It's All Coming Unraveled :(

If you'll remember my post from Thursday of last week, you'll know how strenuously I have been trying to organize myself. I have my entire day lined out in writing, from waking up at 6:00 in the morning to start a load of laundry, to ending my day between 10:00 and 11:00 PM writing, reading or editing photos. Most of my day is filled with work, but during the down times while the kids are napping or after they go to bed, I get a little R and R, again, reading, writing, or editing photos.

And things had been going great. Each day I would wash and hang-dry 3 to 5 loads of laundry, take them down from the line, and fold them, and I would make bread, and keep the kitchen clean, and nurse Baby Hippo to sleep, and play the piano at the high school for chorus .... until today.

I think things started to go downhill on Sunday. I try to keep the Sabbath holy by not doing laundry, deep-cleaning or making the kids do inordinate amounts of chores, but even so, laundry still builds up, which leaves me with an extra 2 or three loads to do on Monday. On Monday, however, I spent the morning feeding company, then, in the afternoon, John and I went out to lunch, alone. While I was so happy to have company for breakfast, and go on a date with John, I got even further behind. Also, when I tried to hang my laundry after our breakfast guests had gone, it started to rain immediately after I had hung about a quarter of the days loads, so I had to directly remove the laundry items from their clothes pins, put them back into the basket and take them back inside.

Fast forward to today. I woke up feeling achy and feverish. I couldn't believe it. On Thursday I am scheduled to travel to Utah for a blogging conference, which trip will be the first I've taken without the kids in over a decade. I needed to avoid this illness going full-throttle at all costs, so I decided to do almost nothing the entire day.

Here's what I did do....

-I made the kids pancakes for breakfast, because, after all, they do need to eat. I used this recipe, though, and I already had the mix bottled in jars, so it was no biggie.
-I made fires in the kitchen and living room, because I was cold, even though I didn't think anyone else was.
-I put at least three loads of laundry in the washer.
-I put my makeup on, in case a good soul decided to come visit me. Two people did. But I didn't do my hair, and it looked like a scarecrow's.
-I stopped by the only restaurant in town on the way to school and ordered 8 quesadillas and 6 burritos for lunch instead of making one from scratch.
-We set up a picnic blanket on the lawn and ate lunch outside, since the kitchen was such a mess. It was quite nice...

-I asked my babysitter who cares for the kids while I am at chorus to come anyway, even though I was staying home, to help me with the kitchen. She willingly obliged, because not only are we employer/employee, we are friends, and she comforts me when I stand in need of comfort. (Mosiah 18:9)
-I nursed Baby Hippo to sleep.
-I put a movie on for the twins.

Here's what I didn't do....

-I didn't clean the kitchen ever, and fruit flies seemed to mate and have babies all over the bits of watermelon that were left out.
-I didn't make lunch for someone I always make lunch for on Tuesday, but commissioned a substitute instead.
-I didn't hang laundry, but tossed it into the dryer.
-I didn't do my hair or get ready for chorus because I didn't go to chorus.
-I didn't make bread as I had planned to.
-I didn't get up out of bed while Baby Hippo took his nap and the twins were supposedly watching a movie when I heard one twin playing the piano. I knew this was a bad sign because it meant that he was no longer interested in the movie and would soon be getting into mischief.

And I was right. When I rose from my sick bed, I awoke to several eggs having been cracked on the floor, even though I had locked the food storage room door where we keep them. (They've apparently learned to quietly move stools around.) I was also confronted with spilled water on the couch, sidewalk chalk thrown and broken all over the kitchen, and a few water-balloons broken on the floor.

The rest of the afternoon, I received two visitors and after they left, I simply wandered around aimlessly. Thank goodness the kids were so helpful and babysat and helped keep the kitchen clean.

No, the house won't be clean when I leave for Utah, but hopefully my illness will have abated because I didn't stick to my schedule.

And I really don't know why I wrote any of this. But thanks, as always, for listening.