Six Seven Eleven . . .

I like when the day's date rhymes :)

What do you do to decompress?

Read on after the projects to hear my decompression story.

Today is Scarlet Lime sharing day. June's kits were packed with embellishments.

First up--FRUGAL FAB kit projects:

 With the Main Kit, I made a layout, a card, and covered a journal.

You can see the tutorial for the journal on the Scarlet Lime blog HERE.

I have a stack of photos on my work table that I have been slowly working on. 99% of them are 4x6 size. As time goes on, I feel like I am going back to more simple pages. Getting the story told is what I want to focus on. Don't get me wrong, I love creating--but I scrapbook to keep our family's memories.

On a completely different note . . . please tell me I am not the only mother who needs to decompress every once in a while! This afternoon our house contained some rather loud volumes of noise in various places.

I had to get dinner on the table and then get out the door to Lina's end-of-the-season game. One child was working on a school poster and having problems. One small child was fussing loudly, having missed a desperately needed nap. Another child was very frustrated because his sisters were teasing him and the three were running around upstairs.

And I had asked nicely twice for them to all come sit down and eat. And sent the 2-year-old upstairs to tell them as well. He says, "Dee!" for dinner.

Finally, they all made it to the table (after my third and stern request) with continual loud voices. "Mom!" "I need . . . " "When are you . . . " "She said . . ."

Once they all sat down at their places, plates of food in front of them, I said, "I am going upstairs to decompress for five minutes. You can take care of yourselves and get what you need."

Silence . . . that lasted for about 10 seconds. Then they figured out who was supposed to say the blessing on the food, and someone fetched cups and milk for everyone.

On my way up the stairs, I realized the washing machine cycle was done. So I took the clothes out that needed to hang dry. As I hung them on the rack, the dryer cycle finished so I turned it back 20 minutes (I always have to do this to completely dry the clothes). Then I sat on the couch and looked at a CARDS magazine for about 27 seconds before I decided to lie down and rest for the remainder of my 5 minutes. Then I realized I needed to put a load of sheets in the wash so they could be done before bedtime. But I had to go to Lina's game and knew we wouldn't be home before 9pm.

If I were to ask DH to put the sheets in the dryer from the washer, I knew he would appreciate if the laundry floor weren't littered with clothes and that there be an empty laundry basket to put the clothes from the dryer in. So I pulled myself up off the couch and went to fold the basket of clean clothes. And I picked up the clothes on the floor in the laundry room to put them in the other basket. The dryer wasn't done yet but I stopped it anyway so I could fold those clothes as well. The wash load went into the dryer and the sheets into the washer.

Then Lina and I left for her game. We returned home at 9:10pm.

I forgot to tell DH to put the sheets in the dryer.

So now I'm writing this post at 10:40pm waiting for dry sheets.

But I appreciated my 27 seconds of decompression time.

As I got up off the couch to fold the clothes to have an empty basket, I thought of how amazing my life is, what wonderful children I have who can take care of themselves for (what turned out to be 10) 5 minutes, and how I am blessed in so many ways.

AND to be honest, I had three hours at Lina's game to watch, cheer, and chat all by myself :)