… well - it can be dangerous. Or at the least, very ill-timed.

Let me tell you about our bedroom.

We have a modest home. I love the area of town we live in and I love our subdivision. We’ve got super neighbors and sidewalks and a pool and playground and walking trails by the river. It’s a great place to live.

We also have 3 small children and a home with 3 rather small bedrooms. (I am totally OK with that, by the way. I remember when I was pregnant with Nathan meeting folks who would ask, “Oh, are you all going to move to a bigger place now? You’ll sure be cramped in there!” For the record, I think that’s a little silly.)

No, not everyone in our house has loads of personal space but that’s OK. It keeps us from accumulating a bunch of stuff we do not need and it keeps us close. (Don’t you remember that Doug Stone song?) Abby and Nathan have their own rooms at the moment but soon enough, somebody will be doing some room sharing. Either Sarah will go in with Abby or Abby will go in with Nathan - It’s not been decided yet. For now, though, Bruce and I are the ones sharing our room. Well, I guess I should say we are sharing our *closet*.  We’ve got a little walk-in closet that’s just the perfect space for little Yubba. Her swing is in there and that’s where she takes naps (and until about a week ago - she would sleep in there at night, too - But that’s a whole ‘nother post!)

So here’s our little dilemma. I actually like that Sarah is in our room. She has a space where I can shut the door and turn the lights out for her while I poke around in my room if needed. But the problem comes in in the evenings when she’s asleep in there and we’re doing laundry or cleaning up around the house. Bruce and I usually do laundry at night after we’ve gotten the kids to bed but if Sarah’s asleep, I can’t put any of her things or my things away. And Bruce’s things go in the dresser that’s right up against the wall and on the other side of that wall, our very light sleeper, Dear Abby, is resting her pretty little head - so his clothes get piled up on top of the dresser. Over the last couple of weeks, we’ve really let things get crazy messy in there - there were dirty and clean clothes everywhere not to mention video cassettes, knick knacks, and other random items scattered hither and yon.

S today - I had just had enough. It was making me physically ill to go in there and so I decided that the only way to solve the problem was to…. empty out all the contents of the bedroom (including everything in the closet, dresser, nightstand and armoire) and deposit them all into the living  room so that I could totally reorganize things (ala “Clean Sweep”).

Great idea, in theory. But throw into the mix a fussy 6 month old who got a flu shot and a vaccine yesterday and a 2 and a half year old with a runny nose and a good case of the mamaclings, and I ended up with much more of a mess than I bargained for and I didn’t get a whole lot done.

Thankfully Bruce had some errands to run in the afternoon so he took Nathan with him and Abby went to play with a friend.

Slowly but surely, I’ll get a handle on it but I am re-evaluating my method.

UPDATE! 3 bags ready to go to goodwill! I love purging!

2004 - Abby 5 mos

2008- Sarah 6 mos

Abby read Nathan a bedtime story tonight. It was the sweetest thing!

(Too bad you can’t hear it! I’ll have to capture it again tomorrow night with the real camera!)

A baby on my hip!!

Winter 2006 w/ 6 month old Nathan vs. Winter 2008 w/6 month old Sarah!

(And note… The same shirt!! And earrings! Ha! Can you tell I’m NOT much of a clothes horse??)

She has no problem falling sleep sitting up on the couch with lots of activity going on in the middle of the day. But at bedtime when we’re ready to go down for the night? Not on your life.

Well - I guess it was really inevitable.

Monday I let Nathan play with the bug and then absentmindedly (who me??) went out of the room for a while. The next thing I knew, I was being informed that the little critter was AWOL.

Bruce found him later that day in the shag rug.

RIP stinky!

Oh well - We’re almost finished with our first lapbook and we learned a lot about insects in the process!

We’ve been having lots of fun with our little stinkbug.

Nathan loves to get it out and let it crawl on his hand (”dat tih-kuhls, mama!’) and they both love using the magnifying glass to look at the little creature.

We bought him a little home and have put some good stuff in there for him (her?) and we have also started a lapbook on all the things we’ve learned through our research and interaction so far.

I have a heart for creation science and I love to see my little ones intersted in God’s fascinating creation as well!

I have been thinking for a while of starting a “Reasons To Homeschool” category here on the blog.

I’ll do a more personal one soon but for now… Here are just a few reasons, in comic strip form. (Thanks, Ruthie!)

Click image to enlarge!

Or more accurately… “Acrosternum hilare”

Today we were playing outside before naptime out by the fence in the back yard and Nathan spotted a bug. We picked the tiny, colorful creature up and let him crawl on us and tickle our hands for a while. When it was time to come in, we decided to put him in a little container with some grass and a bit of water and bring him with us to see if we could do some digging around on the ‘net to identify him.

After about 15 minutes of searching around the web, I found a picture that was identical to the little bug. Turns out it’s a baby! (awwwww.) I found some great info on it HERE. (And yes, It *is* a “stinkbug” but so far, we’ve not encountered any stinkiness. These little guys do have the gland even in the nymph stage but so far we’ve been OK.)

These bugs turn into their green adult versions within about a month and they “shed their skin” a few times in that time period. I am thinking that maybe we will build a little terrarium and keep him for observation for a while to see if we can witness the metamorphosis.

I feel a bug unit study coming on!! Fun!