Tag Archives: Family

Playing Catch-Up

Phew! I keep thinking that there will soon be a day that I can breath. It’s been a whirlwind!

First off WELCOME to all of you that are here from my Write31Days series! A quick-bit about me: I’ve been blogging since November 2007, when I first started sharing about our infertility struggles, which then, by God’s grace, morphed into a mommy blog. My husband Matthew and I have been married for almost 10 years {the end of this month} and we have 5 kids {a 6 year old, 3-3.5 year olds, and a 5 month old}.

We live in rural upstate NY in a really old house {either 130 years old or 92 years old…it’s up for debate. I think it’s closer to the 130 years old}, in the town that we both grew up in. I’m originally from Ridgewood, Queens, NY, moved here when I was almost 4. My husband is obsessed with homesteading and is intent on doing that despite our 1/4 acre in the middle of town. This is our first year of homeschooling our oldest {more on that later}.

Last weekend I wrapped up #Write31Days of Pursuing Your Husband. I seriously hope that some of my ramblings helped you to be better equipped at pursuing your husband…I’d love to hear from you. It’s a learn processing, because we are constantly changing individuals. I’m not done writing about husbands and marriage. I don’t think I’ll ever be completely DONE with that topic.

During the end of October I also headed to Rochester, NY for the Raising Generations Today conference, which was fantastic! I’ve been writing for their blog for the past year or so {find those posts here}, which has been intimidating and wonderful all at once. It was pure joy hearing all of the fantastic speakers {Lisa-Jo Baker, Lisha Epperson, and Kate Battistelli were a few of my favorites}. Traci Michele did a great job of covering the highlights in a post on her blog.

RGT COllage
I went with my mom, my neighbor-friend, a friend from our mom group, and Sweet Pickle Peter! We had quite a bit of fun. Peter was perfect and loved meeting all the people. We even made friends with another momma who was there with her 6 month old little boy {also her 5th baby}. There was even an Ellie Holcomb concert {she was the 2014 Dove New Artist of the Year}.

It was a great couple of days away! There was so much to take away from the entire conference, September and her family have done an incredible job and have such a beautiful heart for motherhood. And of course, there is always the incredible swag bag and sponsor gifts that you get to take home too!

Swag Bag RGT

If you live in the north-east, or anywhere for that mother, and are looking for a christian conference that speaks to the hearts of mothers looking to not only raise their children, but to raise their child and grand children through the generations.  It’s about living in community with moms in all seasons, embracing each other on this life journey; then Raising Generations Today is for you! I’d love to see you there next year!

Then there was also Halloween and our oldest’s 6 birthday. Halloween was fun. I’ve been thinking about this year’s costume since before the triplets were born! Thanks to the magic that is my mother in law, we had an awesome costume theme going on! Peter was my flying monkey, but I never got around to wings or a vest {Avie wore that costume at a year old!}.

Halloween 2015I feel like I’m finally back into this blogging game! No promises on how often it will happen. How are you doing? I’d love to hear about what you’re family has been up to and how life is going! Leave me a comment or drop me an email 🙂

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Comment A Look at Our Life

Routines in the White House :: Cleaning House

Mostly I like cleaning…or at least I like a clean house. Now, I’m not talking immaculate. Nothing crazy-clean like my German grandmother would insist on, but if my house is chaos I start to feel a bit, well…chaotic. With 4 kids running around making messes….there’s a bit of a disconnect between my reality and what I’d like my reality to be.

I used to have a routine: The kind of plan when you did this room this day, this activity this day, then we moved out for renovations. When we moved back in we had 3 three year olds and I was pregnant 2 months later. It all went out the window. It was all out anarchy in our house. I did what I could and didn’t have it in me to fight children to do what I wanted them to.Routines in the White House Cleaning House[4]

Now that I’m not pregnant, Peter is 2 months old, and the triplets are nearing 4 I decided it was time to implement some changes, because honestly my sanity wasn’t going to be able to handle scrapping dried banana off the floor anymore. I haven’t gotten crazy yet about it, but this is what I did do.

*Another toy purge {I do them frequently}
My kids honestly are not interested in playing with toys. They’re interested in dumping them all over the floor, kicking them around the room, and generally not touching them once they’re scattered about. Call me a mean mom. My kids have books in their rooms, some stuffed animals, and a few dolls…that’s it.

Our living room has two boxes of toys; one contains our wooden trains and the other a few random toys and books {which I will be going through again soon}. The only other toys in our living room are 3 Fisher Price Little People buildings {castle, jungle, and a house} and a bag of little people.

*No food beyond the kitchen
I know this sounds like a no brainer, but when you have 3 kids wearing you down…you cave on things. This was one of them. With Ave it wasn’t a big deal. She didn’t spill and didn’t make messes….the other 3….not so much. Elanor has a habit of liking to do pouring exercises on the TV cabinet. Once I did this though cleaning up became infinitely easier, because I wasn’t having to scrape food off of things before putting them away.

*Sweep it all in a pile
     I’ve shared on instagram before how I clean a room: I sweep everything into a pile, sit on the floor and deal with it. Interestingly enough, most of what ends up on the floor is garbage…broken crayons, nonsense and paper, because, again, my kids really don’t play with toys. Once I’ve dealt with the pile the room is clean, because I’ve already swept the floor. How about THAT for multitasking?!

*Stay up and clean
Yup. There are times that I will stay up very late in order to clean the house. What’s the saying? Cleaning your house with kids around is like eating Oreos while brushing your teeth. Exactly. Not always, but probably once a month I will stay up way too late in order to clean the house. I’m not talking spic and span clean, but clean enough that it looks like it’s actually been cleaned.

*A little some of the time
I do try to do a little bit of cleaning every day. I try not to go to bed without picking up the living room and at least having loaded and run the dishwasher. It makes a big difference for me, mentally, to not walk up to a mess, but some times I just don’t have it in me at the end of the day to spend that time {usually 45 minutes or so} to do that little bit.

On those nights, I look at Matt and ask him “What time is Bridget coming?” It’s a running joke. Matt’s grandparents would ask the other when the maid {Bridget} was coming if they didn’t feel like doing the clean up, then blame her for not showing up when it didn’t get done. I like that tradition!

That’s a bit of a peek at how I TRY to keep the house in some state of order.  It’s not perfect, it doesn’t happen all the time, but it’s one of those things that we have chosen to show ourselves grace in….at least until Mommy is having a total melt down and can’t handle the mess anymore. I will openly admit that our showers get cleaned once every few months, the toilet may be a bit more often, and the floors rarely are mopped, but the  kids are fed, clothed, and kept alive.

Do you have a system that you use for keeping the house clean?

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