There is no mess like a homeschool mess

It’s 4pm and I am enjoying the relaxing end of day process homeschooling parents everywhere all look forward to:

…getting the kids to clean up.

My kids tend to keep our house sparkling clean, and listen to me when I begin this most favorite process of mine, everyday of the week …(except Monday through Sunday).

No, reality is that I have normal kids, who make normal messes.

So I begin taking inventory of the house:

Next to the front door are boots, complete with their own pile of dirt, to keep the outside fun going inside of our house.

Our dining room table is host to 3 trays of watercolor paints, 27 paintbrushes, 2 glue guns, a sauntering gun, and eleventy billion sheets of paper.

The living room has been turned into a fort the size of a circus tent.

There are enough books on the couches, floors, and stairs to supply a library.

Every pillow was repurposed for a pillow fight mid afternoon and is lying strewn about the house like helium-less balloons.

Practically every dish in the house is piled onto and around the kitchen sink and every counter space available.

Not to mention the floor that is carpeted in random dirty socks, forgotten toys, and crumbled snacks.

Wow, we really know how to make a mess in my home!

And it’s fine, I don’t need to hyperventilate…yet…

The mess is not a problem; it’s just time to clean it all up.

Surely everyone else in this family will enjoy having a clean house as much as I will right?!

WRONG.

Amazingly, my priorities are not my children’s priorities.

They didn’t skip their childhood and go straight to being a 35 year old mother who cares about the state of her house.

They selfishly stayed 12,11,8,8,7, and 4 today.

They don’t care about dirty socks and squished grapes on the floor.