Incomplete

I'm a list maker. I always have been. Some days there is no greater satisfaction than crossing something off of a to-do list.

When my sister came to our house the day I was in labor to watch Reese, she jokes that she could tell Monday was "list day," because she found no less than 4 lists on the dining room table--grocery, house chores, baby prep etc.

It is ironic that since making our family "complete" with the addition of Paige, I have had to learn quickly to deal with incompleteness. To do lists are still getting made, but I've realized that checking things off with the regularity of the past is unrealistic.

With two needy children around, everything I do is piecemeal, and things are left incomplete constantly.

Dinner takes all day to prepare, and not because I'm creating gourmet dishes. Ingredients are chopped during Paige's morning nap, combined during Reese's afternoon nap, and with Paige in a sling or the bouncy chair, it all gets combined sometime between 4 and 6 and generally left to simmer until Kevin gets home.

Laundry? I try not to let it sit in the washing machine while wet, but it can now take up to two days to get a load completely washed, dried, and hung up. It's not helping matters that Paige sleeps in our closet right now--after soothing her to sleep, it's hard to justify the possibility of waking her up just to get some shirts on hangers.

Dishes now pile in my sink until I can steal a few minutes here or there to get them washed or into the constantly full dishwasher.

And forget blogging, reading, or even showering most days. Finding ten minutes here or there to do anything is a challenge. My car is desperate for a car wash, and I keep my fingers crossed that we get the library books returned on time.

So, with two small kids, things are changing--Christmas shopping is done on line, my hair is a little greasier, and I usually have a toddler in the shower with me. The to-do lists are still getting made, but I'm trying to give myself a break when things stay on them for days (or weeks) at a time.