The Sabbath - a day of Rest!!!?????

Sunday was a particularly busy day for at least one of our family members. Jackie wanted to give mom and dad a run for their money. She started out by getting into the Crayola Color Bath Dropz and dumped the whole thing in the tub. She apparently wanted to know what would happen if you mixed ALL the colors together - FYI - it makes black. Then when we were getting everyone dressed and ready for church, she found my mascara and proceeded to "paint" her arms, legs, belly, and anything else she could find with it.




We went to Stake Conference where she chased two moms out of the mothers lounge because she was talking to loud (she was talking and singing into the vented door that echos into the baptismal font) and not letting the other babies go to sleep. Then when we went out to sit in our chairs she and mom played a good game of Church Wrestling. I still can't decide who won. :)


When we got home, I thought we could relax and spend time together as a family. HA, HA, HA, HA. Jackie and McKinley went into our bedroom and found a box that I had neglected to throw away that still had the styrofoam packaging in it. When I found them it looked like it had snowed in Luke's bed. They also had the little balls of styrofoam stuck to their hair, legs, eyelashes, diaper etc. (Oh, by this time Jackie had also stripped down to nothing but her diaper - if I get her to wear clothes for a 4-5 hour period I am doing great!) This little excursion took me about 20 minutes to vaccum all the tiny little balls out of Luke's bed, the bookshelf, Luke's swing, my bed, the floor, the wall etc.


Immediately after being chased out of the styrofoam bedroom, Jackie went to the kitchen and tried breaking all my mason jars that I was boxing up to make room in the pantry. Luckily Bart stopped her at just one. What a busy day you might think? Well it wasn't quite over. McKinley and Jackie wanted to move Grant out of his closet so they took all his clothes off the closet rod and placed them neatly around his room. The only sanity we got for the day was when Jackie fell asleep at the dinner table around 6:00.


Now you may think - where on earth were her parents during all of this???? Well, isn't it obvious? We were cleaning up all the previous messes.



Even though Jackie pokes her finger in 3 eggs in the carton, dumps 1/2 a bottle of bacon bits on the floor, or squirts toothpaste on my newly washed rug; or when McKinley fills up the bathroom sink to play swimming pool with the toothbrushes for the umpteenth time, they usually make up for it in the end. The simple "Me too" response I get from telling McKinley "I love you", or the cuddles I get from Jackie while I am feeding Luke with all three of us squished into the recliner, or the "your silly mom" that Grant tells me as I rush him out the door for the bus, makes my crazy days seem worth it.

Right now I feel like I spend 88% of my time chasing one or the other around cleaning up from their latest excursion - but I find that I love them more and more every day. I have been re-reading a book that I read this summer and in it the author talks about serendipity. The definition of serendipity is ". . . . . finding something good while looking for something else." The past few months I have only been focusing on the "something else". I have just been trying to get the laundry all caught up or the living room vaccumed. Instead of taking time to enjoy the moment with my kiddos and treasure the precious time I have with them. I know I need to focus on the "finding something good" everyday. Before I know it they will be going off on their own and I will be wishing that I could clean up the cookie sprinkles that have been half eaten - half sprinkled all over the pantry floor. :)