Mr. Clean

My little Andy Man was born with the "clean gene". Obviously from the Greenfield side of the family, as his Daddy is also one that enjoys cleanliness of his surroundings. Some people have called him a 'neat freak' (not me of course) . I find it rather nice to have a husband that enjoys to give the kitchen counters a through once over, and knows how to use the vacuum and the washer and dryer. I do have to admit that it has probably been the biggest hurdle in blending our family. After all any mother of several children will tell you that keeping the house clean at all times is like shoveling the sidewalk in a snow storm. It's pretty much impossible to have a completely tidy house. When you have a husband that craves cleanliness and order and you have 4 children, a toddler and 2 large, smelly, shedding dogs in the house ~ someone is not going to achieve their goal. He's gotten better over time accepting that sometimes it's okay that the floor is littered with 1,000 rubber duckies (thanks Grandma Bauer) or that the kitchen table is the official vacation spot for Barbie and all her friends ~ and the 12,000 accessories that they travel with. It's also okay to shower with Naked mermaids and rubber sea animals watching you. He's become quite a good sport living with us and all our craziness and his reward is his mini-me that's a veritable cleaning tornado. His favorite toy is the spray bottle that I got at the dollar store. I fill it with water and turn him lose with a tiny washcloth. He cleans everything... the table, chairs, appliances, windows, dogs, toys, siblings... He loves to use the Swiffer, so I've adapted it to suit his height challenge I just took two of the handle pieces out and now it's just his height. Last winter I bought a small vacuum at Walmart that is really like a dustbuster with an extend-able handle and a foot attachment. since the handle slides into itself it becomes just his height and as soon as he started to walk last winter, he began his vacuuming hobby! Last week he called me into the kitchen with much distress in his voice. I ran in to see why he was so upset about to discover he spotted a piece of dogfood trapped betweent he fridge and the wall and insisted that I remove it at once. He's become quite the little dictator of housework! My parents have purchased his a cleaning cart for Christmas. Not sure we should bother getting him anything else... it's his dream come true! :) HAPPY CLEANING ANDYMAN

It's a girl!

So my daughter is coming HOME today! I was laying in bed last night feeling like I should have a baby shower or something, she is after all my first baby! Only I don't need a stroller or binkies... I need home decor re-organization and LOTS of Reeses Peanut Butter Cups! (A Xanax or two for Mommy would be cool too... but I've been off the happy pills for a while so my cupboard is barren of any anti-anxiety tic-tacs).

I want to tell everyone I know how proud I am of my daughter! As a 14 year old young lady that's has been through an incredible amount of "stuff", and overcome some pretty ugly personal struggles... she left my "controlling" environment and went to live with her dad ~ where there was no supervision at all. Where most kids would have taken advantage of that and ran WILD! She chose only good and healthy things for herself. She could have had done whatever she wished living in an environment of zero moral accountability, and she came out of that environment with a pure heart and a pure body! Since she was born I have been amazed at her strength... and I always knew in my heart she could use that strength for her advantage! She's amazing!!!

I look forward to her coming home today... glad too this won't include poopy diapers... AndyMan has that covered just fine!!! I think as long as I keep her busy learning and stay well stocked with "middles" ~(she LOVES Peanut Butter Cups and she eats around the edges of each one and stacks up the middles and eats those last) this will be a great journey until the time comes for her to leave the nest for real. :(

WELCOME HOME KRISTEN!!!

Love, Mommy

Welcome to my frightening little world!!!

So for a while now some folks have been prodding me to start a blog. (They'll be sorry)
I'm not quite sure why they want to delve deeper into my thoughts. (Brave or naive?)
Whatever the motivation, perhaps it's a good idea. Whats the worst that can happen?? It'll be good therapy for me, and if nothing else whomever reads it will surely feel better about their own lives. In an effort to survive my first marriage, both physically and mentally I wrote what could have been made into a book of short humorous stories. Perhaps a little of that "colorful" style will spill over into this new endeavor. Whatever happens...

Here's to having fun!!!