05 June 2011

Finding the Silver Lining

Cleaning is a drag. No one actually enjoys cleaning, right? My kids are no exception. But they have figured out that cleaning has a few upsides. Here are the positive discoveries they made tonight:

(1) If you are on dish washing duty, you can spray your siblings with water and create an impressive amount of chaos.

(2) If the living room floor is clear of socks, shoes, books, drawing stuff and jigsaw puzzle pieces, you can have a dance party to Michael Franti's Say Hey, even though Mom says the job isn't done until the dining room and kitchen are clean too.

(3) If you have to put away a long sheer white curtain (and no, no one knows how it got underneath the dining room table, Mom), you can wrap it around your head and shoulders like a shepherdess and sing Mary Had A Little Lamb in an operatic voice. The singing is fun, but the real benefits are annoying the hell out of your siblings, delaying any actual cleaning, and watching Mom do her imitation of Linda Blair because you are ignoring her completely.

(4) Cleaning can unearth buried treasures, especially if you decide to "clean" the bag of stuff mom set aside for Goodwill. All kinds of great stuff can be put back into the household mix, since Mom doesn't recognize real value when she sees it. She was going to give away those purple rain boots that haven't fit anyone in 2 years! She was going to toss a super dingy trashy- looking pink sequined purse with a broken zipper!

(5) If there enough people cleaning at the same time, Mom can't really keep track of all of them, so you can sneak off and draw a picture. She'll never notice you are gone, but she'll get a big kick out of this:


(6) And if your job is to straighten up the couch and neaten the blanket that hides all the cushion stains, you can tuck that blanket in between two cushions and make it look like the couch has a butt crack.

Sometimes, cleaning is just plain wonderful.

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1 comment:

bleu said...

ha ha... the best mom I've ever had. Too cute.

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