Busy Day

School starts back up at the Shubert house a week from today, so we are BUSY getting ready. Kind of our version of spring cleaning, I guess. It is the time when we reorganize everything between semesters so that we are ready for the new schedule and routines. (School switches to afternoons instead of mornings, seasonal chores change and the clutter that accumulates during the winter is cleared out.)

Today was toy box day... The day when we try to round up every toy in the house, dump them all in the middle of the living room, and then relocate everything to it's proper place. It's a big job with four children in the house, and we usually manage to fill a whole trash bag with broken toys and unusable treasure that the kids have been hiding. Today was no exception.

As big of a job as it is, it's got a big reward too... Clean bedrooms - updated to match the ever growing needs of the children, and rediscovered favorites that have been missing for far too long. And a little bit of renovating get to be done as well. This year it is storage based. As the kids grow, we find we need more and more storage space. Space for school stuff, space for clothes, space for toys and books.... This year it is Legos.

The boys have an ever growing collection of Legos, and we finally decided they needed their very own space. So... We got a folding table, a plastic organizer and a chair and made a Lego station. There is still some work to be done before the kids can use it, but I'll make sure to share a photo when it's done.

Other than that, we are enjoying the sunny weather and the kids have been loving having another child in the neighborhood. We decided that it was time to update the 'playground' a bit too (pretty much everything is from when Everest was only a few years old) and are sorting through outside stuff too - some will go to PopPop's house to be enjoyed by all the grandkids, and some will be replaced or rebuilt so that they are more suitable for older kids. (Bigger trampoline, swing set separated from the playhouse so they can use the monkey bars, a bigger sandbox and an obstacle course are all planned/hoped for.)

As always, life keeps us busy, but we are thankful for God's grace each day and for the blessing of home and family. And we try our best to enjoy every minute of it.