Listing Through Life

Abbie and I came to Gramma's house yesterday.
We are here for a variety of reasons and purposes.

One of the great things for me in coming to my Mom's house is that I get to sit and talk with her.

We talk about pretty much anything we want-need-feel like talking about.
Sometimes it is big.
Sometimes it is small.
It's just what we do.

While we were talking away last night Abbie was busy in the basement working on her future career as a clothing designer.

I woke up this morning and added to my growing "to-do" list.
It now goes 1/2 way down the back side of the list.
My list has lists (ie: "Costco-see list", "Kohl's-see list", etc).

Of the 33 things on the list so far, exactly 2 of them are checked as done.

Ya'think I'll get it all done?!

Spot Free Rinse

In the midst of all the festivities last Saturday I needed to help Jake get ready for his week of Especially For Youth at BYU which started on Monday. This is Jake's third year going to EFY and he was very excited. 

So.  Jake, Abbie and I were doing some errands in town before we headed over to the bigger town to go to TheWalMart. One of our stops was the car wash because the truck was pretty bug-splattered and needed a good washing. As I sat in the truck, making up a silly story (yes, to a 16 and a 10 year old...) while the machine washed our truck, I was also thinking about how different this was from my growing up years. How different it was even from the earlier years of my marriage.

We  ALWAYS washed our car ourselves.

And I wondered about which is the better way to do this? Does it really matter? I paid five bucks to sit in the concrete cave and let a machine pretty effectively clean the truck in five or so minutes. Jake and Abbie and I were sitting together and I was making them crazy with the stupid story I was telling and we had a few chuckles together.

We weren't out on the lawn together with the bucket and hose soaping up the truck and teasing one another with the spray of the water, laughing and playing while we got the work done.

Wait a minute. Even when we DID hand wash our cars, it was never really all that fun. The experience was usually kind of spotted with complaining and a sense of "just get the job done so we can do something else". Then when the car dried and the missed spots would become obvious, that was always fun to call kids back for the re-do. 

My questions are these: Are my kids missing something that could be crucial for them because we use the car wash? Is there some work ethic they aren't learning because we don't wash our cars at home? Am I teaching them to find the easy way out, or is this helping them develop a better sense of time management (spend more sweat and time on the things that are really important)? I don't use a wringer washer or hang my clothes on the line to dry, I have a high-efficiency-front-loading washer and dryer and my laundry time is cut in half (so that I have time to blog???) 

This led me down that path of a hundred questions for which I have no answers.

I tell you what. This parenting thing ain't for sissies. I've been doing it for almost 24 years and I'm still questioning myself.

Then again, maybe I'm thinking too much. It was just a car wash. Or was it?

See? I'm just not sure...