Why You Should Just Go For It

They’re out there.

Those moms. The ones that can keep their household pretty much spotless. Whose children are always dressed before 10 a.m. (we are going on noon here, kids are still not dressed), who have make up on their faces before breakfast. The ones who will send out handmade Christmas cards on time. Moms who never forget to check the mail or wash the towels. Moms who are organized. I’m not one of them. Like, not really at all. And I am NOT harping on those women. I’m kind of jealous in a please-tell-me-how-you-do-it, and you-mean-you-willingly-don’t-wear-sweats-all-day?  kind of way. I’d stay in comfy sweat pants (the non-buttoning kind) all day if it were socially acceptable.

Here we be!

So, no, I’m not good at all of the organizational things. The crossed t’s and dotted i’s sort of stuff. It’s not that my house is always horrendously messy or that I can’t keep anything straight at all. And it’s not that I don’t try or haven’t fretted over it plenty these past few years. It’s just that it has never came naturally to me and partially because I’ve given up on some of it. Because children and perfection cannot exist harmoniously together. The things that didn’t take precedence in my life or that didn’t come naturally before children…well, they’re about as lost as my debit card is at the moment.

There is something I’m kind of good at, though.

Going for it.

Or more importantly, letting my children go for it. I would love to have an ordered house. I would love to be more motivated. And I’m actually getting there slowly – just probably not quite fast enough for my husband’s tastes, because, bless his heart, he is the more organized party in this marriage. For as much as I love having days (probably more like minutes) where my house is actually pulled together and clean, I love having one that looks lived in. A house that has trim along the walls with growth charts marked on them. A house that has paint stains on its dining room table from art projects and little hands. A house with a refrigerator that has hardly anything that is actually useful pinned on it and instead is covered in art and school work.

Doing WORK!

Because really, that’s what your home is for. It’s to be LIVED in. It’s another tool, another mechanism in growing, churning lives. It’s for little feet to run around in. It’s for jubilant laughter to be echoed down its halls. It’s meant to be busy. It’s for my children to remember their joy and fun and mishaps from growing up. It’s for Rob and I to etch memories in our hearts and minds of babies who grow up way too fast and don’t stay little for long enough. It’s meant to be used. It’s meant to be filled.

So, I say, go for it. Let your kids go for it. 

Pretty much how my kitchen ends up looking despite my best efforts.

It may be a rare occasion for the next 10 years that you can randomly show up at my home and find it not looking like a bomb just went off. But I would hope you’d find happy children inside. There will also probably be an exhausted and frazzled mum spouting something about wanting sleep, too, but happy children none the less. And hey, guess what? A few more years from now and I’ll have at least two extra sets of hands to help out around here. There is always something to look forward to, right? I think I’ll teach them how to brew a pot of coffee first, though.