Messy House Is Driving Me CRAZY!!

I feel like I can't get anything done. I pick up the living room, but it desperately needs to be vacuumed. DESPERATELY!! The dog goes out and brings leaves in. Ethan comes home from school and drags leaves in, and also brings home rocks in his shoes because the school can't be normal and use something other than rocks on the playground. It's killing me. I can't even tell you how many times a day I put the video games, movies and shoes back in their proper homes only to have Claire come behind me and rip them out. My kitchen is in desperate need of a sweeping and Wetjet run over. My laundry from last week needs folding. My laundry from this week needs doing. My sink is full of dishes, and I feel like I can't keep up with them. I feel so far behind on it all.

Then, there's me. I'm all hairy legged and barely get a chance to brush my hair and teeth in the morning or even at night because Grayson demands food whenever I feel I might have a second to jump in the shower. Seriously, it's like he has a "Mommy Must Shower" alarm and it rings whenever I put a toe on my bathroom floor. I stare longingly at my shampoo and conditioner and VS body washes, and they wave at me across the linoleium while Grayson happily nurses away. By the time he's done nursing at night, I'm too exhausted to think about showering, so I usually wash my face and brush my teeth and fall asleep within 5 minutes of lying down. In the morning I'm even more of a zombie because Claire has decided that 6AM is the new 7:30AM and she must be awake to catch all the cool happenings at this hour. Grayson sleeps until 7:45 while I feed Ethan and Claire breakfeast and try and rush Ethan out the door to catch the bus. Last night I tried to take a bath with him, and he was so not having it. Bathing with Claire worked wonders. She was always calm and quiet in the tub when I bathed with her. I'd lay her on her back on my legs and use a wash cloth to run water over her. It was the only time, apart from the very few naps she took, that we would be free from her colic crying. I remember trying to stay in the tub with her as long as possible just to be free from the crying for a little while. Grayson was not that way at all. He started crying as soon as I got him undressed, cried all the way through the bath and didn't stop crying until I was feeding him and trying to get him to sleep. Good thing though, I was able to finish nursing him, get him into bed and watch a WHOLE movie with David before he was ready to get up and eat again. That was awesome. Hey, it's the little things.

On another note, we'll be having Thanksgiving on Sunday instead of Thursday. David has to work this year on Thanksgiving. He hasn't worked on Thanksgiving in almost 5 years, but this year they are making him. I'm not really very happy about it. I hate it when he has to work on holidays. A few years ago he had to work on Christmas Eve, and we have dinner and open presents at my SIL's house on that night, and when he showed up he was just exhausted. I felt horrible for him. But, at least we'll still have dinner with our family, and we'll still have a Thanksgiving. He's going to be switching his schedule back to weekends so he won't have to work on Thanksgiving again next year. Besides, he never sees Ethan during the week. He gets home from work when the kids and I are in bed, and leaves before Ethan gets hom from school. They always miss each other.