Shiny

Yesterday we washed the van. It took all afternoon. No, really, we took small breaks between steps and stopped for lunch and went to the store for window cleaner and wax, but we started just after noon and ended at 7pm. My standards concerning what constitutes a successful day have clearly fallen far. But it is clean, it got its first wax since we've owned it (pathetic, I know - we've owned the van for about 5 years now), and it's sitting in the driveway all shiny and ready to go drive for 4 hours today. What was I thinking accepting an invitation to celebrate the 4th of July 2 hours from here? At least we'll be driving in a shiny freshly laundered (yeah, we did the carpets too, although that was last week - yesterday we just vacuumed inside and armor-all'd the plastic/vinyl/etc) vehicle. Irritatingly, Francesco and I will have to drive up separately, since he's working today. BittyPrincess thinks we should bring cake to the party. And celery. "Because I like cake and I like celery."

I also had a near-meltdown over the fact that it seems like I care more than the girls do about whether their room is clean. And then I realized my room isn't exactly clean at the moment, either: my dresser is full of random crap I just couldn't be bothered to put away, and my desk has quite a bit of extraneous correspondence on it. *Sigh* I think it's the stuff that's randomly shoved into their bookshelves that is setting me off. If you're going to put something away, do it right. That and the scatter of toys and clothes on the floor. I recognize that I was a terribly messy child and am getting back some of my own here. But I'd like them all to be as particular as Boyness is about his room and his stuff. I suppose it's one of those blessing-in-disguise situations that the two that don't give a shit are living in the same room, so it's not like there's one child stressing out about the mess the other child is making. They're just both really messy.