Day 18: The Weekend

Today I'm thankful for the weekend: Saturday & Sunday.  There is a reason everyone looks forward to the weekend.  Its a break from the routine.  A mini-vacation of sorts, especially if you don't have kids.  Before children, the weekends were a 48 hour party.  Weekends were for church, going out late, eating, sleeping in, relaxing, reading books, watching movies and being social.

Now that we have children, we still use our weekends for some of that stuff (when we can secure babysitting or after the kids are in bed), but we also use it for lots of other things.  Some of the new things that have been added into our weekends are long-distance runs, homework, catching up errands and housework, playing with the kids, and many more things.

This past weekend we did all our normal stuff but we also used it to accomplish a mega "to do" list. If you think I'm joking, I'm not.  I take my "to do" lists seriously.  They must be written out like this so that I can have the satisfaction of crossing things off as they're accomplished.

Yep, I write out the lists and cross them off as we go, I'm a nerd.

First up was some serious babyproofing.  We bolted two large book/toy shelves to the walls, mounted the changing table to the wall in his bedroom, put a glass coffee table at the curb for a stranger to take since we cannot keep Caleb off of it, stored our rocking chair at my in-laws house until Caleb is old enough to not climb it and knock it over, moved his dresser into the closet so he cannot climb it and bought a second superyard gate.  We already had one superyard gate, but this one means that we can keep him from hanging on our drapes (and pulling the curtain rod down). It also allows us to entertain the idea of putting up a Christmas tree this year.  It also means that at this moment, we have 35 feet of continuous gate zig-zagged across our living room--Don't be jealous.  After a crazy week, we are taking this babyproofing business serious!!!

I've got a fever and the only cure is more babygate.

 Two college-educated adults should be able to outwit a 17-month old toddler, right?  We shall see. 

I also used the weekend to attack my second goal: Simplify.

Another written "to do" list--I love crossing things off!

I packed up clothes that all the boys have outgrown.  We listed a bunch of items on craigslist and had some of them picked up already. This weekend, "we"(I mean Jon) cleared out the garage so we can actually park BOTH of our cars inside of it for the winter months.  "We" also ran a bunch of errands after dropping one of the kids at a birthday party.  We didn't get through our entire lists, but we got WAY more done than I anticipated.  My stress level has been greatly reduced, not only from the relaxation this weekend, but also because Caleb cannot get into as much stuff and there is less stuff to manage in our house.

That being said, I'm exhausted.  Since we tucked the kids into bed at 8, I've been sitting on the couch.  Monday morning is going to come too soon but I'm thankful for the weekend, for the time to get so much accomplished and the time to just rest.  I love the weekend!