and homemade items done and cleaned up, leaving the rest of the week for other projects, work that has to be done from home, etc. I'm TRYING my best to also get laundry and some cleaning done on Mondays, but quite honestly the cleaning is sort of slipping through the cracks these days - on Mondays I just plain run out of time, steam, or both.

Everything with small kiddos takes twice as long as it would otherwise, but I am trying to constantly remind myself to involve them in the process to, not only keep them busy, but also teach them a thing or two, and to keep them from destroying something else out of boredom ... Sometimes its a challenge to remember that my days should be ordered because of these two little ones, not in spite of them ...

Our group project for today was cleaning out their car seats. Seems only fair that these ones who made the mess should help carry the load for cleaning it up, right? I threw the seat covers in the wash and let the boys loose with the hose, some homemade cleaning spray, and rags ...

Nothing ever goes exactly according to plan with Will. I did catch him with his rag in the dog bowl AND he did decide to help "clean" the sliding glass door in the process, but he kept busy nonetheless. He LOVED working the spray bottle ...

Thank goodness for sweet Jared, he always works hard and diligently on projects!

Afterward, I treated them to a slushee "re-do" to cool down. (Tim tried to treat the boys to slushees from QT after they were particularly obedient for a labor and delivery hospital tour at St. Joe's on Sunday ... so grossly oversweet - much better today re-blended with lots of water and ice)

So, it's now 2:30 in the afternoon and though I have yet to think about taking a shower or getting dressed today, I'm happy to report that as of now, dinner is made and the yogurt is making ...

The granola is baked and put away...

And the whole wheat bread is cooling ... and all the dishes are cleaned and drying.

As for us? I'm totally exhausted and ready for a nap, Will is sleeping, and Jared is playing Reader Rabbit on the computer. With any luck now I'll have another 20 minutes to rest and read before Will wakes up.

Side note - In case you need more proof that nothing ever does quite go according to plan small kids ... While working on cleaning up the kitchen mess from Homemade Monday, I heard the sound of Styrofoam cracking. Will had snapped the shock absorber head rest from his car seat as I had yet to re-assemble them. Brilliant. Add "figure out how what to do now with the car seat and how to replace that part" to the list.

Another day in this crazy life I am so glad I get to live. Love these boys, love being their mommy. ;-)