Why I'm afraid of taking a shower these days...

This is what was waiting for me after I took a shower and got dressed Saturday morning. Oh, and also 3 HYPER, giggling children. Not the "Oh, how I love my siblings, life is grand!" endearing laughter, the "Mom's coming! look what we got away with while she wasn't looking!" maniacal laughter. Then an abrupt change to sassy "NO!!!!! I'm NOT!!"s when I sent them to their rooms.

Well, it stands to reason that the responsible thing to do would be to calmly have them clean it up, but "calm" wasn't really an option since my blood was quite nearly boiling and I was feeling the onset of spontaneous combustion. For some reason, on occasion my state of mind links itself with the state of my house, so in this instance while it looked like a hurricane came through my living room, the same hurricane was making it's way through my psyche.

Great time to have the kids to exit stage left.

They went upstairs (to quite probably wreak havoc there too).

I looked at the aftermath. I cried. Twice. Okay, thrice.

Turned on saturday morning general conference for ambiance.

Cried again at the perfect first talk.

Called for back-up.

Enter sister missionaries looking for service ops and in an hour, it was back to this.

So, as a side note, my whole house gets messes of this magnitude almost constantly(at least it feels that way) but this mess was just compacted into a smaller amount of time, I didn't see the progression, and it had more unusual components (ie taking the stuffing out of the couch and a PUDDLE of yogurt schmeared into the carpet. Really kids?)

For my own amusement here's the rundown of the specifics. Also, this is my reference for when my kids call me from college wanting money, or to come home for Christmas, or when they wonder why I wrote them out of their inheritance. For the record, this was the day. (Since you were upstairs in your bed Lincoln, you're safe kiddo- in reference to the inheritance AND from the wake of destruction.)

Oh, and for inquiring minds: The kids had to stay in their rooms for the entire clean up, missed their lunch, had all toys confiscated for the day, and have yet to earn back any toys that were part of this particular mess, and they also owe me 20 chores if they want to play soccer in the spring.

But hey- I got a shower and everyone survived!