May I Have Your Attention, Please?

We are pleased to announce ~

The Summer of the Garage is over.

Stuff's hooked up and works and there's room for a vehicle.

Winter of the Apartment has begun! What happened to Autumn, you may ask? Me too.

Rees wants to move out there just as badly as Ken and I want to move back into our room and as John wants to move into the den, getting out of the bunkbed room full of little brothers (although he leaves just as many legos and clothes on the floor as they do!).

I'd like to take this opportunity to encourage families in small houses: it works. Don't be afraid to downsize to save money, work less, and gain time together. It's easy to trash a small house but it's quick to get it all put back together. It's fun to see the teens roll their eyes when Ken and I feign impatience (kind of) to get a real bedroom back. It's charming to shuffle around in the early morning and see that kids have migrated into each other's beds or the couch or the living room floor. It's nice to be able to swing through a drive-through and have an extra $20 to surprise them with a hot chocolate or ice cream cone. And it's quietly exhilarating to live with something you built yourself because there's not that much extra money to hire someone.

On trashing and cleaning, Ken and I had a long talk this weekend about cleaning ~ the mother's yelling/hand-wringing/fainting about the children's cleaning/distraction/disobedience. He reminded me that all they know is the here-and-now and that it stinks to drift off to sleep after getting in trouble. So I promised that the last word they will hear from me will be the story I read and to calm down about most of their work and give them a focus for a few important parts like dirty clothing coming downstairs and small toys off the floor (Lordy, they'll probably tuck stuff under the beds ... but I promised to be cool.).




Oh, and this is what became of the hall space emptied by the washer and dryer:

Pretty doors broken off another closet by the naughty fairies.

Where laundry lives now (Not in their drawers upstairs, which those naughty fairies tossed around and mixed up in the costume box or dirty pile). The kids aged 1 to 12 come downstairs in their PJs so it's easier to grab outfits here.

Here's to a new week and a quieter mother in the evenings!
Love, Allison