It's been a couple days

I could use the excuse that it is the holidays and I have been so caught up with doing Christmas stuff that I have been too busy to post, but nah, I am just lazy.

And really, not much else is going on for me to write about. The kids are off school and rotting their brains with TV. But every day I turn off the TV and turn on the music and they hate it. "Aw Mom, not the music again!"

There is still background noise, but they have no celluloid images to stare at, and proclaim themselves bored. I tell them to go play outside, and they don't want to do that. So I tell them to go clean their rooms, and you can imagine how big that goes over. We are on day 3 of the room cleaning disaster. Are they clean? No.

Katie tells me that she doesn't want to clean her room by herself. I tell her I dont want to clean the whole house by myself, so she is doing her room to help me. She looks at me in disbelief.

I don't get it. These kids empty trash, Jonathan takes the trash out, they help put out the trash & recycling on Wednesdays, they clear dishes, they sort laundry, and they go on toy hunts, searching each room for toys that are supposed to stay in their rooms. Its not like they are without chores. But to tell them to clean their rooms leave them blank.

We have gone over what entails a room cleaning---toys in the box, books on the shelves, laundry in the hamper, trash in the can, etc. So it's not like they don't know what to do. You would think I was using them as slave labor.

I tell them I don't ask them to clean my room, so don't ask me to help them clean theirs. Again I get the hairy eyeball. I have tried the "Santa's watching" ploy, to no avail.

I am this close to going in there with trash bags, handing them to the kids and saying "fill them up."

On a positive note, I found my garage keys. Our garage is not attached to our house. It also has all the Christmas presents in it. So yes, finding the keys is a positive thing.

That's about it. I am going to do more baking for neighbors and try to set a good example to the kids by turning off the TV, turning on the music and cleaning house. Maybe Santa will be nice to me this year.