"To Everything, Turn, Turn, Turn..."

Since the middle of November this is how I feel I've lived my life.:

Nice, huh? Yes, it's true. I like to put on a good front and pretend to have it all together (and I may have even fooled you a time or two). But the truth is, this hot mess has arrived everywhere for the past two+ months on two wheels like a woman with her hair on fire. It’s been fun.

Honestly, I don't remember when exactly I lost control of the whole world. But I do remember looking at our upcoming holiday calendar one day with fear and trembling knowing there'd be some priority shifts as we balanced Christmas busy with every-other-day busy. That's normal. But I haven't recovered and the day to day has continued to be nuts. It goes something like: wake up, feed the girls, work, feed the girls, crash, feed the girls, bathe the girls, put the girls to bed, crash, sleep, wake up, wash rinse and repeat. Notice I did not include 'do the laundry', 'sweep & mop', 'make the beds', 'wash the dishes' (or even 'load the dishwasher'), or 'dust', because frankly, time and energy to complete these tasks have been a luxury lately. When I've had time and energy I've spent both doing other things that - at the moment – have been higher priorities and therefore better choices. But regardless, time has to eventually be made, oh, say, once every year or so, to clean the everlovin' house. Honestly (and I hope I can be honest here), I just have not felt like doing a whole lot around my house low these past few months, and it has all caught up with me.

This is what it usually looks like.

Last week I made it to school on time all but one morning (and on that morning I was late by only 5 minutes - saints be praised). This alone deserves accolades because as you saw above, the mornings have not always been a friend to me. I do as much as I can the night before to prep us for the next day, but you can bet dollars to donuts that something will come up in the morning that will put us behind, and we leave a mess in our wake. On Friday I thought I'd beaten the system when we all left on time with smiles on our faces. But when I got to school I happened to glance down to see a crusty smear of banana oatmeal on the right front upper quadrant of my sweater (yes, there). I thought, "Cry-mo-ninny. I almost made it."

And this is just the tip of the iceberg, y'all.

I've recently begun calling my master bedroom "Monica's Closet" because I have taken to shoving things in there just to get them out of the main areas of the house. Britt and I have a reading nook off of our bedroom which we refer to as "Staging Area 3". This falls behind "Staging Area 1" (the love seat in the den where loads of clean laundry are usually piled waiting to be folded), and "Staging Area 2" (the kitchen counter where we obviously dump all things coming and going). We call these places "Staging Areas" because we like to pretend (or, *I* like to pretend) that the messes are actually just prepping areas for some next great big moment in life. Like, say, FOLDING the laundry and putting it away for once. We've made it as high as Staging Area 5 but that was during Christmas and no one can live up to the pressures of limiting it to 1 through 3 when gift wrap is involved. At any given point, we have an assortment of all four of our random belongings stashed in Area 3. As a matter of fact, as I type this I see an overstuffed Minnie Mouse, a pile of summer baby clothes to sort, a reusable shopping bag full of who-knows-what, a coloring book and tin of crayons, a stack of picture frames waiting to have the pictures updated, about 20 Christmas cards that I still need to mail (sorry, y'all), Reagan's pack-and-play, an old computer, and two mylar Christmas balloons (one of which is a nearly life size Santa and doesn't creep me out at 4 in the morning at. all.). On Saturday, my Mom came for a quick visit. I went through the house that morning with an oversized basket collecting random junk and unloading it in Area 3. I had been expecting Mom for over a week and this was how and when I thought best to neaten our little home. I figure I'll get to "the stuff" eventually. Nothing there is high priority, and it means the rest of the house is neat. But it took company coming to get it cleared. Britt walked into the den, saw the love seat, and said, "I totally forgot we HAD that!" And (full disclosure) I admitted to him one night last week that earlier that day I had just put trash BESIDE the bathroom trashcan because I was too overwhelmed to empty the can itself. We agreed this was a new low. (Don't even judge.)

If you know me, you know this is not me. I am not a procrastinator or a packrat or a poor housekeeper. In fact, I am a plan-months-in-advance, neat-freak perfectionist that gets the shakes when things aren't at least in some sort of temporary order. So, why am I admitting this, you ask? Why in the world would I tell you this when I would DIE if you saw it? Because it's real life, people. It is real, messy, beyond-my-control life right now. I'm in a perpetual state of searching for a brown sweater while the clock is ticking.

It's a season.

Britt has reminded me of this lately. (I just have to say, there is a special place in Heaven for this man. His mansion is going to be HUGE and CLEAN.)

This lasted for maybe 5 minutes.

Life is seasonal. Time passes much too quickly. We mothers have all probably heard the poem about cobwebs waiting because we're rocking our babies who don't stay little forever. And that's TRUE. They don't. They grow into kids who make messes and want to be fed and keep you busy and create dirty laundry and dishes and make you so happy your heart wants to bust wide open to the point you see past the crumbs on the floor because you are HAPPY.

And you are EXHAUSTED. Be honest. I cannot be the only one. I will just keel over and die this minute if you are telling me you never get tired or feel overwhelmed. Sure, you may have found your rhythm and I hope to one day myself, but for now I am wiped. It sounds great to say, "I let the dishes sit while I read my children a bedtime story." Makes me want to watch a Hallmark movie.  But that is not real life for me right now. My real life says, "I let the dishes from a passable dinner sit un-rinsed while I get the little girl ready for her bath and threaten my oldest within an inch of her life to get in the tub already. I wrestle them both like greasy piglets and get them a measure of clean and then leave the towels on the floor while the oldest dresses in too-small, mis-matched pajamas because she's worn the top with a tutu around the house the day before and now she can't find it. The better, matched pairs are still in the drier and after stating repeatedly that no one is going to see them or know any better, I throw up my hands and say, ’Whatever’. By now it is time to settle the littlest while the oldest colors and watches Wheel of Fortune or Jeopardy, depending on how late it is. When the littlest is in bed and the oldest has had a prayer and exhausted all stall tactics about 45 minutes later - and I have told her if she calls out one more time I'm incarcerating a toy in toy jail - I finally shuffle back into the kitchen. Now it's time to clean up the littlest's bathtub and lotions, but first I need to switch out the laundry so I can sit the tub on the washer to dry out overnight. When this is done (another 20 minutes later), I glance down at the crusty dishes and inwardly laugh while I think ‘yeah, right’, then grab whatever's sweet and fall onto the couch.”

Can I get an ‘Amen’?

Here's the catch: I can stand this disarray.  I'll admit, there have been times I've wondered if I'm failing the girls by not making it a priority to keep a better house. I know what you’re thinking: “Great day, Melissa.  If you just took one afternoon a week to get things into shape you won’t have such a mess.”  And I get that.  I do.  Messes are cyclical like life is seasonal, and I accept that.  So, instead I don't lose sleep over any it, and here's why:

I'm a good mom.

This house won't always be messy but it will always be home. This is just a season. A season with Disney princesses and fairies scattered throughout the house and Little People on the countertops and stuffed animals on the floor by my bed. A season with Goldfish crumbs and silver glitter on every surface because of a snowflake craft.  A season where 6 year old toys mingle with 8 month old toys in a wonderful cluttered explosion of hot pink plastic.

This is the 'playroom'.  I mean, what is even the point.

Someone asked me last week if I had no restrictions on my life and could be doing anything, what would it be? I was surprised; I hadn't expected that question. But she shocked me even more by saying maybe I'm already doing it. And I am. I am the happiest I've ever been.  This place is full of messy and I am full of joy.

One day I will look around my pristine house. The mess will be gone and so will the girls. I'll be here in my tidy quiet and remember then what I am so blessed to already know now: it is better to be tired and surrounded by clutter and be LIVING than to be neat.

We sure do some wonderful living in this house.