You know that I am a huge fan of my Rebekah and my Luke and all of {most of what} they do.  I encourage and clean up millions {trillions} of crafts every week {hour}.  There is little we haven’t colored, stapled, glued, folded, sequined, beaded, or decorated with feathers and other outdoor implements, such as {disgusting} seagull feathers.  As wonderful as all these crafty results are, a certain problem arises as they quickly build into a pile that threatens to overtake every space possible in our tiny flat.  This very dangerous problem is only multiplied when 2 well-meaning nursery teachers send home every craft Rebekah has ever done all year.  This is just mean.

Here’s my question- how long do you have to hang onto, or worse yet hang, all these little jewels of creativity?  At what point do you have the liberty to, ahem, dispose of these ginormous and also incredibly tiny and oh-so-difficult to keep track of projects?  And what is the preferred method for said disposal…especially when your rubbish bin has a lid that is not glued shut and your recycling bag is all-too-visible and only gets emptied fortnightly?  You moms of preschoolers know what I’m talking about…it’s as if the moment you finally find the moment to covertly bin just 1 of the smaller crafts some sort of sensor in your preschooler goes off until she finds the source of pain…a precious piece of priceless art now lying withered and crumpled nestled between a toxic toddler diaper and smashed peas.  How can you possibly answer those dejected eyes as they voice what you already know is coming, “Moooom…?  Why is this in the trash?”  Is it sinful to lie in such a situation?  {I know it is…you gotta man up and admit your weakness, which used to be your strength: a total lack of respect for sentimentality.}

It’s not much better if you try to recycle it.  It only leads to explanations of how some other child will be able to use those resources as they are re-purposed…all your daughter hears is that another kid gets what her mother does not want and did not value enough to keep.

Sigh.  What’s a mom to do?  Is there some sort of unspoken number of crafts you keep?  At what  point can we reclaim our homes and walls and refrigerators?  Please tell me!

*I kid you not, I was confronted while writing this post {not that I blog while the kids are around} about why I had dumped out a tupperware container of paper hearts and grass and dead flowers with a small toy bunny in it, referenced as “bunny’s home.”  No matter it was my plasticware.

Last Tuesday night, Rebekah was up sick several times throughout the night…we thought it might be a shellfish allergy until I got sicker than I’ve been in my entire life {all 3 pregnancies included} and all our friends got sick after us {they’re all very welcome}.  However, we thought we did our due diligence by keeping her home from all activities that day and until she was at least 24 hours past it.  I guess we weren’t super-successful.  Sorry, guys.

Anyway, we actually had a really fun day, full of productivity and painting.  Good times.