Breaking the Silence

I've been quiet for quite some time and with some good reason.  You see Lent kicked off a season of busy:

• I celebrated my Confirmation. 
• My daughter had her First Communion.
• My grandmother turned 85 and I got to go visit her in Europe for 12 days!

You can imagine that with a lot of big family events all routine and reason have gone out the window.  They have not only gone out the window, they've moved at least six states away from this family.  Now that school  is out, we're down to finishing up baseball season and a few summer camps...Thank GOD!  But it's also time to restore law and order because we're all less than awesome around here without it.

Lemme back up a bit... I discovered on my trip to Europe that my family can function quite well and peacefully without me.  It was a bit of a kudos... because now I can run away and live like a hobo in Key West.  On the flip side... they were quite peaceful and organized without me.  I realized, I got all the laundry caught up, planned meals, and the schedule before I left.  I left the house not in perfect condition, but in maintenance mode.  

When I returned from my trip, I landed smack dab in the middle of dance recital week and end of the school year craziness.  Jet lag combined with a busy schedule = law, order, peace, justice GONE. It was fly by the seat of my pants and hope we all got everywhere we need to be when we need to be there.  Well now that's all settled, so it's clear that I need to get things under control or by September 5th, it's going to be bye-bye to law, order, peace, justice and my sanity all at once.

Here are some things I noticed about my house (and maybe you have the same problems in yours?):

• My daughter is a direct descendant of Looney Toons' Taz... disasater follows her.
• My son doesn't make messes mostly because he's glued to (as my mother calls them) "an electronical device."
• When my house is super messy, I'm super, uh, CRABBY.
• It drives me nuts when I wash and fold the kids laundry and they throw it all over their rooms.
• I complain way too much.

 In my never-ending mission to continue to be awesome... I needed to do something about all this.  So here's the plan:

• My daughter is going to be held accountable for all her mess trails
• My son needs to have his love of electronical devices redirected to interacting with humans... even if he makes a little mess.
• Clean up the house, get some exercise, eat healthier = super AWESOME
• I'm not going to fold the kids laundry any more.
• I'm re-committing to the Awesomeness Campaign (i.e. complain less, praise more!)

It sounds pretty easy, right?...  Theoretically, it is easy, but try giving kids who'd rather be making messes and talking to Super Mario some guidance and that's when you get some Awesome Genius going.  We don't need more rules... we need more respect: for ourselves, our things, others... so that's what this summer is all about RESPECT.  Oh but more on that tomorrow... because I've got some bonding to do with my little girl.