I tend to be one to wish for the next moment in my child’s life to come: crawling, walking, talking, etc. I just get so excited for the next moment to be happening in his life. When it comes to trying to clean the house though, I wish that we could go back to when he would sleep and only be able to move if I picked him up.
My whole life I have always been a super clean freak. I always would do anything I could to keep everything picked up, organized, and nice and tidy. Bathrooms are my weakness because I can’t stand when I am trying to get get ready in a place that isn’t clean already. I would always have to have a clean vanity, mirrors, toilet, floor, shower, everything. I couldn’t stand a mess.
Now that my son is mobile it makes cleaning almost impossible. My wife is funny because I would get home from work and she would say, “I swear I didn’t just sit here and do nothing all day!” I never thought that, but always wondered why she would say that.
Well, I have had my reality check. I had a day off and my wife teaches sewing classes during the summer. So I had our son for a few hours and thought, “I can clean while he is down for his nap.” Turns out his nap only lasted about an hour and a half. All I could get done was some laundry moved around and scrubbed the shower and tub. That was it!
Normally when I clean I am able to get the whole place done in a few hours: bathrooms, bedrooms, laundry room, kitchen, vacuum the whole place. I didn’t know what was wrong with me and thought that even though he’s awake I can still get some things done. Nope!
Trying to fold laundry with a toddler rolling around in it, unfolding everything, isn’t easy or effective.
So husbands listen up. When you get home from work and the house doesn’t look clean, maybe look a little harder. Maybe a toilet was scrubbed, a counter was dusted, or the laundry was moved around. These things aren’t easy to get done when you have a child that needs you to hold them every five seconds. But I will tell you this, I would rather make sure that he is happy and know that I love him by paying attention to him even if my house isn’t perfectly clean all the time. So my reality check today is that cleaning is a team effort. It takes a family to get the job done and together we enjoy the tidiness while it lasts because we all know that the baby tornado will wake up tomorrow.
