The Little Things

Messy Fingers© Debra S. Higginbotham

Sticky fingers ' tangled hair,
scattered crayons, everywhere.
Fancy artwork ' on the wall '
drawn by midgets ' three feet tall.
Tell me why ' and tell me how '
that was mine ' I want it NOW!
Fix my bike. Buy me gum.
If you have it, I want some.
Dirty faces, grass-stained knees,
learning words ' like pretty please.
Endless hugs & goofy wet kisses,
learning respect with 'Mr.' & 'Mrs.'
Scraped-up hands, from falling down.
Tender tugs - - on my night gown.
Need more paper ' for Santa's letter?
I wasn't so bad ' but I've been better.
Watching a movie ' again and again '
Mommy, please ' put the tape back in.
Messy fingers ' hair gone wild '
all in the life ' of a precious child !!

This poem pretty much sums up our life lately. We've been going, going, going 24-7. Baseball season has now started so daddy's been very busy with his new team and I've been very busy with my online master's class (yes, that's class singular, as in 1, and it still may kill me) and hauling around and cleaning up after these three precious children of ours.

So I found myself alone in my house for a few minutes this afternoon, which never happens. Well...sorta alone, Cade's at school, Cora's playing at a friend's house, and Clara's asleep. So I had to make a choice, a. to clean the house or b. to work on my class online. So I started to do choice a, but there was weird crap everywhere and I got tired of that. Then, I transferred over to choice b. My master's is in educational technology and the module I am working on is on photography and still images. My camera stinks, but I was reading about different techniques, lighting, and settings. And our assignment was to play around with our camera and take pictures of things around the house to try it out. We were supposed to choose a common "theme" for our pictures. So as I walked around my half picked up house trying to decide on my theme it became apparent. I chose to take pictures of all the little annoying things left out all over the place by my children. I didn't take long until i got sentimental and thinking about how I complain about this kind of stuff all the time, but it's sooooo temporary. I've been super sentimental about my baby turning one, and I know in a few years all these little messes will change and eventually go away. So I'm now totally sidetracked again and trying to appreciate these little things and enjoy them while they're around!
i pulled this out of cora's backpack from school. She does this a lot. It's a picture (well, a valentine, I peeked) that she made and then wrapped with a million pieces of tape.

an Elmo toothbrush on the floor in the hallway. this is clara. she won't crawl or toddle around without something in her hand. her favorites are toothbrushes, toothpaste tubes, or lotion bottles.

a random baby shoe on the dining room table--i will soooo miss having tiny socks and shoes around! they are my favorite.

2 lego soldiers waging war on the bathtub. do you know how many times i've asked cade to remove his lego guys from the bath tub????? like 100000! grrrr! We pay oodles and gobs of money to the LEGO people to have small plastic choking hazards all over our house!

what's a refrigerator without some original artwork?

bows....i LOVE having little girls. I find hair bows and headbands, clips, rubber bands, and ribbons everywhere. can they wear bows forever?



more legos. ok really i just had to throw this one in there because this is a huge problem at our house and i'm desperate for an answer or suggestion. how the heck are you supposed to store already built lego sets? he plays with them and once they break apart her never correctly rebuilds them, so there they sit, covering every hard surface in our house. this is just his room, you should see the play area. could some incredibly resourceful boy mom please help me???? i'm begging! until then, there they'll sit!