The other night I came up to kiss the girls goodnight and found them voluntarily cleaning their room. 

And folks,I don’t mean stuffing toys under their beds and clothes down the laundry shoot.  I found them in the closet sorting and they asked me for a laundry basket and a trashcan.   It was already past their bed time, but they were clearly in the cleaning mode. 

And I know when it comes to things like Deep Cleaning you gotta embrace the mood when it hits.  So, I said, “Here you go, go to town girls, but stay quiet.”

When I peeked in on them later I found them asleep in an truly immaculate bedroom, with these piles at their door.

My type A sorter LOVES piles… everything is always in piles or bags… at first glance it can sometimes look like clutter, but there is almost always a system in place. 

I LOVED the labels on the piles.  I learned the next morning, that the piles were left for me to put away… clearly labeled with where it all went.  Ha! Here are the piles…

Middle Floor

the books

toys and color stuff

Basement

trash

Laundry

My favorites… basemint and logre.  

If only the boys would get struck with that same cleaning bug…not holding my breath on that one. 

When we walked through the house with the kids, after we knew we had won the contract, they eagerly checked out their bed rooms to call dibs on which would be the boys room and which would be the girls room.   The boys chose one of the 2 “kids rooms” and the girls petitioned for the master bed room.    After all they pointed out, “it has a bathroom right off of it and we go to the bathroom in the middle of the night, not you guys”  and “it has the laundry shoot in their too so we’d be sure to put away all our dirty clothes”  and it had plenty of room for their bunk bed and dressers.  I’ll admit that they had some well thought out, legitimate, and even logical arguments for getting the master bed room.  But, logic doesn’t always prevail.  We took the master bed room and they got the still unclaimed kid room. 

However, they either haven’t let go of their hopes of getting our room, or are trying a little passive/aggressive technique in claiming their territory… because at least 3 out of 5 nights a week when I peek into the kids rooms on my way to bed, I find the boys snuggled in their room sleeping soundly and then I go to the girls room and find this

Startling at first, isn’t it?  Where’d my babies go?

I know it’s blurry, but I love how snuggly they are.

Quite often, I’ve noticed when they spend time making their beds… they don’t want to risk messing it up by sleeping in it, so they go to ours.

When questioned as why they fall asleep in our bed, I’ve heard varied responses…

“our bed is bigger and more comfortable”  they couldn’t sleep in theirs… they like our touch lamps, and recently my older daughter told me she liked our comforter. 

It’s gotten to the point that I typically expect to find them in my bed… in fact one night I was shocked to come to my room and find this

No girls….

but it seems I was also missing something else.  (This particular night I had informed the girls that they had to stay in their room).

So, she took our comforter back to her room. 

I truly never know what I’ll find when I walk up to bed at night, but one thing is a guarantee… it always brings a smile to my face. 

I am trying to get my blogging groove back on… not sure how exactly to do that, but it seems one way is to simply post… I am short on words right now, so I’ll just post a few of my favorite recent snapshots.

He loves to help me in the kitchen, in large part b/c he loves to sample the ingredients EVERY CHANCE HE gets.

Kit joined us for school at home

No wonder I ran out of butter this month…

my Spy kids… they’ve been having a TON of fun playing with these Spy kits we got at 5 below…taking finger prints, lifting finger prints…

It’s February and that means Blue and Gold banquet season for Cub Scout folks.  An annual tradition at our Blue and Gold banquet is the Dad/Lad cake decorating contest. 

This is always a fun event in the circus household.  Even though all of the baking and decorating is done by Dad and the cub scout… the rest of the kids greatly enjoy observing the fun in the kitchen.

This year they made an entry in the Most Unique category.  They decided to make a “cake you can play with” and therefore, they had to test it out by playing a game of checkers on it.

Another fun part of the Blue and Gold banquet is receiving their awards.  Our son earned his Bear rank tonight…completing his Bob cat trail and filling in the last of his diamonds on his uniform. 

They were delightfully surprised when they were awarded first place in their cake category!

Way to go guys!!

A State of the Union here at the Circus Casa on this Friday afternoon would include a sink overflowing with dirty dishes, a living room with traces of party balloons and presents strewn about, a dining room bursting with hearts and red and a pile at the bottom of the laundry shoot at near epic proportions.

It’s been a full week at the circus.  Started the week off celebrating my daughters 7th birthday… she had a party, a gymnastics meet, and grandparents and cousins in town for the occasion.   On Monday I served as Parent of the Day at the kids tutorial (which always leaves me feeling dead tired, a little cranky and over the top impressed by my working mom friends), Tuesday was Tuesday… it’s the most exhausting, most challenging, most jam packed day of my week…On Wednesday we  celebrated  Chinese New Year for our family fun night and Valentine’s Day was on Thursday….somewhere in the midst of all the celebrations we scrambled to maintain the weekly juggle of school, potty  training, and taxi driving back and forth to Cub Scouts and gymnastics….we even had a Cub Scout field trip to the Police Station this week. 

So, of course, what better thing to do on this Friday afternoon when the youngest is sleeping and the older three are enjoying an extended recess on the trampoline in this Spring like weather, but to blog.   Because this Momma is too tired to tackle laundry or dishes and this moment of tranquility is too rare to not stop and soak it in. 

What a week. 

We had so much fun celebrating Chinese New Years on our family fun night.  We colored paper finger puppet snakes b/c it is the year of the Snake and I introduced the kids to the movie Mulan.  (forgot how much I liked that movie)

And we had fortune cookies for dessert.

Valentine’s Day was full of yummy foods in heart shapes as well as some cards and small presents to show the family how much I love them.  Topped off with mug shots at the police station.  Because that’s how we roll…

What a week!

I recall seeing something on Facebook before I went to bed about possible flash freezing or snow.  But, I didn’t give it much thought.

When I woke up I peeked behind the curtain to see if anything came of it and I gasped. 

It was that big white puffy snow that sticks to the branches of trees.  My most favorite kind of snowfall.  And I laid in bed and watched it fall snuggling with my hubby and kids. 

Hello February 1st. 

The kids ate a quick breakfast and made a bee line for their snow gear.  Scott headed to work with promise of coming home for an early and long lunch and hopes of a sledding excursion. 

After an hour delay to our school day, I threw the kids winter clothes in the dryer, and we set out to tackle their least favorite and most time consuming subjects.  (with promise of sledding dangling in front of them)

Scott came home 2 hours later and the sun was already putting a dent in the snow, but not in our fun.

Going back up the hill was much harder than coming down.

We were the only ones on the hill.  I think this partly due to the fact that public schools did not get out or get a delay and partly because it was equal parts mud and snow on the hill this afternoon.

But, we were able to scout out some snow paths and a good time was had by all.

WIPE OUT!

We don’t often get out sledding and this was the first time I remember sledding in years… as in my entire adult life.  (last time we took them to the hill I was preggo with baby number 4)

I had such a fun, fun time today.  It was a totally unexpected, beautiful treat and surprise and a wonderful way to end the week!