Today I did two things that made me feel very accomplished, neat, tidy, on top of things, a real homemaker, fresh and clean......
I swept and mopped every. single. room of our tiny home. :-D
Yep, you read right - it is only on rare occasions that I find that extra 'umph' I need and do both sweeping and mopping at the same time. Oh sure, some days I sweep every room but more often than not I don't mop. Why? Let's just say it's a very laborious job and quite boring. And no, I don't like it. ;-)
But this morning, for some reason, I found that extra 'umph' and I went ahead and did it. Usually, I will offer myself excuses of why not to do it- such as, the baby will only sit in your dirt pile and play in the mop water!- but despite these very real reasons, I did it anyway.
And you know what? I am soooo glad I did! Not only is my house in way too much order for the upcoming weekend ;-) but I am sitting here blogging... something I have been wanting to do for a very long time but never could find the time to do it.
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It seems like only yesterday I was still single, living with my parents and brothers and sisters (the whole lot of 'em ;-) ), engrossed in a life of waiting for my Prince Charming, singing with the family band, writing fictional dramas, feeling sorry for myself for not having a husband- or even a remote possibility- on the horizon, doing my part of family chores, etc etc etc etc etc....
Then, all of a sudden, when I decided that it was high-time for me to get up and start serving the Lord even more, my husband-to-be literally fell out of the sky. <3 (Okay, okay, not literally, but pretty much so!)
In six months' time, we fell in love and got married. And then, within a few weeks of getting married, we found out we were going to have a baby join our unit. How crazy excited and nervously happy we were!
And all this happened to the girl who was pining away just a few months before.
These days, my life is filled with piles of laundry, piles of dishes (warning girls: they don't go away once you leave your family's house and have a home of your own :-P ), blocks strewn out over the living room floor, bits of torn toilet paper all over the house, spilled orange juice on the floor, a hard-working man who loves and cares for his family, and a sweet little toddler girl who waddles from room to room exploring, lays on her belly coloring with one of Mommy's pens or crawls up in Mommy's lap and offers kisses all over.
Yes, some days seem like such a chore- there is so much to do, so little time. What is for dinner? Did I remember to take the chicken out of the freezer? Where did the baby go?! Why is she quiet? Does he have work pants for tomorrow? Oh no, today is my workout day. Why does she want to be held all. the. time? Did I remember to pay the power bill? I wish she would just go to sleep! We need a vacation! I need some coffee.....
But I wouldn't trade this life for the world. I am blessed beyond measure. My cup runneth over. This is my dream come true! I am loved, healthy, clean, dry, warm, cool, blessed.
Which brings me to my opening story about sweeping and mopping. Yep- the baby was in the dirt pile, and she did try to play in the mop water (yuck!) but at least she was with me, learning the ropes of housecleaning 101. ;-) We laughed together, she found a dry washrag and dried patches of the wet floor, I got another kind of workout in, and the floors got clean in the midst of things!
In my opinion, a clean house equals a fresh outlook on every day life and feels like a breath of fresh air. At least, to me it equals that. It makes me feel accomplished and clear-minded, and I love the thought that maybe it's a fresh haven of rest from the busy world where my husband has to work every day. Plus, our baby is so much closer to the ground and dirt than we are, might be healthier because the floors were disinfected and cleaned to perfection. (Oh, ahem, pardon my boasting...)
Life is very much a whirlwind and time is certainly fleeting. Think about it: whatever time it was ten minutes ago is gone forever. Whatever age you turned on your birthday is the last time in your whole life you will ever be this age. The baby was just born. She weighed only 8 lbs, 9oz.... she couldn't walk, couldn't talk, didn't know how to sit up.....now she is almost SEVENTEEN months old, weighs a whopping 30 lbs (approx.), can walk very well, can talk very well, can sit up by herself, she can even give kisses night-night and wave hi or bye-bye.
So, if my talk about a clean house made you all nervous... forget it. If you have a choice of sitting in the middle of a dirty floor and scribbling nonsense with your babies, or making your home immaculate for just a short time (because we all know it just gets dirty again), I encourage you to sit with your babies. Of course, there is a time for cleaning and scrubbing. But it can wait. Your babies can't. They are growing, learning and maturing nearly every second.
Enjoy the ride.
(And just so you know: my mom always said that babies grow up too fast and that a dirty home was sometimes better than a clean one if it meant time with your little ones... I didn't really believe her until I had a child of my own. :-) )
