Crashed Out

Laundry is My Kryptonite

I hate doing laundry.

Really, I hate it with the utmost passion.

I know I should be grateful that we have clothes, that we have a means to keep them clean, and all that. There are people who would love to have the problem of having decent clothes to wash.

That little caveat aside....it is really is my least favorite job in the home.

I don't like bathroom cleaning, but love it when it's done. It's just nice.

Dishes really aren't that bad.

Vacuuming is actually very satisfying and easy.

But laundry...ugh...laundry.

It's a constant battle. First is the problem of the laundry room not being in my apartment. It's a little walk down the sidewalk to get to the laundry room, and I really don't enjoy doing it during the day. It's just easier to do it while the kids are in bed.

This involves dealing with laundry room politics, broken down machines, and people who just refuse to take their laundry out of the machines in a timely fashion putting the rest of us in an awkward position of waiting and waiting, or having to put their wet clothes on the table and usurp their position in line. Sometimes I'll wait it out. Sometimes, in my grumpier times, I will remove their laundry. I just don't have time to wait for them to finally get around to taking care of their clothes.

Then after it's washed, then dried, I have to bring it back to the apartment. Usually it is late at night, so I very frequently will just refuse to deal with it anymore. That often means that it can be days that I will work around my clean, unfolded laundry. Only after I see my poor husband rooting around in the laundry basket looking for socks in the morning that I finally get myself in gear to deal with it.

Occasionally, I have the discipline and fortitude to just finish it all at one time, but whenever I do that, it is SO exhausting. Sorting, folding, putting it away. Can we just track how many steps there are in the laundry process: 1) sorting dirty clothes 2) washing dirty clothes 3) drying clean clothes 4) retrieving clean clothes 5) sorting clean clothes 6) folding clean clothes 7) putting clean clothes away. And if there needs to be ironing done? Eight steps for one chore? How annoying.

It's no wonder I often have a Mt. Washmore in my room. I can hang with a chore that requires 3 steps (wash, rinse, dry) such as dishes, bathroom, etc. But 7-8 steps? Even if a recipe requires seven or eight steps, it better be a fancy meal!

But, those rare occasions when I get those 7 steps done at once, it does feel good. I often envision it like a video game when your stamina of your character goes down until you eat some power pellets and then you can run faster, jump higher, etc. Well, when the laundry is all clean, folded and put away, I feel like I am at full laundry stamina. The day does just go a little bit better and it certainly is nice not having to be bothered by the constant, hovering presence of unfolded laundry.

Right now, I am finished with step 6 of 7. I have the laundry in the baskets, folded and ready to be put away. But heaven help me...I just can't seem to get myself to finish that last step. Maybe tomorrow...

...or the next day...

The Best Place on Earth?

1. It's free.
2. It's not crowded.
3. There are trolleys
4. There are airplanes flying right overhead.
5. Lots of room to run.
6. And now, as we've just discovered, there are sticky spider webs in the trees and sticks to poke them with.

Really, Balboa Park may be Heaven according to these boys!

"Look what I did!"

As I was fixing lunch, both boys called me over to view their separate activities. "Look what I did!" They both yelled.

It's funny to watch kids as they go through a "sorting and lining up" phase. For all the chaos they seem to enjoy causing, it's nice there is a desire for order, balance and symmetry too.

Action Shots

We are doing our best to take advantage of the sunshine and life before it gets a little crazy in March. Lately, we've been getting to the park everyday. The boys love it and the sunshine keeps me energized. This very warm winter reminds me that A) I don't need a winter wonderland to feel like we got in all our "seasons." Especially in a small apartment I dislike being cooped up during cold, wet weather. B) it is worth the higher cost of living to have this kind of weather. I love it!

Here are some action shots of the boys:

Bookworms

They love their books, Tracee! :)

I Can't Caption This

I guess some pictures just speak for themselves....

Sense of Justice

Michael has been all about "bad guys."

I don't know when it started, but he frequently asks questions, "Are bad guys happy?" "Do bad guys get presents?" "Do bad guys get dessert?" "Do bad guys lie?"

Often these "bad guys" are exempt from the normal protections we offer to good guys. Like, it's not ok to push Matthew or other children, but "it's ok to push bad guys."

I am not entirely sure if I'm doing the right thing by saying it is ok to push bad guys, because of the whole "love thy enemies thing" but sometimes I envision these bad guys being the sort of people that sneak into bedroom windows at night to try to take things...and yeah, in cases like those, it's ok to push them.

Since loving thy enemies is a more sophisticated teaching in the pedagogy of morality, we're still at rudimentary principles: good guys are happy and don't get punished, bad guys are sad and do get punished. So in our house, bad guys are not offered much in terms of mercy. That can come later. In our house, bad guys are the most unlikeable types for whom nothing goes well.

Michael does not like bad guys. Somehow, even "hating" them crept into his vocabulary (where does he get that? Do I say I hate stuff? I didn't think so....) He talks about them all the time. He likes to emphasize the fact that they don't get things he gets to have. I like this. I want him to see that being good is what you want to do because then you'll be happy and it's how you get all that really matters. In all honesty, it's the Beatitudes adapted to a 3 year old boy's mentality: Blessed (happy) are the peacemakers, blessed are the meek...etc...they get the good stuff.

At lunch today, Michael surprised us by his dislike of the bad buys when he told us, step by step what he was going to do with the bad buys.

"I'm going to get the bad guys."

-"What will you do with them?"

"Put them in the basket."

-"Then what will you do with them?"

"I'm going to dump them in the parking lot."

-"What will happen once they are in the parking lot?"

"They'll get squished by a car."

-"Who will drive the car?"

"Mommy and Daddy and Michael and Matthew."

Michael Sr and I are cracking up, on the one hand slightly disturbed by the violent nature with which he will deliver justice against the bad guys. On the other hand, aware that at a certain point, this is not much less violent than the Biblical teaching of the Wheat and the Tares. I mean, does it not say in Matthew 13:36-43 that, "The Son of Man will send out his angels, and they will gather out of his Kingdom all things that cause stumbling, and those who do iniquity, and will cast them into the furnace of fire. There will be weeping and the gnashing of teeth."

So, we're going to let this be in our home for a while to further cement how undesirable it is to be a bad guy. I'm sure as time goes on, we can develop who the bad guys are, and make sure to always teach mercy and the willingness of our Lord to forgive anyone who asks for it. But, if this is a good springboard to make them want to avoid being a bad guy and do the things that good guys do: praying, being kind, listening to Mommy and Daddy, going to Church, etc, then I think we are heading on the right track.

In the meantime, if Michael comes up to you in a parking lot with a basket in hand, I would go the other way.