i've come a long way

9 years old is a good thing. life has changed a bit for dear, little colton. due to being the oldest of 4, he has acquired a few responsibilities that are new to him. for one reason or another, the transition from little kid to big kid has been harder for me than him. not only for sentimental reasons, but logistically too. for example, when do you turn over teeth control? let's not kid ourselves...if i am not going over them, it will take a small miracle for them to remain cavity free. this is just one small issue that has been a hard loss of control for me. there is also when to start letting them bathe themselves, pick out their own clothes, put their own laundry away, making beds, cleaning rooms, and the one that still plagues me...washing their own hands. i still have the "if it's gonna be done right i have to do it" voice in the back of my head. however, since adding puddin to the already less than in control equation, i have had to let go. we have come up with a great little idea, and it is called colton gets paid $5 a week to dust the entire house for me, put his laundry away, help chase and aiden get theirs put away, keep his room and bathroom clean, and do whatever else i may ask him to do to help. let's face it...i would gladly pay him three times that for doing that stuff, but he thinks $5 is the cat's meow. puddin only takes 1 long nap during the day and it is from about 9:30-12:00. so i have given myself "chores" to maintain what is left of my sanity*. before this plan was in place, i was ready to pull my hair out. i felt like i was spinning my wheels all day long trying to keep it all done and it just isn't possible. now, as long as i finish my "chore" i feel accomplished. mondays is laundry. (i start it sunday afternoon and then try to have it finished by when the kids get home from school on monday so that they can take it up.) tuesdays i try to hit the grocery store. wednesday is bathrooms. thursday is sweeping and mopping. colton usually dusts on either saturday or sunday. i need to find a good time to vacuum. this never quite fits in because i don't want to wake annslee up. technically, my house han't been vacuumed since, like, christmas...but we aren't gonna focus on that right now. this works for me, because instead of thinking i need to be "getting something done", i can say, "i finished the bathrooms, so i can sit down and play with aiden instead of going to the next thing"...because there is always the next thing. before colton was born, i cleaned the house from top to bottom every single week and any time we had company. i mean, you just never know when someone from small group might want to poke their head in a linen closet upstairs or something. so, everything was always perfect. today, i would challenge someone to be able to get the door closed to my upstairs linen closet after poking their head in it...due to the fact that about 18 towels and 6 down pillows would most likely fall on their head if they did decide to take a gander. i've come a long way!