Of school shelves, snoring dogs and the house is quiet!!!!!!!!!

Nothing like the *no sleep-i-tus* of knowing you are making a move in the fall or sooner...Tonight has me organizing the school shelves, making plans for the next few weeks of school and listening to the puppy snore rather loudly...

And..listening to the quiet of all those busy bodies sleeping. Shhhhhh....this will NOT last forever and is so worth staying up for, but I rarely do it, choosing the energy over the peace and calm. I can always tell when the baby is starting to get bigger because I am all abuzzzzzzzzzz with new plans and the house seems to get cleaner overnight. Julia sat up on her own and played for well over an hour tonight. Record moment :)

Anna, on the other hand: WOW! What a day in her life! She is right smack dab between two and three and everyone here knows it. I had to remember to deep breathe quite a few times and rely on the WORD for wisdom and direction. She has turned out to be a screamer, unlike any of my other children. She will be my buddy for the next few weeks till we get this in hand. Buddy time always gives me the opportunity to spend so much time enjoying them and for them to learn how to take every whim and want under control. When the frustration is nipped in the bud by practice time right in the moment, it is pretty effective. (hopefully..lol)...

Sarah was every bit the four year old today and was the only one of all of us to notice Daddy had a new hair cut. She greeted him with *I like your hair cut*, and we all looked at him with new eyes :) I adore four year olds for this attention to detail. I have been mimicking her tone of voice today to help her get over her whiny sound...there are a few things I cannot abide and whiny-ness is at the top. Deception of any kind, complaining, whining, stealing...If you cannot do it in front of me, there must be a reason (for little kids)...

Daniel & Jon were every bit monkeys today and they were quite a bit of help. Those two never stop moving and I love in our very European house how the stairs go circular and there are 45 of them...they run them endlessly horsing around and they are a nice energy outlet. Mitch has been taking Jon to work with him every other Friday since he is the big 9 now. Jon is really benefiting from the one on one and has a pretty firm character already. Time will tell.

Those are the younger ones here and today was sort their clean laundry into totes day. We wash daily for them but it goes in a pile to be sorted into containers with labels like *boy unders, boy shirts, boy pants, etc..(nine containers)..then one day a week, we sort them into 7 containers of outfits. Everything they wear or need (diapers, socks, undies, etc) are in this tote (they are labeled for the days of the week and two fit in each cube of my IKEA shelving), so when the morning fog is thick, they can clearly find what they need. (or, in the case of certain wee little ones..they match pretty effortlessly!!) This keeps them in clean clothes, keeps me from looking like the mother in the shoe in the neighbourhood and it is a win win all around. This is without doubt the best system we have ever used and I only wish I had thought of it a WHOLE lot sooner..it would have been a life saver when my now bigs were little..

Books I received in the mail today: Super Natural Home by Beth Greer and the Naturally Clean Home by Karyn Siegel Maier   I have enjoyed reading tidbits here and there this afternoon..

I hear the baby..time to scoot..
Good Night!
Becky