an average day contains...

An average day in the Kelley household contains any of the following happenings:

1. Aidan will crawl into bed right next to me before the hour of 7:30 a.m. She is our alarm clock most days, and while sometimes she'll lie there semi-quietly, most days, she grabs my face with her hands and whispers into my ear, "Let's go get some squares cereal!" (that's Life cereal, by the way)

2. I will walk out of the bedroom, expecting the goldfish to be floating on the top of the bowl finally, but it will be swimming around. We inherited this goldfish at a birthday party, and though the average life expectancy of a household goldfish in a small bowl is three weeks, and though every other goldfish given away at the same party died at least two or three weeks ago, our Dorothy persists and lives. I'm starting to root for it/her.

3. I will set up the dining room table for the kids to color, and we will end up with markers all over the floor, markers without lids suddenly, and markers all over the kids. These pictures show an average day of coloring after Taylor decided to color his and Aidan's noses black. 4. The same markers will also end up on the table, wall, and anything close when I'm not watching Taylor. When I ask the kids to pick them up, Taylor will start singing, "Clean up, clean up, everybody clean up!" as he throws them on the table. Half of them roll off, and Aidan has to do the brunt of the real cleaning up. She is quite good-natured about that, usually.

5. When I ask the kids what they want for lunch, their answer will always be mac n cheese. Always. Sometimes I run out, and when I do, Aidan's next request is always fish sticks. That's what she was eating in this pic with her black nose. I always give them some kind of fruit and have to forcefully coax them to eat it.

6. Someone spills something, at least twice in any given day, and I have to sweep and mop under my dining room table. Every. single. day.

7. We are in the middle of potty training Taylor, and while a couple of times a day he goes with my prompting on the big potty chair, at least once a day, he decides on his own that he has to go and goes to sit on his little chair. This usually happens when I am in the other room or not paying close attention. Aidan plays mommy and tries to "help" him, he misses the potty chair completely, and she either gets peed on or gets all serious about cleaning up his potty all over the floor. It's gross, I know, but cute nonetheless.

8. Taylor will predictably draw in his breath in surprise and say, "She say no!" when Aidan won't let him play with something, or when Daddy or Mommy says no. It is one of my very favorite things he does right now. So dramatic; so predictable.

9. Once a day, it seems, I have to tell Aidan to pick up her room. Strangely enough, if left on her own, she'd throw all clothes and shoes all over the floor, which just leads to anything being strewn all over and mayhem. However, once I tell her to pick up her room, she turns into OCD child, and every single thing must go EXACTLY in the right place and be facing the right direction. She gets upset sometimes when I try to help her, because apparently I don't clean her room the right way.

10. Taylor will pull a chair from the dining room over to the pantry closet at least four times to look for a snack. On the way, he will drag the kitchen rug, knock things off the counter, and move half the things in the pantry to look for the snack in his head, even if I tell him we don't have it.

11. And finally, my kids will break into spontaneous song together. All the time. And I will laugh, especially when the song is something like "Go Cubs, Go..." Indeed.