Spring cleaning...

My garlic is up, and a squirrel has already attacked one of them, and the air is lousy with robins, so between those two facts the cool temperatures don't bother me as much as they would usually.  'It's okay', I tell myself 'It's clearly still spring'.  And then I wander inside and wonder if I hang my clothes out if they will freeze.

I still get that itch in spring, the itch that says Clean All The Things And Organize Them.  Now that I'm back on my housekeeping schedule everything is moving smoothly (or smoother) and I can actually see all the extra above-and-beyond-the-daily that needs doing.  That schedule has just saved my house, I tell you.  Every day I do a full load of laundry, even if there isn't a full load of laundry to do, and put it away.  Every day I do all of the dishes.  Every day I wipe the tables and straighten cushions and open curtains.  But when the everyday is taken care of you start to think about the other stuff to do...

I think I'm going to try and tackle the playroom again.  Oh, the playroom.  It's getting a makeover this summer and I can't wait to write all about it.  But first it needs a good cleaning with a garbage bag.  And then a dustrag and a mop.  Off I go.

Gardens

Yesterday we started raking the lawns around the parsonage, working first on the front, which looks amazing, and while we worked we, or at least I, thought about the improvements we'd like to do to the outside 'landscaping' (put in quotations there for very good reasons).  I would like to dig up the rocks and moss in the little north-facing nook and put in some ferns and maybe lily-of-the-valley, if it will grow there, and then I would like to clean out all the rubble from under the front porch, a holdover from some previous resident, and I would like a new garbage box that the raccoons can't get into.  I know, I have big and glorious plans.  I even thought about re-seeding the lawn, which would be a Project, but probably also something the older children could help with and maybe even more likely than my sudden acquisition of a power saw and the ability to turn wood into a garbage box.

Today I'm going to start raking the side, and thinking about what I'd like to do there.  I have a friend with teenage sons (imagine the luxury, for a moment, of teenage sons) who are sweet and pleasant to be around and also very smart with hand tools and one of them built me two raised beds for my vegetable gardens last year, and is building me a third this year, and also a raised bed with stone around the side of the house, which I will fill with flowers.  What sorts of flowers remains to be seen; I think I will buy a whole bunch of wildflower type seeds and scatter them to their respective destinies and then try and keep the cats away.

Wild Animals

Around the time we moved into the parsonage we were told about all of the wild animals that one could see in the area, or in the town, or even, in one memorable case, in our neighbour's yard.  Apparently deer were all over the place, and various birds, and bears and raccoon and coyote; the apple tree next door had a bear come visit it in the fall, and we were warned about letting our cats outside.  I was pretty excited, I have to admit, to hear stories like that - not that I have any desire to see a bear on my porch, but when a lady who lives one street over from me told me about an encounter with a coyote that she had on hers, I was pretty interested.  I mean, how neat!  How cool!  A COYOTE on your PORCH!  Or the woman who told me about a lynx in her backyard, or the family of baby skunks...

Therefore, I dutifully wake up every morning, and this has become a habit now, I look outside my bedroom window for animals.  Well, we've lived here almost two years now and I have never seen a thing.  Birds, sure, even cool birds, and squirrels and chipmunks.  I've seen the wreckage of *something* getting into my garbage and my compost, so I'm assuming that's the raccoon, and in the winter I've seen rabbit tracks and something larger with paws, maybe also that elusive raccoon, who knows, but as for big, elusive, cool animals...never in the yard or around town.

Now, I have seen deer and wild turkey and eagles and such driving along the highway.  And last fall we saw a black bear and this spring something that I think was a coyote, but it was moving very fast.  The cats bring me mice and birds and once, a mole with it's strange little nose, but I keep peering out at the apple tree in the fall, waiting for the bear.

Sick

All of the children were sick this past week, even to the point of going to work with David and lying on the church sofa wrapped in blankets while he worked.  Of course, whenever the boy gets really ill it goes to his chest - and the dry cough he'd been nursing and couldn't shake for weeks turned into a very unpleasant sounding chest cold so off we went to the emergency room.  The good news is he is finally going to get tested for asthma, and they gave us inhalers to use while he gets better, the bad news is that he's still sick, poor thing, and of course being *only* five means that he can't take any cold medication.

It's weird, how you *not supposed* to take medicine when you're pregnant, or nursing (one or the other of which I have been for five years) or for the first six years of life - all some of the times when you really most need it.  Because you certainly can't explain to, say, a three year old how you can't make them feel better except with some Tylenol and a hot water bottle, and you can't help but glare at your husband when you have a cold and are nine gazillion months pregnant and he has the same cold and is swigging back the cough syrup.  You, on the other hand, get to live like a pioneer and lean over a bowl of steaming water.

Ah, well, at least the weather's nice.  Oh, no it isn't - it's snowing.  It has been snowing and melting and re-snowing for the past two days and every time I look out the window and see flakes falling a little part of me dies inside.  I still force everyone to go on brisk, reviving walks, however, because I'm a mean mother and believe in the power of fresh air.  I'm not saying they end well, or last any length of time, or work to get the crabbiness out of the little people around here, but I don't care; my mother walked me around when I was sick and well and my children will get the same treatment and hate it and then do it to their children.

And the laundry...no, but that will wait, I'm sure you'd like to breathe deeply and go find someone happier.

Seasons

We're in that 'Not Quite Winter But Not Quite Spring' weather pattern here, and it's frustrating me, although it shouldn't because it's essentially indicative of the rest of my life - a feeling of a door not firmly shut but a window not opened, or a season that hasn't passed and yet has started to.  I suppose another word to describe that would be 'life'.  Sadly no one consulted me when that was all being made so I just have to live with it, but I'm generally unhappy about the reality of it all.

You'll be pleased to know, because surely you were all on the edge of your seats, that the great big list of things to do has been whittled down to almost nothing, and after today will consist of such excitement as 'plant the rooted green onions in pots' and, um, oh what else...write my mother, I think, and mail a picture to grandparents.  It's down to the last few items, in other words, and in celebration of that I started another list because, again, never ending.

In a few weeks our incredibly hectic summer of travel will begin, and I'll have many opportunities to practice packing and repacking for five people in a tiny car trunk, and also patience - those two things will go heavily hand in hand.  So pass along your very best suggestions for how to fit it all in, and also travel tips for driving with young children - I'll happily take both.

Spring

Last week I went for a long, long walk and saw an entire yard covered in robins, and I've heard the geese and the sandhill cranes, and seen the gulls returning from wherever it is that they winter.  There are bulbs sprouting up all over the place and the ground is muddy and just yesterday I went out and stuck my hand as far into the garden bed as it would go and it went several inches before hitting frozen soil.  The ice on the lake is getting old looking and the ground is muddy and all of the snow that's left is covered in gravel.  During the day I turn the heat off entirely and open the doors to let in the air - and the cats have Spring fever.  I can reach my compost bin again and so I've restarted it, as well as hanging the laundry.  The days are longer and longer - at 8pm the children have trouble sleeping because it's still so light out.  Last night I optimistically cracked open the bedroom windows for some fresh air while we slept, and no one froze.

I think...it's Spring.

More throwing away

When we had our third child, things changed.

I wasn't as prepared for it this time; I knew when I was preparing for the birth of our first that our lives would change drastically and as we got ready to welcome baby #2 I figured it was going to be a big adjustment, and both times I was correct, but I really thought baby #3 wouldn't be that big a deal.  In a lot of ways I was right; she doesn't make me panic when she cries and all the parenting stuff has been a snap really because I feel like I know what I'm doing in regards to solid food and nursing and such.  But on the other hand, we have entered into a stage of life where it is so easy to feel overwhelmed all the time.  Some days all it takes is a potty accident or a kleenex through the wash and my whole day is ruined.  I've had to minimize our lives and streamline everything I can in order to keep a handle on life.

I don't keep trying to take stains out of clothing; it gets one good shot, and if the stain is still there, decisions are made.  I am ruthless about hand-me-downs or anything that comes into the house; I will throw things away constantly, even if someone really, really likes it.  I don't fix broken toys (unless they are a real favourite) and I don't do any sort of major repair of clothing like taking down hems - really anything beyond sewing on a button.  I don't glue things together.  I don't keep art, or practically never.  I don't have duplicates.  My house is too small.  If everyone here has a pair of sneakers, a pair of sandals, and a pair of boots, that's 15 pairs of shoes to find a home for.

I like having these rules on what to throw away already there in my mind so when I see the item I can just toss it.  When my son had his birthday last week he came home with gift bags, which I threw away.  It felt good.  I didn't keep anything besides the gifts and cards.  And as soon as a gift was out of its packaging, I threw that away as well.

Lists

I have a very detailed planner into which I put all of my daily goals and things to do, and it usually works very well for this.  But every once in a while, for some unfathomable reason, I fall deeply behind on all the things and need to write myself A List.  A big list.  Sometimes, as it is currently, the list is several pages long - but lest you think I'm important let me assure you it's mainly a giant brain dump where I just get everything out on paper that has been rattling around in there for weeks.  The last Big List was before the baby was born, which is very typical for me - nothing makes me turn into a crazy list making woman more than imminent birth.  This list, I have no idea, I guess I've simply been lazy for too long.  Here we are, with three pages facing me down.

It helps to have a time limit set on The List - and I am challenging myself to finish it off before this coming Sunday - 5 days until the Sabbath and those 5 days will work me to the bone, I can assure you.  Some of the tasks I might be able to pass off to others, but some - go through all of the boy's clothing to find gender neutral pants the girl can wear, plan out the gardens, make soup for an ill lady in our church, etc. - are only going to get done by me.

Easter

Like every Christian parent out there, I have spent the last while thinking about Easter and how to make it *special* for my children...in other words, how to talk to them about Christ, what kind of traditions I want to make sure we have, what sort of amazing foods I'm going to prepare, even what their Easter baskets will hold and how they'll look on Sunday.  Now, here it is, Easter, and my hopes for the picture perfect time are not going to come to fruition, and I'm totally okay with that.  I'll tell you why; I've learned that you need to have realistic expectations.

My 'must have' Easter list included new clothing for everyone, washed, ironed, and beautiful and all of our family posed for a picture.  I accomplished new clothing for the children, but not for my husband and I, and I skipped pretty shoes for the girls.  The clothes are washed, and it's possible they'll be ironed, and someone will take a picture of us.

I intended to produce Martha Stewart-esque baskets, which did not happen.

I had several cool Easter crafts lined up - what we managed to do was dye some eggs and decorate Easter cookies with store bought icing.

And so on.  It isn't important!  I have been working all Lent at learning to be more mindful and contemplative and now, faced with Easter that doesn't look like my plans, I'm okay.  We discussed the Easter story, which was the most important part anyway, and I spent a reasonable amount of time doing 'Easter stuff' with the children, without totally upending my daily life, and I touched on the traditions.

Throwing away

After the birthday party this past week I had a whole bunch of gift bags sitting around.  Guess what I did with them; I threw them away.  It's true!  I don't keep gift bags, or wrapping paper, or lots of elastics and plastic bags.  I don't keep stained tupperware or clothing.  In fact, there's a lot of stuff I don't keep that other people might think is wasteful.  It's just that I don't need those things piling up in my house and making me make choices about where to keep them and so forth - I like throwing them away, and I get to be more intentional about what stays.

My goal is a peaceful house, not a cluttered one.  I want only a few things, so that I can find them and maintain them and enjoy them.  I don't want six sets of dishes because I don't need them, and I don't want to store them.  But life is what it is, as well, and I do have clutter and stuff all over the place sometimes, and that's okay, too.  I just keeping going along.