Silly Poem

I must be starting to lose it. This morning while I was nursing Ethan at 5:30 as I was drifting in and out of sleep, my thoughts started moving to the rhythm of the rocking chair. This was more or less what my half-asleep brain came up with:

Runny noses,

Snotty faces.

Hints of urine waft through

Certain places.

Sticky fingers,

Gummy smiles.

I feel my heart

Stretch out for miles.

Endless cleaning,

PB&J.

At least one person

Crying all day.

The heart is a house

With many rooms.

Look, my children

One for each of you.

To do

To do before midnight, Sunday:

• Create 4-slide presentation on the feasibility of creating a community "victory garden" on the Navajo reservation in partnership with the Indian Diabetic Initiative
• Finish editing paper on providing pictorial-based documents to illiterate diabetics in Tucson
• Finish making what is essentially a power-point scrapbook of "how I spent my semester in my Public Health Nursing class" (I need approximately 10 more slides)
• Write a critical analysis of a mainstream article about Mormonism
• Find a mainstream article about Mormonism to write about
• Contemplate DEEPLY (I loathe my professor's use of caps, and the word "deeply") the issues surrounding how the Church views and treats its history
• Write 200 words about how such views and treatment make it difficult to attract new members (or something).

Also:

• Take care of my children
• Sweep and mop my floors because they are driving me crazy
• Figure out something to cook for the missionaries tomorrow
• Go to the store and buy ingredients for said dinner
• Make some time on Saturday so Tyler can work in the backyard, because I want this thing to get DONE. I'm SOOOooooOOOOooo sick of the dirt.

Bike Ride Fail

Lillian on Christmas day, riding her new bike

Lillian likes the idea of riding a bike. She likes to find her shoes and put on her helmet. She proudly rolls her bike down the driveway, and that's mostly where the bonhomie ends. If I actually make her get on her bike, she starts crying. If I coax her to pedal, she starts to scream.

If you ask her what the problem is, she'll tell you any number of things: the wind is blowing too hard, and she's afraid it will blow her over; a car might come and run her over; the garbage truck will come and hit her (this is a surprisingly strong phobia); she'll forget how to break so she can't go very fast; and so forth.

I got tired of the dramatics, so I told her she couldn't ride her bike until she was over it. We waited a few months and on Friday, she begged and begged to go for a ride. We got on shoes and helmet, marched the bike to the end of the driveway. She got on and biked about 3 houses down, then started freaking out. I told her that she just needed to bike down to the for sale sign a few more houses away, and then she could turn around. That done, she got back to her original 3-houses-down-freak-out spot. She got off her bike, crying that she couldn't do it anymore. I told her that she could get back on her bike and take it home, push it home, or we could just leave it there and someone might steal it, but I wasn't going to take it home. Oh the tears. The stamping of the feet. The hysterics.

My neighbor peeked out of his house to see if I was torturing her. She was screaming so much, she wet her pants, which caused more screaming. She cut such a pitiful picture, I took her home and put her in her bed, and I did, in fact, push her bike home.

We tried to give her a "brave necklace" (courtesy my lovely sister-in-law Chantel), and that worked wonders for a while, but it doesn't work for bike riding.

I guess we'll be walking to kindergarten.

How's your backyard?

This represents about 4 weekends of work. By Tyler. He's nice to have around.

Toy Purge

Lillian likes to explode her toys; she pulls out the bins and dumps them out in rapid succession. I think this is fairly common, but it drives me absolutely crazy.

On Monday, I told Lillian that I would help her clean up the toy room for 30 minutes, and whatever wasn't picked up, we were going to take to DI. "Oh good, let's take them all," came her reply.

No, really. You will never. see. them. again. "I know mom, let's do it! I'll find a box."

I helped her clean up by walking around and saying things like, "OK, let's find all the cars and put them into the car bin. Oh! I see another one over here!" and when the timer went off, she had only picked up about 2/3 of the toys.

So, I did it. It was kind of an empty threat at the time, but I knew I had to follow through. I got a big box and Lillian was very enthusiastic about putting the toys in. I saved a few prized toys and parts of sets (I rescued a few of Handy Manny's tools and some errant puzzle pieces), but everything else went in the box. I tried to make Lillian feel some sort of loss by pointing out the toys as I put them in, but it didn't work. She didn't care, and as far as I can tell, she hasn't missed them.

I like her not having very many toys as it brings out more of her creativity. In the top picture you can see our well-loved Weeble-Wobble tree house. This has alternatively served as a tree house, cash register, carnival ride, doll house, baby crib, grocery store, and stove.

This picture is what remains of the Wonder Pets mobile that Lillian and the neighbor boy made yesterday. It had a sail made out of a triangle of paper and a pen, but I think Nora destroyed that part. I cut out the sail and gave them the tape, and they constructed it all themselves. They were pretending that the afore mentioned Weeble-Wobbles were the Wonder Pets and came up with all sorts of elaborate rescue scenarios. I tend to think that this sort of creativity is good for their brains, thus making the toy purge win-win by forcing more creativity and resulting is less toys for me to clean up.

I do have a problem, but it's not that bad

Have I ever told you I have something like obsessive compulsive disorder. I've been diagnosed, but that was by a doctor who spent all of 3 minutes talking to me. So either I have it so bad that it is completely obvious in 3 minutes of conversation, or he got it wrong. I learned in nursing school that to have a diagnosis of OCD, your compulsions need to take up an hour or more per day, and I don't have that, so I'm thinking that he got it wrong, or just, not quite right.

Let me tell you 3 stories that illustrate my problem.

1. It was my junior year of high school. That was a hard year for me; my parents got divorced and my mom and I moved out of my dad's house on the day that I was scheduled to take the SAT II. I was thinking that the ward members coming over to help were mostly going to move family things: couches, pots and pans, lamps. I was frazzled and I got all the way to school and realized that I forgot my ID, which I needed to take the test. I sped back home and saw that one of the ward ladies had started boxing up MY things in MY room, probably thinking she was being helpful because I had been studying and hadn't started packing. I freaked out. Fighting back hot tears, I told her to stop packing and that I would do it. Then, in the car I started sobbing. I called my mom and in a fit of teenaged self-centeredness I asked her how DARE she let someone touch MY stuff. I felt really bad as soon as the words had left my mouth because the day was undoubtedly stressful and incredibly sad for her as well.

2. When I was 19, I went to the doctor for some problem that I don't remember what it was. The doctor, probably in an effort to be friendly (or maybe it had something to do with my problem) was asking me about my personal life. I was going through a kind of rough patch with my then-boyfriend (not Tyler), and was probably reluctant to talk about it. I dealt with my anxiety by picking at a loose string on my jeans. The medical problem was such that I had to come back a few days later, and it was that visit that the doctor told me he had been thinking about our conversation, and that he strongly felt I had OCD and told me I should go on medication. I took the prescription, but never filled it.

3. Last night. It was the first Monday in the new quarter, so it was flip the bed day. I took off the sheets, flipped the bed, and washed the pillows and mattress cover. I got busy with my day and didn't put the bed back together. After dinner, I sat down to do homework, and I could hear Tyler upstairs putting the sheets on the bed. I like him. (Note: We have a duvet on our bed. It's getting hot here, so we took the comforter out of it, and just put the cover on the bed.) When I came up to bed, I saw that the duvet cover was inside out. On the bed. Inside out on the bed. Made. I had a strong desire to take it off and fix it, but Tyler had put it on, and my keen wife senses told me that it would hurt his feelings (and discourage him from helping out in the future) if I re-did it. So I got into bed. I laid awake, knowing that the cover was on wrong. I tried to convince myself that it was silly, but I had a hard time falling asleep. When I made the bed this morning, I took it off and fixed it.

That's the kind of thing that is sort of funny later; Tyler can't figure out why it would bother me, and I can't figure out how it doesn't bother him.

In short, I realize I have a problem, but it's not that bad.

Pencil thing

The pencil thing always makes Nora laugh.

Untitled from Amanda Ball on Vimeo.

Fickle and mercurial child. I like that she goes from laughing to demanding that I stop, and then back to laughing again.

Albuer... Albuqur... Alberquirk...

We headed up to Albuquerque to see one of our good friends marry an awesome girl.

Here's a little slideshow of our pictures, plus some other stuff we did this month.

Untitled from Amanda Ball on Vimeo.

The funniest part: At the fancy pants luncheon after the ceremony, Patrick said his Bishop asked him why he wanted to marry Sarah, and in a round-about way, he answered because he loved her. The Bishop asked *why* he loved her, and he said he had no idea, but he has eternity to figure it out.

The longest part: The drive home. We sang every verse I could think of (and make up) to The Wheels on the Bus, Old McDonald, , and every other song I know (which if you realize that I'm my mother's daughter, that's a lot).

The happiest part: Watching the look on Sarah's face during the ceremony- she looked like she was going to explode with glee.

The tastiest part: The raspberry sorbet with the lemon cookie is tied with those delicious home-made crescent rolls. I jokingly told the girl helping with the food that I could eat 5 or 6 more, hoping she would bring 5 or 6 more, but she only brought one.

The most well orchestrated part: Sarah arranged babysitting for us during the temple ceremony AND during the fancy pants luncheon. She's awesome.

The best part: Being with a lot of good friends.

Best Homemaker in the World?

This week, my Current Issues in Mormonism class and my Home/Community-Based Nursing class have combined in a bizarre way. For my Mormon class, I wrote a short essay on President Beck's Mothers Who Know and why I thought it was so controversial. Here's what I thought, the 30-second version: President Beck lays out a formula that is very black and white: (M=V)=(C=R) where M equals mothers, V equals virtue (as defined by President Beck as leadership, teaching, homemaking (which specifically includes housekeeping), etc.), C equals children, and R equals righteous. Thus, Women who are Virtuous will have Children who are Righteous. Because President Beck made no qualifying statements, women felt that it was implied that the reverse is also true: that if your children are not righteous, you were not a virtuous woman, which is false. Also, women hate the conflation of housework and righteousness, or the implication that if you are a poor housekeeper, you don't love your kids, or something.

But, what if that is sort of true? For my Home/Community-Based Nursing class, we have been studying about environmental health, and I learned that I should be vacuuming and dusting once a week. Once a week? Every week? When I read that, I couldn't remember the last time I had vacuumed. Pickles.

A study published in the New England Journal of Medicine found that regular vacuuming, along with other interventions like non-permeable covers for mattresses SIGNIFICANTLY reduced asthma and allergy problems.

Both the Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology and the Asthma and Allergy Foundation of America both recommend dusting and vacuuming once OR TWICE a week if you have allergy or asthma sufferers in your house. Which I do.

So I am making this a school project. For the love of your lungs, vacuum and dust once a week!

And, because this is academic, it has to be measurable. Please take a minute to take my survey so I can show that I really changed your perceptions about vacuuming. Or I didn't.

Create your free online surveys with SurveyMonkey, the world's leading questionnaire tool.

No (wo)man can serve two masters

How are things? I haven't heard from you in a while. Just calling to see how you are doing. How's school? You haven't updated your blog in a long time, have you been busy?

I have never been this busy in my entire life. The whole thing. Never.

I have two full-time jobs:

My mom job involves taking care of 3 children 4 and under. I get them up in the morning; I make all their meals (except I switched to store-bought baby food for Ethan. Best. Decision. Ever.); I am in charge of all their bathroom needs and I have to monitor the cleanliness of their underwear/diapers; I make sure they get enough naps, that they are engaged and active while awake, that they are learning and growing; I make sure they maintain a good balance between socialization and quiet time; I help them learn how to do chores; I clean all their clothes and wash all their dishes (except the dinner dishes); I pick up toys, dust, vacuum, sweep, mop, and scrub toilets; I plan all their meals and buy all the food they eat, while making sure they eat a variety of fruits, vegetables, and whole grains; I keep them clean and groomed by washing faces, brushing teeth, giving baths, brushing hair, and keeping track of endless hair bows; I am in charge of making sure they are safe by watching them as much as possible to make sure they don't run into the street, get into a stranger's car, eat dishwasher soap, touch the hot stove, sit on each other's faces, etc; etc.

My school job involves reading, reading, and more reading; researching things like how to get college students to increase their condom usage or whether or not educating expectant fathers on breastfeeding techniques will increase exclusive breastfeeding rates at 3 months postpartum; writing 1 or 2 8- to 10-page papers per week; going on "field trips" like going to a rehab facility for prostitutes, visiting an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting, or going to a grocery store in a low socioeconomic part of town to research food disparities; watching lectures; making power points; more reading; completing about 5,000 self-study modules put out by the CDC about things like intimate partner violence and arsenic poisoning; watching about 8,000 documentaries on the health-wealth gradient; and more reading.

Now, do them together. Oh yeah, and my baby forgot how to sleep through the night. So, I do all this while sleep deprived.

Also, about 2 weeks ago, my kids were exposed to the neighbor girl who was later diagnosed with RSV. It looked like this for about a week in my house:

Except with more crying and whining, plus a sick baby.

Sleepless Night

Last night, while not in the top 5, was for sure in the top 10 worst night's sleep.

9:30 Fell asleep watching a webinar from The Council to Improve Food Outbreak Response.

10:00 Tyler woke me up suggesting I move to the bed, apparently I declined.

11:00 I went upstairs.

11:30 Ethan woke up with a fever and a cough. He coughed so much, he puked on me.

12:15 Ethan cried in his crib until he fell back asleep.

3:00 Both girls had to go to the bathroom; Tyler handled this one.

6:00 Ethan woke up again. I fed him so he would go back to sleep.

7:15 Ethan was up for the day.

To top it all off, Tyler was having so me sort of exothermic reaction going on, so he was about 500˚ next to me (it's not a fever, it happens to him kind of a lot, I think it's how he stays so skinny). I also had a crazy dream where my friend Michelle was on a French cooking show talking about how to make roast duck, but she was acting like Dan Akroyd acting like Julia Child.

I've cut the dickens out of my finger.

Dent and Ding

I've never been very good at haggling with people over prices. If I think something is priced too high, I usually just don't buy it. My only real experience with haggling came when we were shopping for a house. Obviously we were dealing with a hefty chunk of money and nobody ever pays the full price for a house. After making a few offers, I could feel myself getting more comfortable with my dormant yard sale skills. However, I think yesterday's events will go down in history as one of my best deals ever. I was at The Shop which is a soccer and rugby store in Tucson looking for some soccer socks that didn't require pantyhose-like effort to put on over my shin guards (and no, I've never put on pantyhose before, Amanda simply was offering up her expertise when I was having a hard time putting on my socks). I found the cool ones I was looking for and noticed that they were $18!

Really? For socks? Then I noticed one of the pairs looked suspiciously like they had been used and returned and hastily put back on the rack (they were a little dirty and the package was taped back together). Knowing that these socks would soon be dirtied by me anyway, I didn't really care if they came a little broken in. Instead, I took the opportunity to see if they would take a few bucks off the price. The guys behind the counter were convinced they hadn't been worn before, but that they got dirty like that in the store. Yeah, sure guys. But when they took it out of the package, the manager-like guy said they were filthy, and gave the following discount:



Best discount ever. At least for me. Anyone else have any good stories about getting a good deal?

You better fix this!

I was pregnant, I went to the hospital, and then I had a baby. I couldn't really remember any of the specifics about the labor and delivery, but I was so tired taking care of this new infant, I didn't really care.

Then months went by. I started asking Tyler questions like, "how long did I push with this one?" and "did they end up giving me Pitocin? I don't remember."

He would always change the subject or bat the question away. I began to be suspicious when I realized I didn't really remember being pregnant; all I could remember was being big, I didn't remember any of the discomfort, pregnancy insomnia, sickness, or fatigue. Did I really go to the hospital? How did I have this full-term baby when Ethan is only 6 months old?

I looked into it further and did some detective work. Turned out, Tyler had a mistress who got pregnant and then died in childbirth. Tyler knew he would be responsible for this child, but was afraid to tell me about the other woman, so he had my memory altered to make me think it was mine.

When I put all the pieces together, I confronted Tyler. I explained how I figured everything out and how it was no use lying to me anymore. I finished my tirade by saying, "Now, you say your sorry to me, then call the bishop RIGHT NOW and FIX THIS so we can make this baby part of our FAMILY!"

Apparently, in my subconscious, fathering a child with another woman and not only lying to me about it, but having my memory altered is still not a deal breaker. Tyler is now wondering what he could have been getting away with this whole time.

The little ones

As I was procrastinating writing/reading any number of school things, I was looking through old blog posts of Lillian when she was a baby. I posted a lot of pictures of her doing cute things. Eating. Sleeping. Laughing.

Why don't I do that with my other kids?

I should start.

Nora was sad about something. Lillian stole a toy? Got in trouble for trying to climb the bookshelf? Wanted ice cream for lunch? Who knows? To fix it, I told her we'd take her picture. You can see the glistening tear remnants under her eyes.

Ethan sits now. I know, it snuck up on me too. A few days ago, I realized that, as he is sitting now, I should stop waiting for him to chunk up. Sitting is just weeks away from crawling, which means crawling up the stairs and pulling up and burning calories, and it is just a few months away from walking. This is the stage that Lillian and Nora started thinning out.

While I'm sad that he never chunked out, I'll still keep him.

Because he's so cute, sometimes you just want to squeeze him and laugh maniacally.

Fun, More Fun, and Most Fun

As far as activities we have available for the kids, some are more fun then others. Take for example the sandbox:

Max capacity: probably like 10 kids
Possible injuries: Sand in the face, maybe a sliver
Fun Rating: 6.0

Then we have the bakers rack:

Max Capacity: 1.5 children
Possible Injuries: Kicks to the face, smashed fingers, bonked heads
Fun Rating: 7.2

Finally we have the wagon:

Wagon Ride from Amanda Ball on Vimeo.

Max Capacity: 3 (although we almost had 4)
Possible injuries: minor smushing, faceplant on the driveway, flattened by passing car
Fun Rating: 9.8


Note: No child was injured in the making of this post.

P is for Projects

We're big into letters around here, but that's not what this post is about. On rare occasions, I (Tyler) have time to be handy and make stuff. Here's a couple of the recent ones that I wanted to show off:


First we have the train set. Lillian came home from preschool one time with a train set she made out of toilet paper rolls (the cardboard on the inside) and milk carton lids for wheels, all held together with brads, string, and a little glue. Sadly, the train didn't last through the night. After many tears, I told Lillian I'd make her a new train, a BETTER train.







Second, we have the shelves. You many not know this about our brand new house, but we only have one (1) closet that is not in one of the bedrooms: the Harry Potter closet under the stairs. And although large, it was deep and impossible to get to anything in the back. In with the shelves and now we have an extended pantry/food storage/place for the games/camping stuff and we still have room to walk in and out.







Finally we have the spice rack. Amanda apparently had no problem finding spices when she had them scattered willy nilly about the cupboard. It drove me crazy trying to find anything so I built this double decker rack. It may not be perfectly flat, but I think if you check out the video you'll see that it gets the job done quite nicely.

spice rack from Amanda Ball on Vimeo.

A Day in the Life

I gave Lillian the camera. She took about 400 pictures, these are the greatest hits. We did laundry.

And changed the sheets. I wish I could remember what she said that made me laugh so hard.

Ethan woke up and I changed his diaper.

Nora woke up from her nap.

More laundry.

Messing around in the kitchen.

Has Lillian talked your ear off about Toy Story 3 yet? No? Just wait.

The turquoise horse is Bullseye because I'm such a mean mom, I won't buy her a real one.

Oh, hey Ethan.

Skype with Anne. She was at her nerd conference.

I like baby feet.

End

Thus ends my separation of Church and school.

Run and tell that

While we were in Fresno, we went to church with my sister-in-law. The man that was teaching Sunday school was... old? He kept saying those odd Mormon lore-type things that have no doctrinal basis, like that the reasons babies can't talk is because they would tell us all about the pre-mortal life. He didn't say that, but it seems like he could have. He did keep saying that there are no coincidences. I don't remember what he was trying to connect, but it was a long rambling string of events. "And I just knew it wasn't a coincidence. There ARE NO coincidences. Believe that." I couldn't help but add a mental "homeboy," it sounded so ridiculous.

I am unaware of any doctrine on coincidences, but I do know about Tender Mercies.

Quick note. I don't usually talk about the serious side of my religion because it makes me really uncomfortable to do so outside of church or my home. It reminds me of what I heard a (gay) comedian say once. He was talking about how some people say things like, 'you know what? I don't care what you do at home, I just don't want to see you being gay in public.' He said he often wants to answer, 'Well, I don't want to see you being straight in public.' This is how I feel about people showing off their religion. I don't care what you do at home, but I don't want you to try and convert me as much as you don't want me to try and convert you. Even though being Mormon is awesome. But, this blog is as much a record for me as it is entertaining for you, and I feel like I want to write this down.

In the tender mercies talk, Elder Bednar comments about the first time he had to speak in General Conference as an Apostle. He was understandably very nervous. Right before he was to speak, there was an intermediate hymn, Redeemer of Israel. He says if he could have picked one hymn out of all the hundreds of hymns, he would have picked that one. He knew that the music selection was made months in advance and he only found out he was speaking 3 days previous but, because this hymn had such special significance for him, he knew that it was meant for him. That it was God's way of letting Elder Bednar know that He was mindful of him at this stressful and huge point in his life.

I had a hard day two days ago, I wrote about it, and then I felt better, a little. Literally seconds after I hit 'Publish Post,' I got an IM from my friend Elizabeth. She lives in Flagstaff, and usually attends the Snowflake Temple.

Her IM said, "Jacqueline and I are going to the Mesa temple on Saturday. If you and Tyler want to do a session, I'd be happy to watch your kids. I know it's short notice but we just decided this morning."

This is huge. This is my equivalent of Redeemer of Israel. Tyler and I haven't been to the temple to do a session since I was pregnant. With Nora. The problem is that the temple is 2.5 hours away, and it takes about that long to do a session, plus the drive back makes it an 8-hour deal. I've had little babies for a long time, and I can't be away from them for 8 hours as Ethan doesn't take a bottle and my body has caught on to the fact that the breast pump is a fake. The only other way to work it is to have someone watch your kids at the temple, but we don't know anyone who lives close to Mesa and/or who doesn't have kids of their own. Elizabeth is doing us a huge favor. There's no way she could have known that I was having a mommy meltdown. She didn't know that this Saturday is our 6th anniversary. She didn't know how badly I need this. I really feel like Heavenly Father knew, and this is His way of telling me that He knows about me and my problems, and that it's all going to work out.

Go upstairs and come back with a different attitude

I woke up a little off today. Usually, I'm really patient with the kids until about 4 or 5 (which is good because Tyler comes home at 5 or 5:30), but Lillian started right up I'm coooooooooooold!! I'm huuuuuuuunnnnngry. I don't waaaaaaant oatmeal. Nora hiiiiiiiiit me. and I couldn't handle it. I was snapping at her left and right and threatening to spank her bottom if she didn't quit whining. Usually the I'm-going-to-spank-your-bottom threat doesn't come out unless things get really bad.

I took a step back and said to myself in my best mom voice, "you need to go upstairs and come back down with a better attitude." So, I did. I shut myself in the bathroom (while Nora very helpfully slid some magazines and small toys under the door, in case I got bored), sat on the edge of the tub, said a little prayer, and thought for a minute.

Sometimes, I feel like I'm stuck in the movie Planes, Trains, and Automobiles as the Steve Martin character, and my kids are collectively the John Candy character. In the movie, Steve Martin is trying to get home for Thanksgiving, but things keep happening, some natural (there's a blizzard and his plane is re-routed) and some (most) are caused by the John Candy character: he spills beer on the bed, he gets them into a car accident, he lights the car on fire, etc. This is my life.

I was trying to make dinner yesterday while talking to my friend Myriah, and during our short conversation (I called her because Tyler was running late and I was starting to go crazy), there were like 10 different disasters: Nora and Lillian were fighting over the slinky and then stretched it out, which caused a separate melt down all it's own, Nora had to go to the bathroom 3 or 4 times, then she needed her jacket off RIGHT THEN, then it was WHY, OH WHY DID YOU TAKE MY JACKET OFF, I HATE YOU, then Ethan was crying and Lillian was saying, "MOM THE BABY IS CRYING" over and over again, plus there was the "Mom, mom, mom, I'm hungry. Mom, I don't want to eat that. Mom, I'm huuuuuuungry. Mom, I haaaaaate broccoli soup."

At the end of the movie, Steve Martin and John Candy are good friends and can laugh about it all, which is how I felt last night watching Nora do her little dance to the "L says llllll, L says llllll" song that the alphabet toy plays. It was so cute, my heart about exploded.

But the underlying frustration is still there. I'm frustrated that I can't get anything done. And by anything, I don't mean like... I can't volunteer for Doctors Without Borders or Literacy Volunteers of Tucson, both things I really want to do, but realized a long time ago it wasn't my season of life. I'm talking about the fact that I tried for 3 hours yesterday to mop my floor, something that should only take 45 minutes at the most, and it still didn't get done. Plus, Lillian dumped two pocket's full of sand out right after I had finished sweeping.

I know, I know. It will get easier, but for today, it is hard. And, I need a better attitude.