Housework

Nicole over at Deliberate Life made a great comment the other day in her post called Little Ways To Deliberately Slow Down, about meandering around in the morning doing the housework. I felt that phrase "meandering around" really fits what I do each day. I don't consider much of the housework much of a chore, as I rather like to go from room to room tidying up a bit each day. Making the beds, opening the shades, straightening the stuff, sweeping the floors, wiping the counters.

However, sometimes the "damage" my kids can do to a place really gets me down. Cleaning their spaces can be a monumental task. Yes, I know I should have them more regularly clean their rooms. And we're trying, really we are, to have them tidy up each night before bed. But I'll admit I'm the most guilty of being too exhausted to even look at the messes each night, much less remind them to clean it up. So at times it gets left, and it builds up. And builds up. Two weeks ago I worked on Eli's room. That usually just takes an afternoon, once I really dig in. His main issue is books piling up on every surface, and dust bunnies all around and between the books. Here I've got all of the books from around the room piled just on top of his bookshelf. Yes, he needs a larger bookshelf! Much larger.

Now here is his room all neat and clean, with all 152 dust bunnies eradicated:I just love that boy's room. The kids each picked their paint color, but I combined his turquoise walls with all the blues in the bedding, curtains, etc. He is a kid who likes and needs blues. He's a phlegmatic and somewhat melancholic child, if you're familiar with the four temperaments (we learned through Waldorf education and anthroposophy and just dabble in caring about it). See the kitty picture on the wall, and the "stuffies" on the bed? Hee hee! And shhh, don't tell him I showed you. He is eleven after all.

Okay, and warning: below is Rose's room. Can you tell she's the polar opposite of her brother in oh, so many ways? Sanguine and choleric. She chose bright, bright yellow for her walls. And this is what her room has been looking like for the last month or so:

Aaaccckkk! There are things on the dresser, things on the floor (poor upside down dolly), things hanging on the walls and from the walls and probably things crawling around in there too. It makes me want to scream, and I don't know how she lives like this but she actually seems to prefer it. I had a lot of stuff as a kid, too, but I generally kept it in "neat" piles, at least by her age. I don't like a lot of stuff around now, but apparently she does.

Elijah's room is restful to me, and his bed so warm and cozy. Rose's room, on the other hand, even without all the stuff in there it makes me nervous. The bright, bright yellow. The pink flowers on the wallpaper border. It's so her. She makes me jumpy too. But boy, do I love that girl. I love both of them so much. And I really don't mind helping them clean up their spaces once in a while.

We're slowly working on Rose's room. It already looks better than this, but is still in progress. I'll post the "after" shots when we get to the final stage. This one takes a while, because I have to take a lot of breaks, sometimes for a week or so...

To be continued.