There is one truth that you can be absolutely 100% sure of in a house of seven: There will always be laundry. Just when you think you’re getting caught up, there’s another basket-full ready to be washed. The laundry in a household with 5 children is literally never-ending. So I know laundry. I also know…
Cleaning my Car – Cargo Tote and Coupon Organizer
My car is not the picture of organization. In fact, it usually takes me weeks of dealing with messes, trash, and loose junk that really should be taken back into the house before I break down and clean it. The biggest problem is that I don’t have anywhere to keep (and organize) the things that…
A Week in My Life: Day 2
I’m linking up again today with Adventuroo’s A Week in the Life series, taking a close-up look at everything I’m doing this week. My day started out early. I thought that sleepless nights with wakeful kids were something that I left behind years ago. Not so. Last night, AJ fell off my bed (yes, he…
Tales of the Snake Family and Kids Who Don’t Want to Clean
My 6 year old son is a story-teller. Here’s the 1st paragraph of his latest book: “Once upon a time there lived a snake family. And all they did was watch movies. And sit around. When their parents told them to clean they would not listen….” After some hysterical laughing, my husband and I looked…
How to Avoid Cleaning the House in 10 Simple Steps
When my kids were little and taking care of them (and my house) was my only job, I remember thinking ahead to the day when all of my kids would be in school and I would be in an empty house for 6 hours each day. When I was in the middle of the toddler…
My Kitchen Remodel – From Outdated to Finally Finished
Our sadly outdated kitchen Our kitchen remodel started many years ago. Friends who have known me for a long time may remember the dizzying brown and yellow brittle linoleum on the floor and the dark wood paneling on the walls. The cabinets were an even darker shade of brown. Yes, my kitchen had not been…
Teaching Kids to Set Goals – Goal For It!
After potty training, I have always felt like training kids to do chores consistently was one of the hardest and most painful processes of parenting. It’s so much easier to just do the work myself….but I don’t have time to do everything on my own and I recognize the value of teaching kids the life…
Home-Ec 101 Book Review and Giveaway
**Giveaway closed – The winner is Katie of Kady Did. Congratulations, Katie!** Spring keeps teasing us around here. We’ll have a wonderful, sunny day and then we’ll have a week and a half of cold, wet weather. Despite the fact that the Spring weather hasn’t made up it’s mind yet, I have determined that…
Salvation, Courtesy of Maytag
I’ve spent considerable time over the last 6 months complaining about our broken dishwasher. On a good day, I would spend a full hour washing dishes-for-seven by hand. On an average day, I spent closer to 2 hours washing dishes. And on a bad day, my kitchen looked like this: Stacks and stacks of rinsed…