Kids are......?

My living room floor, before 10:00 AM. (This is actually a good day, usually it's worse.)

There is just no nice way of putting it, kids are messy! They absolutely love to make messes, simple as that. Messes that take mommy quite some time to clean up. Yes they do help clean, but there is always the abundance of stuff that they forget to clean up; not to mention the food my youngest seems to hide in every nook and cranny of his highchair. (I think he saves it for later, who knows though.) I have met some mothers that cannot stand a mess and are constantly running behind their kids cleaning up, I am NOT, I repeat NOT that mother. My entire house will look like a disaster zone before I clean up in the evening. I think messes are important! While making those messes they are playing, rolling cars, stacking blocks, looking at picture books, doing puzzles, and most of all they are LEARNING! See, a mess is a good thing, if looked at in the right way! I always encourage my kids to make messes, it seems, especially when we are outside. Here lets get the sprinkler and do this, or that. Let's make mud pies, red clay castles (in the south we have very little sand, just red clay everywhere), roll in the leaves (pray for no dog poop while you do), or whatever else we can get into. For instance, yesterday after hunting eggs and enjoying the goodies the Easter bunny left we took a walk. While we were on that walk we veered off the field road and into the woods just to see what we could see. It ended up being an hour of adventure. The boys found some pretty rocks, got stuck with thorns, saw several different kinds of animal tracks, a turtle shell, and the oldest found an old ax. I stumbled upon an arrowhead in nearly perfect condition, the tip is missing, but it's still a gorgeous piece. We all had a blast and the most enjoyment for me was seeing the love of learning shining from my kids, the smiles on their faces just from being outside. We arrived back at the house a little sweaty and a little dirty, but that hour of adventure had SO much learning involved! Anyway, I reckon my whole point is, don't mind the messes, your kids are just making memories. Encourage them to make a mess, then teach them to responsibly clean up after themselves. Be in no hurry, take your time, see the world through your children's eyes! Remember they are only children once, you may be complaining about the messes now, but one day you will miss them! ♥