Cork Boats

Oh, my house. It looks like the cottage of the Seven Dwarfs before Snow White showed up. I guess that makes me Snow White. Only I don't have the help of any musical woodland creatures. And if we're keeping score here, the Seven Dwarfs are winning.

This weekend, Mark and Hyrum had a Scout camp-out. My daughters declared - at the tops of their lungs - we must! have a girls night! since the men were all! away! ("except George, but that's OK.") 

[More exclamation points! We use a lot! of exclamation points at the House of Phogles! Good thing I buy them wholesale! Italics are much more expensive.]

Gabriella used a coupon she won and took us out for pizza (I covered for the lemonade). After the smallest folk were asleep, I let the older ones stay up watching movies. 

Me, I cleaned. No, it's OK. It's what I wanted to do. My house needs me. I could clean for a month of Saturdays. And I would do it, too, willingly. If only I could get the Dwarfs to participate...or leave; either one would work, really. If you have any coercion tips or travel discounts, leave your information in the comments. Anyway, so, while the late night movie went on in the other room, I swept and scoured and sorted and stacked. I did not whistle whilst I worked, for obvious reasons (it was important that the baby stayed asleep).

My goal was to turn the kitchen and accompanying bathroom into a haven of shimmering cleanliness, and then effortlessly do all the ironing before going to bed, to magically awaken at dawn to begin again with renewed vigor and enthusiasm.

In real life, I got the kitchen floor and counters clean - except dishes - and the back entry swept and mopped (for possibly the second time since we gained ownership of this house) and put to rights. By then, the movie was over, it was past midnight, and my golem-in-the-gears toddler was inexplicably awake. So, after meeting his needs and executing a half-hearted attempt at continuing on, I gave up and went to bed. I could still get up at dawn and tomorrow was still another day, right? Yeah, between George taking an hour to settle back down, and Aurora's early morning needs, it was 2 a.m. before I got to sleep.

Fast forward to Saturday morning, when I finally manage to drag myself out of bed. Still no army of helpful, housekeeping raccoons and squirrels begging to pitch in. So I resorted to bribery motivation. 

I rounded up my girls (men still out Scouting, conspicuous lack of singing animals), laid out my plight (boo-hoo-hoo! I wanna clean house! waaa-haaa! *sniffle*), my plan (if we work together, we can clean TWO WHOLE ROOMS!) and the deal-clincher (if you help me do it, we'll make boats and go float them down the stream at the park).

Sold!

We cleaned the girls' room first. We practically needed shovels. We used laundry baskets instead. It took two hours, but it sparkled when we were done. Then we stormed through the Playroom/TV room in exactly 25 minutes (I know because I set a timer). 

We emerged victorious...over-tired, irritated, bickering, but victorious. Then I produced a package of corks, and toothpicks were procured, and off we went to the park, boats (and camera) in hand. 

It was miraculous, how quickly my daughters transformed from over-burdened, griping girlies to enthusiastic boating adventurers. I interviewed them for truth in blogging purposes: 

"It was fun...and really wet," Eliza said. "I really liked it, that we could spend time together and play and have fun, and ...that's pretty much it." She had fun, apparently. Her favorite part was getting wet (without getting in trouble) and playing on the dinosaur at the playground when we were done with the boats. Next time, she wants to make tiny people to put on the boats. 

"I had fun," Lucy said. She liked playing in the water the most. She named her boats Grumpy and Crabby. At one point, she was under the bridge, and proclaimed herself Sloppy, the Bridge Troll.

"I liked playing on the dinosaur (on the playground). I liked playing with my sisters," Gabriella said, "which doesn't happen very often - and naming my ships. I named them Ia and Tina." She used leaves for her sails, instead of the fabric scraps favored by the other boat builders.

Yvette said, "I think it was good at the park with the pictures and the boats. Cleaning was hard, I'm glad I cleaned so I could go to the park. I love cleaning!"

Twenty-four hours later, there are still two completely clean rooms in my house, plus the semi-still-clean kitchen. I am thoroughly committed to getting up at dawn, rousting out the dwarfs, and whistling while I (cheerfully) motivate them (through positive reinforcement) into working. It's going to happen. I swear it.
And if the birds and deer ever show up, they're fired.