I was sitting at my computer today checking emails and had this sudden feeling of panic…”oh my gosh, I forgot about my blog!”…really, I forgot I had a blog! I haven’t read anyone’s blogs for the past month, I haven’t posted anything on my blog in the past month, I haven’t even thought about blogs for a whole month…and the world kept spinning around! Amazing! I blame it mostly on the lack of a camera in my life, which is no longer an excuse as I finally compiled birthday $$ and gift cards to replace my beloved point and shoot last week. I learned that photos inspire my blogs. I start with the picture and narrate the story behind it. No Pictures=No Blogs.
In the meantime I have been rather productive here on the homefront. The past 6-9 months has been a season of change for the Ginther family…starting with the finances as we take on this hard time. The downward spiral of our nation’s economy made us stop to evaluate where we have been, where we are now, and where we are headed. With the help of a perfectly timed Financial Peace University course at church Bryce and I have revisited our lifestyle circa 1999…needs have been reevaluated and discussed at length, and wants have pretty much been tossed aside for the time being. With some inspiration and motivation from Dave Ramsey we are pushing through with “gazelle intensity!” Alot of the changes we are making have affected our lifestyle in several different areas. We are home ALOT more…and I am in the kitchen alot more! No more unnecessary trips out, no more entertaining the kids by wandering the aisles of Target, no more spontaneous trips to the zoo, no more runs through the drive through…you get the idea. We live in a small community, we have great neighbors, we are a block from a large park…so our fun revolves around home these days. I have really embraced most of this change…with the exception of the eternally messy house! We’re always here, and because “here” is an Oregon winter/spring, we are always inside! I am reminded that we are a family of five and two free-to-roam-the-house pets…and I am the only one who picks up after them all! My biggest frusteration is hearing “Hey hon, have you seen my…” or “MO-OOOOOM, where is my…” I find myself often saying “Yeah, I’ve seen it, just don’t remember where.” or “Well, if I wore your shoes, maybe I would remember where I took them off last.” or “Nope, I wasn’t playing with your storm troopers today.” And so on…
So I have been testing some new techniques week by week to get the kids (and Bryce) a bit more involved in taking care of their stuff. When Bryce and I were first married, I loved having new husband to take care of…and when the kids were really little I always just cleaned up after them. Times are changing! I no longer smile as I gather dirty laundry from Bryce’s side of the bed. I grumble as I find a sock here and a sock there throughout the ENTIRE house. I sigh as I kick and trip over toys in the kitchen. I am the queen of making a “place” for everything, yet it seems no one else is interested in putting things in their place. We’re working on it! I am open to hearing how others “manage the mess.”
4 Comments
April 29, 2009 at 2:28 am
I was wondering what had happened to your blog! Glad you’re back.
And I’d love to hear about your “techniques” so I can try them out at my house too!
April 29, 2009 at 6:23 am
Holy Cow! I could relate SO much to this posting! Especially the last paragraph. We have a “no toys in the kitchen” rule. If we find toys in there, they are set away for a while and not to be played with until we see they are ready to “try again.” The kids learn rather quickly to not put things in the kitchen or they will lose it! LOL.
April 30, 2009 at 6:20 pm
I like that Mandy! I used to have a clear rubbermaid that I would put “lost toys” in until they could be earned back, but with 3 kids there is so much stuff to play with that they just forgot about it and moved on. We are going to do a major cleanse of toys this summer for the garage sale…and I am hoping with less options there will be less mess and more motivation to take care of their things. Right now, I am considering the pros and cons of NO food or drink upstairs, and looking for the perfect way to deal with laundry…enforcing a “no stain? no stink?” rule to get the kids to put away clothes even if they were worn.
May 9, 2009 at 4:08 am
We keep all the toys in the playroom, the kids don’t have any in their rooms. It makes it so much easier to keep things less cluttered. I also have boxes of toys that I put away when I notice they aren’t being played with very much. Sometimes I will bring them out 6+ months and they are new again
FYI – toys sell really well at garage sales. We had our first one last year and they sold super fast.
Oh, and congrats on doing so well on the FPU. That’s awesome!
Erika