Tallied up this mornings failures and successes...

Failures: 1. My children's bedrooms are in an "enter-if-you-dare" state. 2. The laundry pile is growing, not shrinking. 3. Christopher just cut his own hair...again. 4. I called it quits on potty-training our youngest for the 2nd time. 5. Three out of our four toilets are out of commission.

Successes: I caught my youngest two children on the the couch surrounded by copies of the Book of Mormon. They announced to me that they were reading their scriptures. At the end of "scripture study" they sang their version of "I Am A Child of God" and it was pretty cute.

I'd say the successes FAR out way the failures and make me feel very very grateful.

I am tired of the complaining that takes place almost every dinnertime at my house. There is always somebody who doesn't like something. So, today I told my children that they could each give me a list of 3 things that they do not like and would prefer not to eat. If I serve those things they are excused from eating those items. Nathan is a pretty good eater and had a hard time coming up with three things. Finally he proclaimed that LOBSTER is on his list. I have NEVER cooked Lobster...ever...and Nathan has never eaten lobster. I hid a giggle and told him that would work, but maybe he should pick something we actually eat at our house. He pondered that response and said "but, what if you accidentally cook lobster?" That could be a problem so I promised him that if I ever ACCIDENTALLY cook lobster he does not have to eat it.

We've never had an actual lesson entitled "don't touch mice", but somehow my girls know that they shouldn't anyway. It is part of their nature. My boys, however, didn't learn that lesson in heaven. They automatically think it's a good idea to touch the mouse, even to pick up the mouse. They found it today in one of our window wells and instinctively knew it would be fun to chase the girls with it. They chased my sweet screaming girls through the house with the mouse before dropping it on my kitchen floor. EW! EW! EW! I'm no stranger to mice. I grew up in the country and mice were part of the package, but on the kitchen floor? Is there a way to get it clean enough? I told my mouse-loving boys that their hands would be satisfactorily clean after they wash them 500 times in hot soapy water.

Nathan finished telling me something and then he looked at me expectantly for an answer. I said "ok," but he just kept looking at me. Then he tilted his head to one side and said "do you know what I just said." I wiggled my toes nervously and replied "uh, huh." "Tell me what I said then," he shifted his head to the other side. "Hmmmmm. You said something..." "Nope," he cut me off before I could make an intelligent guess. For the next few minutes he looked me right in the eyes and told me his plan for a leprehaun trap. It was a pretty good plan about a toilet paper roll with a ladder on one side and a slide on the other side. We made it together tonight, but I've been thinking. Maybe I don't listen as well as I thought I did. I've read plenty of articles about how important it is to listen to your kids. In my 5-year old's life leprechaun traps are very important so that means they should be important to me. I want my kids to share the big things with me, so they need to know I listen NOW to the things that matter to them. Nathan seemed to know I hadn't heard him the first time and he was right. It makes me feel sad that I almost missed this awesome chance to spend some one on one time with my growing-up-way too fast little guy. He needed that time and so did I. I am grateful that he had the patience and forgiving heart to give me a second chance.I am a LUCKY mom. Tomorrow I will post a picture of the leprechaun if one is so unlucky as to fall into Nathan's cleverly designed trap.

Now that I have successfully lost...well, pretty much everyone who used to follow my blog, I have made a decision. I am going to revive my struggling for life, but not quite dead on-line story. This time I'm going to add something new. Complete truth-telling. That's right. The kind of truth-telling where I admit that sometimes I want to cry. Loudly. Louder than all my children combined and that is loud. Right now it is 3:30 AM and I can't sleep. Not surprising, given my bike accident induced headaches. It's not really the bike accident's fault. It's physical therapy's fault, but who's pointing fingers? To pass the sleepless time I popped on over to my blog to check on the song I recently posted for some friends that aren't on facebook and it sparked an interest in blogging again. I miss it. I miss the outlet. I actually like to write, so stay tuned and we'll see if my interest in blogging is still there when the rest of the world is awake.