Quote of the day...er...week...umm...hey, look, a quote!!

"...besides love, independence of thought is the greatest gift an adult can give a child." - Bryce Courtenay, The Power of One

For old quotes, look here.

Tuesday, October 21, 2008

Another Fine Mess

*Edit - I decided to play along with Marcy and join the G.I.R.L party, because why not??

Hmm. No, not fine. Not fine at all. Hateful and mean, that mess. Awful, evil, and probably inhabited by aliens.

What mess?

Oh, wait, I'll show you!


I shot this from the doorway because I couldn't figure out how to get in there. How does he get to bed??


To get this photo, I had to levitate over all that mess and hover in the corner.


This is under the bed, which is supposed to be a fort kind of thingy. We took it down because it made making the bed and cleaning too difficult, and the Evil Genius asked if we would leave it off so he had more room to play.

I think he really meant "room to make messes and not clean them up."

Not pictured? Under all of that stuff...under the toys, books, crayons, puzzle pieces and random other junque? Almost an entire box's worth of Cheez-Its crackers (a staple around here), smushed to smithereens. Smithereens that stuck to me as I sat on the floor, cleaning inch by inch all yesterday afternoon because apparently I am insane.

What, you don't clean when you're sick??

Now, don't you wish you could flip a switch and go from that horror above to the scenes below? Yeah, me too...I'd like my nearly five hours back.


Holy crap, is that a floor? Who knew that was in there?? I thought his bed rested on the Golgothan Mess Monster (second and lesser known cousin of the Golgothan shit monster featured in the movie Dogma).


I have much love for the dragon/toy hanger thingy - it was a gift from my friend K, who got it from her secret love Ikea during one of their brief, torrid affairs. Unlike much of what you get from Ikea, it doesn't matter if the toys aren't metric - they still fit. See the cat's face? She's all like "Ohmuhgawd, it's not all bumpy and shifty when I walk! Am I in the right place??"


Whew...no monsters, no mess, just an aircraft carrier - the same one the cat likes to perch on.

Yes, it took me almost five hours. I could say it's because I was (and am) sick. I could say it's because we had friends come over and I had to stop. Both true.

It would likely have gone faster if I didn't give a dang about sorting things into bins in some kind of order and just dumped stuff in there. If I didn't mind mixing up puzzle pieces and games, it would have been much faster. If I didn't have to sweep every few inches because I sit on the floor to sort and the crumbs were sticking to me and making me itch, it would have been done in half the time. I swept so many times, I think there may be permanent straw marks on the Pergo. Also, I was (and am) sick, my back hurt, and there was a hiccup in the space/time continuum. Yeah.

Or I could own up to the fact that my kid has too freakin' many toys, games, and general stuff and I am a crap housekeeper.

Nah...I'm going with the space/time thingy.

Oh, well - if our finances get bad enough, I could always open my own Toys-R-Us; we already have the inventory!

20 comments:

Anonymous said...

I've seen that before and after in my neck of the woods. Scary, scary, scary. The hangy things from Ikea are definitely a godsend.

Kit said...

LOL- Littleman came up behind me as I was reading this post, and said, "Is that Bird's room?" When I said yes, he said, "Wow! Is it Christmas?"

Hee hee.

(This from a boy whose mother spent her whole evening yesterday cleaning up toys and sneaking some things into the trash, rather than enjoying her evening with you!!)

RachelW said...

He could be one of my relatives! lol! About a year ago, I lost my patience with similar disasters and day-long clean-ups, so I put 3 large tupperware bins full of toys away in storage. Then I banned the purchase of any new toys; if the boy wanted something new, he could choose a toy out of one of the bins. Yeah I'm such a big blue meany! But I yell a lot less now. ;)

Anonymous said...

Oh this IS glamorous!

It totally reminds me of the Mrs. Piggle Wiggle cure for not-picking-up-toys. Eventually the little boy can't get out of his room at all and the mom sends him food on a rack thru a side window!!!

Hey I once spent 8 hours sorting a million legos..BY COLOR. So I get the sorting thing FOR SURE.

You are totally a glamorous mom.

Blogger Dad said...

LOL - That looks like my office, only instead of toys, I have tons of magazines, newspapers and books surrounding me.

If you learn how to blink and make it all clean, please let me know, because actually picking up my toys is too daunting a task.

Anonymous said...

Wowzas. I would have just moved.

OneZenMom said...

Wow! Kudos to you for the beautiful "after" result"! But, my empathetic condolences on the "before" ... I have no idea how they do it, but my four-year-old and my 16-month-old manage to make their room look something like that just about every other day. I'm like Sisyphus, over here.

Cheryl Lage said...

A stunning transformation...am in awe. (And sorry you were so sick...but that's a heck of a silver lining)

Thanks for the tip on the organizer..we have a Boon "stuff all the soft toys into it" thingy and it's our God-send.

Glad to finally be visiting we have many similar blogs we frequent. Love yours, and will be back.

Kyddryn said...

Writer Dad, that hanging dragon is a bit of brilliance - I only wish I could hang more of them, but the only place I could put 'em is the ceiling fan, and...ulp...can you say "disaster"? Sure, I knew you could!

Kit, I totally understood why you didn't come up - as soon as M told me, I laughed and said I didn't blame you one bit! I would have done the same...if Bird hadn't been around yesterday, more toys would have...umm...been eaten by the cats.

Mizz Glamorous Marcy, I did actually have thoughts of sliding flat foods under the door to feed the child trapped therein! I didn't sort the legos by color, but I DID sort the toy cars by type and size. Thanks for popping by and for inclusion in the G.I.R.L party!

Blogger Dad, as soon as I figure out the blinking trick, you'll see the marketing blitz!

Jennifer, welcome. I suppose I could move...but I'd just have to pack the junque, and that kind of mess is smart enough to follow a body to her new digs.

Zenmom, welcome...and I feel ya. Kind f makes you wish Hercules was around to redirect the occasional river, huh?

Kyddryn said...

Cheryl, welcome - glad you could stop by! We do have quite a few in common, eh? Funny how small the world can be. I just adore the bins and hanging organizers - without them, I fear we'd be lost in our own home. C'mon back any time - there's always tea on.

Susan said...

Go to bed, dream about that beautiful room you just cleaned, and GET WELL. And keep those pictures for young adult blackmail.

Anonymous said...

This weekend, we all got so sick and tired of cleaning after our 4 year old that I and his mother, along with his 4 siblings, took all of his toys and parked all of them in the garage...LOL

Eric Francis said...

I've said it before and I'll say it again: Yet another reason not to have children.

It's OK to be WEIRD! said...

You are just the sweetest mom in the world. I would NOT have cleaned that room for my kiddos. I might have locked the in their room for 5 hours to make sure they got it done themselves... actually I have made them stay in their room a whole Saturday just to get their alien-infested who-knows-what-else-is-lurking-in-there rooms cleaned! You did a SUPER job, mom!! Not a glamorous job, but an awesome one, anyway!

Threeundertwo said...

I think you shouldn't let him back in now. Wouldn't want to spoil it!

Very impressive before and after pictures.

I seem to follow Cheryl around a lot. Found you through Marcy's GIRL party.

Mrs. G. said...

Wow. Good work.

Susie said...

I agree...your son and my daughter are definitely cut from the same messy cloth:-) Great job on the cleanup:-)

Suzy said...

Cant say this will work for anyone but my mom cleaned our rooms every day and had 3 job, made all our meals etc.

Because of that, my sister and I are both clean freaks. It's what we grew up with.

Anonymous said...

Sadly, I have a bedroom like that in my house, too. But the inhabitant is 14 so there's no way I'm touching it. I wasted too many good hours of my life sorting and stacking.
--MomZombie

Kyddryn said...

Susan, thanks - as of today I am better (at least, as far as I can tell.) I was thinking the pics would be great in the pre-wedding slide show. Muah.

Chris, I feel your pain - more than once we've bagged a fair number of Bird's toys and hidden them in the garage, either to bring out later, take on the road when we travel, or sell at a consignment sale to pad his clothing budget.

yrob, yeah but then who would wake me up when I want to sleep in, puke all over the couch right after eating something that stains or is sticky, or give me the sweetest hugs and kisses in all Christendom??

Sweet Mummy, welcome, and thanks! When the Evil Genius is older, he WILL clean his own room, but at a few months shy of six, he's still "a little whelmed" (as he puts it) to clean it up when it's that messy. He did help once or twice, and so far he has kept it clean. One may hope!

Threeunder, welcome! I wouldn't let him in to play or even touch any of his toys until I was done...except when he wanted to help.

Susie, welcome...and I thought you'd understand!

Suzy, I am a crappy housekeeper...I'm trying not to pass that on to my son, but the nut doesn't fall very far from the trees, does it?

Momzombie, welcome! I wouldn't go into a teen's troll-hole, either - one might lose a limb!