May 26: CinderJen & CinderVic

‘Scuse the lack of posts. It’s been a busy past few days. Katie and Jack went to my mom’s for the long weekend, and Victor and I have been cleaning and organizing their rooms. We had hoped to work on a few other projects too, but everything took longer than we planned. The good news is that our to-do list for the kids’ bedrooms and playroom now has these things crossed off: de-clutter, shampoo carpets, organize toys in marked Rubbermaid boxes, collect and re-box crayons and markers and coloring pencils (oh my!), sort clothes, install shelves, hang new window coverings, remove trash and itty-bitty pieces of paper, catalog books according to the Dewey Decimal system, move new desk into playroom, donate outgrown toys and clothes. I think that’s it. Hard to believe we spent three days doing just a paragraph’s worth of stuff.

Katie never throws anything away. She keeps every math worksheet, scrap of paper, torn crayon wrapper, orphaned pen cap, Barbie hair extension… it’s infuriating. I gained a lot of sympathy for my mom when I realized Katie was like this, because I was exactly the same way as a child. What??? You threw away my bottle cap collection? My life is over!

Jack hoards underwear in his desk drawers, most of which is dirty. That was a super-fun discovery. He also painted on his door and then covered it with an art project from school. From now on, before I praise his artwork I’m going to look underneath it to see what he’s trying to hide.

We found a Nintendo 64 game system that we stored away long before the kids came along. Fortunately we also found the only game we ever bought—some Star Wars thing that Jack is going to love. Vic says he’s sorry he erased all your high scores, Stephen. Note that he deleted them; he did not beat them.

Casey was nervous watching us work. Because we’ve pretty much concluded that she was dropped off in our neighborhood after her owner died, it’s no surprise. Every time I looked at her she had this expression like, “Oh no. This is just like when the old lady disappeared and her kids packed up her things and then they took me for a ride in the car.” Poor girl. She’s been getting extra lovin’ on our breaks from cleaning.

That, in turn, pisses off Scout. To make up for it, we’ve had the dogs sleep with us every night. Vic and I both go to bed fully clothed when the dogs are on the bed because we know our blankets will be stolen during the night. Sure enough, this morning I woke up in the upper corner of the bed with my feet hanging off the side and all the blankets under Scout’s big fat beagle ass. Now I’m not only sore from all the work I’ve been doing, I’m sore from the position in which I’ve had to sleep.

We did have one nice break this weekend. Last night our neighbors hosted a barbecue and we all gathered outside for a few hours. Although I was tired, it was lovely to sit around and talk with our friends. (Note: Mike’s Hard Tea is goo-ood)

Well, I’m going to finish this cup of coffee and get the last few things on the list done. Then we’re headed down to Cottage Grove (halfway point between here and Medford) to retrieve our kids. Yay.