Mr. Clean

Thursday morning before I left for work, I looked around the house and had a minor melt down. Since all three of my guys were sitting there I informed them that before we did anything on Saturday, we were cleaning the house. Then I added "Collin and Nichols, there are things you can do to help and you will be expected to do it before you can do anything fun." Friday night I was making a grocery list and said to Collin "Do you know what we have to do tomorrow?" I was going to ask him to come grocery shopping with me. To my surprise he said "I know, I know, we have to clean the house" in a totally exasperated tone that clearly said, I get it, quit nagging me Mom. Saturday morning Collin woke Tim and I up at 7 a.m. by saying, "Come downstairs, I have to show you something." Tim got up and went downstairs and sure enough, Collin had picked up all his toys in the living room. It looked beautiful. Who knows what time he had gotten up to do that. We were so proud of him. Needless to say, he got to play the wii that day.

How I spent my day off...

We are so slow at work right now that I was able to take today off. I got up at 6:45 when Collin woke up (way better than the 5:10 I usually wake up), got the boys dressed and sent them to daycare with Daddy and the promise of a surprise when I picked them up if they were good. After that I let the dog out, grabbed a shower, put Collin's books back in his book case (they'd been in a laundry basket all week because he dumped them all out of his book case and I took them away), made the beds, sat down and had a yogurt for breakfast, then I went back upstairs and gathered up every piece of laundry I could find. I have been really good about doing laundry but, as usual, the clean laundry has piled up on me and I had 4 huge laundry baskets to fold and put away, not to mention the 2 loads of towels, the load of lights, the load of darks, the load of jeans, the load of reds and the bathroom rugs that I had just dragged down to the laundry room. I tossed the first load in and grabbed a basket to sort and put away. A couple hours later the clean laundry was completely put away and I was even done with the first load of today's pile. I grabbed a quick peanut butter sandwich for lunch and went back to work. I cleaned up the living room and the dining room and vacuumed the whole downstairs. Then I went upstairs and vacuumed the bedrooms and the steps. Then I cleaned my bathroom top to bottom and ran back downstairs to clean the half bath as well. Since I had the Windex out, I cleaned the sliding glass door and the glass in the front door as well. In between chores I ran up and down the stairs grabbing another load of clean laundry as it finished drying and putting it away. At 3:45 I called the cops on the jackass that's been riding his motorcycle down my sidewalk for the last 2 days and ran to pick up the boys. On the way I stopped at 7-11 and picked up slurpees for the boys Good thing I did it too because all Collin talked about all day long was that he was going to get a surprise when he got home. Of course I walked in and Collin said "where's Dad?" Huh? I thought he'd be happy to see me but he wanted his Daddy, apparently when he wasn't talking about his surprise he was talking about how Daddy was picking him up. The slurpees in the car made him forget how disappointed he was that I picked him up instead of Daddy. By the time Tim got home I was in no mood to cook so we went to Macaroni Grill for dinner. The boys were so well behaved. It was just so nice to go out as a family and make it through an entire dinner without having to correct either one of them for bad behavior. When we got home I pulled the very last load out of the dryer and put it away. As of right now the only dirty laundry in the entire house is the stuff we wore today. I will wash that along with the sheets tomorrow. It feels so good to come home to a clean house. It also feels good to accomplish something rather than just chilling out and relaxing all day, not that there's anything wrong with that, it's exactly what I plan to do tomorrow.

Mean Old Mom's Cleaning Frenzy Just Got a Whole Lot Easier

I've been on a cleaning frenzy for the last week or so. Spring is here, I'm tired of all the mess and I'm determined to renew my New Year's resolution and really stick to it this time. Just one problem, in the middle of all this cleaning, my vacuum cleaner up and died. And not just not sucking so great anymore died (because it's not-perhaps we should have had it serviced in the last 6 years) it died complete with smoke and a really nasty smell that lingered throughout the house, of course at 9pm because I don't clean while my kids are awake. And of course I was vacuuming out the couch cushions before I did the floor so the part that needed to be done worst of all didn't get done. So tonight, after some research at Consumer Reports (they just happened to test vacuum cleaners in January of this year) I went and got myself a new one. It's a Kenmore Progressive bagless. The one with the bag got slightly higher ratings but I really wanted one without a bag. I think they both rated as best buys. Anyway, I absolutely love the thing. It has a feature called Intelliclean that shows you how dirty your carpet is while you're vacuuming. Mine was beyond gross. I'm talking embarrassing. I probably spent an hour vacuuming tonight and picked up so much stuff it's ridiculous. The intelliclean has different lights that light up while you're vacuuming. Green means little to no dirt. 1 amber light means light dirt, 2 slightly heavier and 2 ambers and a red means your carpet is filthy and the vacuum is working at its maximum capacity. My carpet started out in the red but by the time I was done, is in the 1 amber to green range. It needs a really good shampooing and then it will look really good. Even the areas where it was filthy from the kids and the dog tracking dirt in look considerably better.

When I went out to get the vacuum cleaner, Tim was just putting Collin to bed and I told him that I was going to buy a new vacuum cleaner and I would check on him when I got back. I was only gone 45 minutes because I knew exactly what I wanted when I walked into the store. When I got back Collin was still up and the first thing I heard when I opened the door was "Mommy, what color is the vacuum cleaner?". Tim said he just couldn't sleep because he was so excited about it so we let him come downstairs for a good look. It's purple by the way. Collin helped me take everything out of the box, put the handle on and wind the cord. He wanted so badly to read the instruction manual with me. Finally, he helped me vacuum. I've never seen a little kid so excited about vacuuming but it made me happy. Too bad he won't be this excited to vacuum when it shows up on his chore list in a few years. I finally got him back to bed around 9:15 and he was still talking about the new vacuum cleaner and how we had to get rid of the old one because it was smokin'.

In other Collin news, he informed me today that I was old and mean, although not in the same sentence. I don't know why he thinks I'm old, but I'm mean because I punished him for running away from me for the 3rd day in a row. We haven't turned the tv on all week because he keeps doing that. He asked Tim last night what "freakin'" means. To which his daddy responded "that's not a nice word and we don't use it, ERIN". He's right, I really need to watch my language better. I don't swear in front of the kids but, occasionally, I use other words that don't sound too nice when they come out of the mouth of a 2 year old. This morning, as I was bribing him with everything I could think of to use the potty, he finally looked at me and asked "Mommy, why do I have to pee in the potty to get something?" I felt like a rotten mom. He's right; he shouldn't have to pee in the potty to get something and I don't want to teach him to expect a reward for every little behavior. I'm just frustrated because he's almost 3 and he has the ability to use the potty, he just chooses not to. Feel free to drop me your suggestions because at this point, I'll try just about anything.

Resolutions

This year I made one New Year's resolution and that was to get on top of and stay on top of all our laundry. I have failed miserably! So once again I resolve to try to do better. Washing laundry isn't the problem, it's hauling it back upstairs and putting it away that never seems to get done. This week I have made a serious effort to do some laundry every night and get it put away but that requires entering my kids bedroom after they've fallen asleep and opening drawers and closet doors. So far I've been lucky and they've stirred but haven't woken up. I have also managed to clean up (and keep it clean) my living room, dining room and kitchen and both of the kids rooms. I need to tackle the half bath but its not too bad yet and the other stuff is more pressing right now. I can't tell you how many people have told me "just spend 15 minutes a night and clean something and your house will stay neat". Clearly those people don't have an out of control house to begin with. No way is my house going to get clean in 15 minutes a night so I'm trying to take the extra time and get each room cleaned up so I can spend 15 minutes a night and see if it works. Working full time and taking care of 2 small fry doesn't leave a whole lot of time or energy for cleaning. Every weekend I say I'm going to clean something and then I choose to do something fun with my kids instead so I have no one to blame but myself. I need to clean my bedroom and both of my bathrooms and then I will finally be in a position to try the 15 minutes a night thing. So my goal is within reach. I'm trying to put away all loads of laundry I complete each night plus one extra from the gigantic pile of clean laundry in the basement. Maybe since I have given myself a very public challenge I will finally find the motivation I need to keep my house in order. I just feel so much better when I walk in and it looks nice. How do you keep your house in order? Any tips would be greatly appreciated!