Underwear Hanging on My Wreath . . . and Other Parenting Woes.

My new favorite pastime:  Being Home Alone.

Friends.  I highly recommend this.  This happened like, never, in the days of yore.  But now . . . it is happening EVERY NOW AND THEN.

The girls drive themselves and are busy with jobs and sports.

The boys and David love to go buy livestock and hunt together.

And that leaves me to be home alone.

Darn.

And what do I do with this glorious time?

I clean.  And here is the best part:  If I clean a room, and leave, and then come back . . . that room is STILL CLEAN.

I do laundry.  I can actually get all the laundry done and have empty hampers.

I light candles and my house smells good.  I listen to music I want to listen to and deal with no fighting children.  This all makes me a very happy camper.

Until.  They return.

The male folk walk in the door first.  I greet them at the door and begin to flip out if they start to dump junk all over the couches.

PUT IT AWAY.  DO NOT PUT IT ON THE COUCHES.  THIS IS NOT WHERE THINGS BELONG!

I see/smell Little Dude.  He is going through this darling phase called, ¨I do not find it necessary to shower most of the time, but I definitely don´t shower on days I plan to hunt.¨  I sent him immediately to the shower and lovingly yell at him to make sure his clothes end up in the hamper and not on the floor.

You know.  I am going to call that a win.  Because it is a definite improvement from how LD usually leaves his clothes.  And, yes, his underwear is in fact hanging from the decorative wreath.  But it shows he made an effort to get the underwear into the hamper.

The boys are not allowed to eat in the loft, but, alas, they do it anyways and they have completely stained the couches.  They have not shown one bit of care about their infractions until I told them that they had until December 1st to scrub those couches clean.  And if the stains were not out to my liking, they would be buying me new couches.

They work on them every evening.  Feel free to steal that parenting trick.

Genius.

***

My mom got her Disney tree up, and here is the picture, as promised.

It would appear that she has added tissue paper to the popcorn boxes.  Very clever and cute.  I would like to shock you all with a little Christmas decorating I did yesterday, even though it is still November.

Bam.  It is a lovely, festive plant.  I got it for $16.88 at the Walmarts.  And it took me, like, 30 seconds to set up.

***

Let us talk about fighting children, for this is my life.

The girls.

For all eternity, they will fight about clothes.  I used to hope it was a phase, but it has been over ten years and they are taking quite awhile to get through it.

Here is a summary:

The girls are only 15 months apart, so they have always been close in size.  I see this as an opportunity to double wardrobes.  I mean, what fun!?

Now that they are the same height as me, we can share a lot of ¨forgiving¨ clothes.  Like shoes, leggings, sweaters, dresses, etc.

Not, I repeat, NOT jeans.

So, they wear my clothes all the time for work.  And I do not care.  Because I am nice and easy going.  Unlike my offspring, apparently.

Anyways.  The same fight always happens.

DM always allows SP to borrow clothes, but SP sometimes will not allow DM to borrow clothes.  It causes everyone much anguish.  It does not ever make a bit of sense to me, but I just try to keep everyone from physically harming each other.

DM has copped an attitude about it all lately and now will just secretly borrow clothes because she does not see the point in asking SP because SP will just say no.  Even if SP is currently borrowing something of DMś.

You might say, Taylor!  There is a simple solution!  Tell DM to not share with SP anymore!

This approach I have tried.  It has proved unsuccessful.

Anyways, I do all the laundry in the house.  But one night, while I was sleeping, because it was 8pm, SP dumps a pile on my bed and wakes me up to inform me that she is FOLDING CLOTHES FOR YOU, MOM.

How kind.

She actually was not doing this to be kind.  She needed some leggings washed for the next day.

The next morning, I woke up and did a load like always.  So, I put whatever load she washed into the dryer.

SP is always the last to wake up because she does not need to leave as early as the rest of us now.  So she is always waking up when we are headed out the door.

SP:  Mom.  Have you seen my Lululemon leggings?

Have you people heard of these things?  They are leggings that look to me like all the other leggings in the world, but are worth many, MANY, dollars.  The girls have been wasting many dollars on them at consignment shops.  And even the used price is ghastly.

Me:  Nope.

SP:  I put them in the washer last night.

Me:  Well, then they would be in the dryer.

SP:  I checked.  They are not.

Me:  Ok, go out to the car and ask DM is she knows.

Rookie mistake.

Apparently, DM, the crafty gal that she has become, had worn different clothes to the car so SP would not catch on and then changed into the prized lululemons while sitting in the car waiting for me.

And SP caught her in the act.  Which resulted in much fury and DM throwing the leggings out the car, causing them to LAND IN THE MUD, MOM.  And now the LEGGINGS THAT I WASHED LAST NIGHT ARE MUDDY.  And WHAT ARE YOU GOING TO DO ABOUT THIS, MOM.

*sigh*

Me:  They look fine.  You can still wear them.  I am sorry.

SP:  BUT ARE YOU EVEN GOING TO DEAL WITH HER?!?

Me:  Yes!  But I need to get in the car and drive!  I will talk to her on the way to school!

*sigh*

DM was definitely in the wrong, but sometimes she is not receptive to constructive criticism.  So.  Guess how well that conversation went.

Parenting.  Not for the faint of heart.

Happy Sunday!