Slow Down, Summer!

Summer is FLYING by! Luckily we still have a couple weeks left before the non-stop days of school routine descend upon us.  This past week we've been consumed with grief as we mourn the unexpected passing of one of our friend's sons and one of Randy's scouts,  Tommy Beatty.  We've been grieving right along with the family and supporting them any way we can.  Randy spoke at the funeral and did such a great job that one guy said, "I need to get to know Randy better so he can speak at my funeral!"  Death is such a hard thing for us to accept, and yet it is inevitable.  I've learned a lot about grief and I can tell you that time truly heals all wounds but when your heart is aching, time seems to drag by.  This past week has stirred up lots of past heartache for me, but it has also been good for me to see how far I've come since the deaths of Lindsey and Mom.  It gives me hope for our friends, that eventually their hearts will heal too.

But now back to all things summer.  There have been so many little things going on here and there.  I feel like most of my time is spent juggling time doing fun things with the boys, cleaning up the messes they leave in their wake, and falling asleep anytime I sit down for more than five minutes.  A good way to measure the chaos in my life is to take a look at my laundry room.  It hit a new level of disarray that I had to document before getting it cleaned up, only to have it destroyed the next day.  My boys are slobs.

The explosion in my laundray room and you can't even see the stuff piled around the corner.  Ugh.

We went hiking with our neighbors

We made it to the waterfall but it was all dried up.  Still beautiful though!

Henry is still as cute as ever

After the hike we went to Chik-Fil-A for lunch, courtesy of gift cards from Grandma Great.  Thanks Grandma!

Every week there is a free concert at Pine Lake Park so we've ridden our bikes there a couple times to enjoy the music and play.  The free balloon swords are a nice bonus as well. 

Marcus got a job!  Hallelujah!  Bored teenagers are so annoying.  Mostly because I have a million things I could use their help with but that requires lots of nagging and then no one is happy.  Now I don't have to nag him (as much) and he's out of my hair AND earning money.  He lifeguards at The Pine Lake Club and basically gets paid to watch kids during their swim lessons.  He hates it.  I tell him it's a great motivator to get an education so he doesn't have to do it for the rest of his life.  Another perk: There are very few bikini-clad girls there to flirt with him.  

 We had some yucky weather for a few days.  It even rained which it never does in the summer.  I got so desperate I found a groupon for an indoor trampoline place and took my boys and their friends.  I read a book and made phone calls while they played.  It was money well spent!

Eventually we had the place to ourselves

Ethan needs to be a Ninja Warrior

We created a short bucket list for the summer and one of the things on the list per Landon's request was to go to the Fall City Library, (not the one near our house that we usually go to) and try out this little burger joint.  The library was a disappointment (most books have to be reserved online so there's not much on the shelves) and the burger place was greasy and delicious.   

It started to rain hard so we ate in the van.  Marcus downed this in about 30 seconds.

Marcus went on trek for the first time.  I cringe at his accessories but was happy he went.  Eventually he was happy he went too.  He quickly became nicknamed "The Ox" as he helped everyone pull their handcarts.  There was a major lightning storm so all the leaders had to figure out a new plan and while they were doing that, they put Marcus in charge of the entire group of 500+ youth, leading them in songs as they waited.  I've heard from many adults about what an awesome son I have so I'm proud of him and his natural leadership abilities.

Trek 2019

And the Stress Continues

We put our house on the market yesterday.  I can't even begin to tell you what a relief it is to finally have it ready to show.  I've cleaned, scrubbed, and de-cluttered just about every surface of the entire house and actually wore out a huge hole in my cleaning gloves last night.  Hopefully our hard work pays off.  It's only been listed for 24 hours and we already had our first showing today. 

Here's a link with all the info in case you know someone who wants to move to Rhode Island.  Ha! 
 I know it's unrealistic but I'm hoping the house sells in record time because keeping my house spotless is stressing me out so I've made a few changes to help maintain a higher level of clean than what we are used to.  For example, the boys are no longer allowed to stand up when they use the bathroom because I don't want to clean up their mess from their bad aim {which they always blame on someone else because they think their aim is perfect.  Yeah, right.}  We put about half the boys' belongings in storage so their toys are easily contained in the toy box and a few cupboards where they are out of sight.  The Legos are now in Parker's closet which means the boys have pretty much forgotten about them so now I don't have to pick up the endless amounts of Legos that manage to spread throughout the house each day.  This all sounds like my kids are big slobs and I should teach them to clean up after themselves.  Yes, like most kids they are messy but they do clean.  Just not good enough for showcasing a house.  If it were an option, I'd move out to Utah for a couple months so my perfectly clean house could be maintained with no effort on my part.  Sigh.

The Jar of Doom

I had another good idea.  It happens occasionally.  This idea was motivated by my frustration with my messy house.  Years ago I accepted the fact that the house is always going to be messy in the summertime.  With all the kids being home it's just the way it goes.  We clean but it only takes a short time before it's a mess again.  Yes, they should clean up after themselves and for the most part they do but I really have to nag and nag and nag.  I got tired of it. 
I wrote a bunch of random jobs down on slips of paper, put them in an empty jar and it was done.  I wanted to come up with some cutesy name for the jar or stick a vinyl letter on it but there was no time for that.  I told the boys if they made a mess and walked away from it they would have to pick out an extra job from the jar to do as punishment.  If they didn't obey the first time I asked them to do something they would also have to pick from the jar.  Marcus's eyes got really big and he said, "You mean the Jar of Doom?  Nooooooo!"  So the name stuck. 
The boys are doing much better at cleaning up after themselves, and I love that little jobs like dusting the piano, taking out the trash, or washing windows are getting done as well.  They try to avoid the Jar of Doom at all costs.  Landon even prayed over dinner saying, "Please bless me that I won't have to pick from the Jar of Doom."  It was awesome! 
It's taken about a week to get through every job in the jar and already I'm thinking to color code the papers so the older boys will have to pick jobs that are a little harder like cleaning out the fridge or vacuuming, but for now it works like a charm.  Bring on the child labor!