I'm reading a new book by Peter Walsh called Does This Clutter Make My Butt Look Fat?. It had no special allure to me as a diet book, but the title intrigued me, so I picked it up. Flipping through it, I found that it had a whole huge section on organizing your kitchen and closet, grocery lists, and menu planning. It jumped into my buggy. Funny how that happens sometimes.

Well, it took me about a week to carve out enough time in my bathroom, er, study to read to the part about organizing the kitchen. So, yesterday I took upon myself the task of completely rearranging the kitchen. I have wanted to do this for a couple of years, but haven't had any idea how to go about it. With Peter's help, I set about tossing out stuff I no longer want or need and emptying my cupboards. As you can imagine, with 5 kids this (or any other task, for that matter) can turn into an all day affair.

My dear husband pointed out to me last night about 8pm that the wonderful time each year when we all get to lose one whole hour of sleep was once again upon us. This meant that the kids were already an hour late getting to bed if we didn't want to be awaking 4 angry bears early Sunday morning. (Did I already mention that Encyclopedia Brown was in Tennessee with the Royal Rangers having a sleepover at the Ripley's Believe It or Not Museum?)

Anyway, this revelation (Daylight Savings Time) was made to me while the kitchen floor was knee-deep in the contents of the cupboards, and I was given my marching orders about getting the kids in bed! My well-intentioned husband wanted me to leave the rest of the "organizing" for later (presumably today), and get ready for bed so that I wouldn't be exhausted at work/church today. When I informed him that I positively could not go to bed with dirty dishes in the sink, he sweetly offered to do them while I laid out everyone's clothes for the morning. I told him that I did not want to be greeted with a dirty sink in the morning, and he said he'd take care of it.

Now let me preface this by saying that I would never complain about my husband over this matter. He is the most helpful man I know when it comes to pitching in with the house and kids. But, truth is, he has some sort of mental block against finishing dishes. He would definitely explode if he washed everything down to the last fork. So this morning, I woke up to a kitchen still knee-deep in stuff and a sink full of dishes! AAAAAAAHHHHHH! He meant well, though.

And I didn't get home tonight until after 9:30 at which point I decided that it would all just have to sit there cuz I am done for the day. I can't see it hurting to put it off one more night, can you? Oh, and by the way, the sink full of dishes was technically a sink with a partially washed pot. There, now see? I didn't let myself exaggerate!

Yesterday, I spent much of the day once again going through stuff and coming out with a couple of boxes of items to send off to Goodwill. Since I wasn't focusing so much on schoolwork (okay, so I wasn't focusing at all on schoolwork), the kids were finding ways to entertain themselves in between chores that I assigned them. One of their favorite games was to use the box lid from the cupcakes we had on Tuesday as a television set. They took turns sitting behind it and being news reporters and other interesting characters. The Little Princess has a particular knack for this. She lives for every moment in the spotlight that she can happen upon. I wish I could say I sat and watched them so I could have some funny little story to share, but I was too busy sneaking away all their toys into boxes!!

Oh, and if you were wondering...yes, we did finally get around to schoolwork. At 4:30. ;) Oh, well!

Another crazy day. I haven't damaged any children yet, but the day is still young! I think my day seems to go better when I get every last dish washed the night before and wake up to a shiny, smiling sink (ala flylady). School has started out very slowly today, but Monday's are always like that because of the busy day at church (where I work as the Preschool Coordinator) on Sunday.

Over the weekend, I cleaned out closets. I managed to put together 4 large boxes and one bag of items to send to Goodwill, along with two boxes and 3 bags of things that just needed to be trashed. Loren (dh) and I also continued to work on his sister's bedroom downstairs. That was another 4 large bags of trash and another box for Goodwill that I cleaned out of my parents things they had stashed in that room. Loren, meanwhile, busied himself with hanging sheetrock.

It never ceases to amaze me how much stuff we have piled into this house. I send Loren off to Goodwill with a pickup truck load of things about every other weekend, and we still have stuff up to our eyeballs! Where does it come from? I think the junk is multiplying like little rabbits intent on repopulating the place. And with 10 people in our house, it isn't any wonder!

Anyway, I think that Monday should be our day of rest. That's what our Senior Pastor does, and it makes sense to me. Sunday is just about the busiest day of my week! But on Monday, there's still homeschooling that must get accomplished. So I guess I'm back to the hypothesis that I've held to for several years now (well, ever since baby 5 came along): "I can rest when I die!!!"