We are being over run with cards. Pokemon. Football. Basketball. Even some golf cards and about 18 decks of incomplete playing cards. It’s driving me bonkers. They are everywhere.

Fleet (8) and Luke (7) have notebooks and boxes for card organization. There is an entire shelf in their closet dedicated to cards. Yet, I find them in every room of the house, in the couch cushions, the bath tub, the baby’s crib, the toothbrush drawer, the side pockets of the car . . . you get the idea.

This morning, I picked one up from the hallway, Mark Somebody. Luke was walking by so I asked him if it was an important one. I asked this because I am not above throwing these away but I have zero clue which one’s they treasure. He responds, “YES!” I hand it to him and carry on.

I walk back down the hallway a couple of minutes later and Mark somebody is lying on the ground in the exact spot that I handed him off to Luke.

I handed him that card and he dropped it right back onto the floor.

I lost it. You guys know (but apparently my kids do not) that I clean up their messes all day long. Now before I get a bunch of emails saying that they should be cleaning up their own messes, they do sometimes. Probably not enough but that is another blog post.

So that I didn’t scream and yell at him, I sent him to his bed. Then I made him deep clean his room. Like, fill up a huge trash bag with actual trash and junk that they no longer play with. He cleaned out his shelves and rearranged his books. We changed his sheets and cleaned under the crib and vacuumed. Mama was on a rampage.

At the end, he was so happy that he was organizing more areas without being asked.

I talked to him about how disrespectful it is to leave toys around the house, especially ones that I had just handed him to clean up. Not to mention, they are always more creative, inclusive of their siblings and generally happier when they have a clean space to play. That is huge ya’ll!

I’m not totally insane (only partially, umkay?!) I know that kids are messy and it’s my job to teach them and all that, but GUYS, it feels like an impossible task sometimes.

So I guess that I keep trying. Progress not perfection. I keep pointing out how much happier they are and how much fun they always have in clean spaces. (Are anyone else’s kids this way?) I keep talking about love and respect and valuing one another. I don’t give up.

Oh, I also put him on card restriction.

XOXO