Jan 13, 2017

If you ever want to recognize more clearly what your gifts and talents are, what you bring to the table, just don’t do any of them for a few months. Then look around and see what’s falling apart. There’s you.

Here are a few things I’ve learned to value in myself lately, now that my energy is starting to come back some and I can be more help again.

A clean kitchen counter. As in, completely cleaned off with no random junk on it. This will never happen without me.

Kids clothes that fit and that have been correctly categorized. Spent a good chunk of time yesterday and today going through all the kids’ clothes that were in their bins of stuff to wear (i.e. not storage). Felix (who turns three tomorrow) had anywhere from 12 month-5T clothes. No wait–there was a sweater that’s marked 9 months, but to be fair, it runs big. The smallest thing I found for Olivia (who is seven and a half) was size 4T. So obviously this is a chore that could have been done before I got pregnant and maybe isn’t one of my particular gifts, but the fact that I recognized the problem, took time to deal with it, bought storage bins for the extra clothes worth keeping, and then put those clothes away says something. And what it says is that the problem would have only gotten worse the longer I stayed sick. And that more of Olivia’s socks would have ended up in Felix’s bin, and visa versa. (Side note: the number of Olivia’s leggings that I straight up threw away baffles me. What was I thinking saving those things as pajamas? Buh.)

Tidy living room shelves. Between the clutter of Christmas decorations, new toys for Christmas, and random Christmas gifts that still had no home, the living room was technically picked up, but really just an eyesore of indecision. Went through all the toy bins to sort and detox. (That’s the word we’ll use.) Found homes for all the new gifts. Put away the rest of the Christmas decorations that someone else didn’t realize were Christmas decorations when they (sort of) put those away a couple weeks ago. Reorganized, cleaned up, and de-junked the doll house. And finally found the top of the living room shelves.

Folding the socks. It’s not that he’s incapable, it’s just that he hates it. Much like I feel about sweeping.

Gift shopping. I honestly don’t know what would happen if he were in charge and can’t remember the last gift he picked out for anyone on his own. (In case you were wondering, he works off a list very well and, consequently, I got a lot of things I love for Christmas.)

And to be fair, here’s a list of the things he does to help out: everything else.