Bail out...

Yesterday was one of those Sundays when the kids are all wrestling and fighting and begging us to take them somewhere (usually grandpa's house). I had already spent the morning wrestling with kids (not one of our stellar before-church mornings...) and then wrestling the kids through Sacrament meeting (hoping they wouldn't break anything while I was up leading the choir in a musical number) and then I finished off the three hour block wrestling a class of 7 sunbeams including six rowdy boys. When I say wrestling I mean that quite literally.

Rustin had been at meetings and home teaching since 6 am so he was ready to stay home too. This is one thing that makes him great. Rustin spent an hour and a half playing with the kids...hot and cold, alligator, hide and seek, Simon says and anything else they wanted. I can't say how much I appreciate him. He doesn't just show them what to play he completely plays with them which makes all the difference.


On a really great note--we have an oven! We have been eating every baked good we can think of. Cookies, muffins, potatoes, German pancakes... The kids all requested pot pie for dinner tonight. I think we might eat only things baked in the oven for the next few weeks!

This week I didn't get the office organized, but I did get everything cleaned and painted and organized and put away in the kitchen. Rustin also cut some shelves for the bathroom closet which is really helping to organize that room. I think the rest of this week will mostly be filled with Halloween stuff. Which is fun. I have been sticking to my resolution to have the kitchen, front room, hallway and kids rooms cleaned and vacuumed by 10 every day. It feels good. I'll have to add laundry to the list one of these days...

All right, Benson is begging me to play 'monster' so I will better get going. By the way--this boy will never be potty trained. He does rinse out his own underwear and climb into the tub by himself. Does that count? I am completely drained of ideas and I feel like a total failure. But I keep reminding myself that there some things I can't control and a four year-old's sphincter muscles fit into that category. Right? On a positive note, he does seem to be finally able to tell the twins apart. Up until now he has been calling them "the guy with the broken leg" or "broken arm" or on a bad day just "that brother". We find that weird and rather baffling. We've never even had to tell the other kids who their brothers are. Someday we'll figure this little one out...