At Any Given Time

At any given time someone, somewhere in this house, is making a gigantic mess.
There is absolutely no way I can stay on top of it.
I made dinner one night. I spent a whole 20 minutes in the kitchen.




That was when Oliver and Griffin came into the kitchen. They were drenched.

" Need Kleenex" demanded Oliver, king of the understatements.

The last time Oliver said " Need Kleenex" the entire bathroom had been smeared in poop. I was in there for about 2-1/2 hours and went through quite a bit of bleach.

I went into the playroom to discover the fish tank was loaded, LOADED, with toys. Water had poured over the sides, it was on the floor, the sofa, it was everywhere. A Kleenex wasn't going to cut it. Every train, Playmobil figure, Toy Story character, Brio person, puzzle piece and plastic animal that they could stuff in there had been stuffed in. The worst part? They did this LAST week. We had JUST cleaned out the fish tank, replaced the gravel ( last week's episode included dumping the light into the bottom of the tank before filling the tank with toys. There was broken glass in the tank) and we'd bought a new fish.
Now here we were, back at square one. Clearly I should never make dinner. Or perhaps I should handcuff them to the wall while my eyes are off of them.
Yesterday it wasn't even the kids, it was the cat. While I was sorting out Holden's quarter fiasco Chloe decided it was high time she contributed to the great and glorious mess. So she went into the twins room and dug her way through their wardrobe, making herself a cozy bed in the process.
Laurel screeched with delight when she saw the piles of clothing and began hopping in it.
" I dancing in DA mess!"
Yeah, great.

Of course one of my all time favorite disastrous messes occurred at the beginning of the school year last year. I made Oliver go to the bathroom before we left to get Holden. This was shortly after the gigantic poop smear debacle and I wanted to keep an eye on him. Of course that meant Laurel and Griffin had no eyes on them for 5 minutes.
A lot can happen in 5 minutes
They found the litter box.
Had they just put there hands in there I could have washed their hands and we'd be on our merry way. But thats not what happened. They had toys in there, they poured litter on themselves and each other. Not just a little USED litter on their laps. No, it was ALL of the litter. They smeared it on their faces, dumped it on each others heads, it was in their hair, in their ears, between their toes. They were COVERED and they STUNK and I needed to leave RIGHT THEN to go get Holden.
I called everyone I knew that went to Holden's school. Of course this was the beginning of the year so everyone I knew was about 5 people. By the time I got to person number 5 I said something like:

Idon'trememberwhoIcalledbutthisisCatharyn, Holden'smom,canyoupickhimup?

Fortunately they could and did. That was the first time Laurel and Griffin had a bath together. Oliver thought the whole thing was hilarious. I wasn't as enthralled as Oliver was by the twin's antics .


Every time I clean one room I turn around to find someone trailing in my wake, with an upside down open container of fish food.

As soon as I mop a floor someone spills milk on it.

As soon as I sweep someone finds some secret long forgotten stash of cheerios, and grinds them into the floor.

As soon as I clean the bathroom someone gets distracted while peeing.

While I am picking up toys in one room some one is inevitably taking out playdoh in another.

When I painted Holden and Oliver's room Griffin busied himself with scribbling all over a bookshelf.

Jeff taught Oliver how fun it was to draw on a tablet PC. So Oliver tried it on his own one day... with a sharpie. [incidentally Mr. Clean Magic Eraser is the key to removing sharpie from laptop PCs].

When Holden was in preschool he learned that everyone puts their name on their things. So he put my name on my $300 handbag, in ballpoint pen.

Every time I turn around...I wish I hadn't.