And the laundry gets finished... at last!

Today started out with high hopes (on my part) of doing a few homemaking-sorts of things... after all, Crystal hosts Making Your Home a Haven [1] every Monday, and I'm really getting left in the dust!! My kitchen counters are packed with junk, and the other day when I tried to set something on top of the fridge, dust bunnies flew down onto my head.

So today I was really going to be on the ball. I decided I would do my projects in the morning, take pictures, and then spend some of Eliyahu's nap time posting on my blog about it all. Then I would take a nap myself, and have the rest of the day free. Haha!! That didn't exactly happen. ;)

Task number one: Give Ruth a bath. She smelled like sour milk! Yehoshua and Eliyahu helped run the bath water, and watched closely while I bathed her. Here she is in her long-sleeved onesie (a great invention for winter babies!) right before her bath. I don't have any during-pictures, because I can't quite manage two toddlers plus a camera while bathing a newborn. ;)

Yehoshua got to pick out Ruth's clean outfit. He loves this blue turtle sleeper. :) After I nursed Ruth, she fell asleep. I put her in her bed, got the boys busy playing, and jumped in the shower. Even though I hurried, Eliyahu got antsy and Ruth woke up before I was done! At least I got a shower. :D

Now, the laundry part. This was going to be so easy. (haha!) Here I am half-way through the day's laundry. I had Joshua's work clothes washed and hung to dry, and yesterday's load was in the basket to be folded and put away. (Since I'm using the indoor clothes rack and it takes about 24 hours for a load to dry, I do one load every day.)

But, in between diaper changes, nursings, and keeping Eliyahu out of trouble, it was suddenly 11:30am, and time for some lunch. The children and I ate some leftovers, and by the time I got them washed up and got Eliyahu ready for his nap, and sat down to nurse Ruth yet again, I was about ready to fall asleep myself! And all I had done was give Ruth a bath and hang up one load of clothes!

Yehoshua was tired too. I read him a story, and since Ruth was already asleep in my arms, we all just laid down on the couch and took naps.

Eliyahu woke up about 3pm, as I was changing Ruth's diaper. She went back to sleep, but now it was time to start dinner. I had Eliyahu help me in the kitchen (Yehoshua stayed asleep) and we made a dish of Farmhouse Chicken. [1]

This is what it looked like before it was baked. :)

So, dinner was made. Yay! Now, time to tackle all the dishes in the sinks.

Eliyahu is a great dishes helper. He loves playing with Joshua's travel mug, especially.

And then we were done! I love a clean kitchen. Unfortunately, the part in the picture was the only part that was really clean. Oh well... Ruth woke up just as I took this picture. :)

So, we ate dinner, cleaned up the dishes again, took care of babies and toddlers, sang some songs together, picked up toys, and got Eliyahu off to bed. Yehoshua played with Play Doh at the kitchen table while I held Ruth, who stayed wide awake (and a little fussy) until about 9:30.

Nine-thirty... and still my little bit of laundry sat, unfolded. Oh well... it was time to pack Joshua's lunch. I finished that about 10pm... when Ruth woke up, again!

But, Ruth ate and went back to sleep. And I folded my laundry. And took this picture, finally. :D Tomorrow morning, the work clothes will be dry, and I'll have a new load to hang... and we'll start all over again. :)

We had a good day. My kitchen counters are still packed with junk, and I know there's a layer of dust on the top of my fridge, but I can always try for those things tomorrow. :)