Dinner . . . Again?

      Photo taken on a day that I let Red Robin make dinner for our family. It was amazing.

My mom used to tell this story about me. In the story she was making dinner for our family. I, being the self-centered three-year-old that I was, wanted her attention and stood whining at her side. I’m sure the conversation went something like this:

“Mo-Uhm! Mo-Uhm!”

“Yes, Sally. What do you need?”

“What are you doooo-hing?”

“Making dinner.”

Stunned into silence for a moment, I came up with the following:

“Diiiin-nyer? I don’t want dinner. We ate dinner yesterday!”

My mom thought this story was hilarious. That is until many years later into my teens when I still didn’t like dinner. Then she worried. She worried about eating disorders. She worried about my health. She was probably a little more than annoyed that I disdained the food she cooked for our family, but most of all she worried that I wouldn’t cook dinner for my future family.

This is a true story.

So, one evening as she was preparing dinner and I was hoping to just snag a snack instead of sit down to a meal, she confronted me:

“What are you going to do when you have your own family, Sally?” My mom asked with worry and annoyance thick in her voice and manner.

I rolled my eyes and breathed in patiently as only a teenager can and took the bait, “What do you mean, Mom?”

“About dinner. I hope you’ll make dinner for your own family,” she said with such importance that I felt defensive.

“MOM! Of course I’ll make dinner when I’m in charge. I’ll make dinner every night,” I said this with assurance like ‘Why in the world would you think that I won't make dinner for my family? Why do you even think about things like that?’

I’m sure she didn’t believe me, but the thing is, I do make dinner for my family pretty much every night even when I don’t want to eat it. And, really, I think it’s because I told my mom I would.

Thanks, Mom.

P.S. Claire seems surprised every night that I’m making dinner again. She complains, “I don’t want dinner, Mom! I don’t want healthy food! I want a snack.” Like mother, like daughter, I guess. :) Also, thank you for all your comments about this baby-on-the-way. I have nausea and fatigue, but I'm happy. We are due June 4.

On Floors and Squinkies

                                                     source: pinterest

My ultimate dream in life is to have someone else clean my house. I’m sure this desire isn’t unique to me, and it wasn’t even important to me until I had two small, wonderfully messy and imaginative girls in my life. Now it is at the top of my list. Before they were here, I declared that I enjoyed cleaning. It was ‘therapeutic’ I said. I’m sure I thought this because I only had to sweep the floors once a week and maybe mop once a month. Adults don’t tend to drop cheerios, toast crusts, syrupy waffle pieces, and cups full of milk on the floor during breakfast. J

Because I feed children in my house on average five times a day, I also sweep several times a day. No matter how recently I’ve swept, I will always find Squinkies, jewelry, fairy wings, and beads in the dustpan with all the other crumbs when I’m finished. Sweeping becomes monotonous. On top of that, my dustpan recently broke. It’s particularly annoying to use a piece of paper as a dustpan, which means that I sweep less often. This increases my wish for a house cleaner tenfold, if you know what I mean.

We moved into our new house two weeks ago. I have spent most of that time unpacking and arranging all our stuff. Until this morning, I had yet to clean this new house. It’s always that way with me. We’ve moved enough times that I know what I’ll do. We move in a flurry and unpack for a couple of weeks, but I don’t clean. I think it’s because I don’t feel like it’s my job yet. Because it doesn’t feel like it’s my house yet. 

Today it was time. To clean the house.

I started with the tile floors. I swept up bits and pieces of our day’s meals. While sweeping, I mostly watched the massive amount of dirt, food, and toys accumulating in a pile, but when I started mopping that tile floor stretching to forever, I finally saw my kitchen floor. I settled into a rhythm with my mop brushing back and forth over the brown and gray pattern. I covered every inch of that beautiful tile floor for the first time with my mop, and do you know what? Suddenly, the kitchen floor was mine. By cleaning the floor myself, I felt ownership over it, a connection to it, and care for it.

My new house didn’t feel like my house until I cleaned it. Myself.

So, today, while I sway to the rhythm of the mop and Train, I am the steward of this house. I will clean it. I will care for it. I will love this house into a home.

Would a cleaning lady do that I wonder?

Disclaimer: If you have a house cleaner, I’m really just jealous of you. J