A Glimpse Into the Future

Today I had the lovely opportunity to help a fellow parishioner brand new to town by babysitting three of her children when she was in a real pinch, needing to be with her fourth child.

I was pretty nervous. I have never watched six children at once. It was to be at her house, so I wouldn't even be in my familiar territory. I packed up snacks and a St. Valentine's Day art project the night before, knowing it would be a very early morning to be there by seven thirty.

And you know what? The four hours were easier than a typical morning at home with just my three. I was sending emails to my husband (from my phone) about how I was bored and wished I'd brought a book to read.

Bored while watching six children?!

The three I was watching were 11, 9, and 3. First we ate breakfast together: the children have an extremely good mealtime routine--a routine that does not involve leaping from their seats repeatedly, but that does involve the three-year-old setting the table herself, everyone praying the Angelus and grace, eating their food, then one child clearing the table while another child washes all the dishes, right away, not hours later when frazzled mama can get to them. Table is wiped, crumbs are swept, the whole cleaning was done in ten minutes, everyone having worked as a team.

Then we read some stories about the real St. Valentine and did a St. Valentine's day art project. The 11-year-old paired up with one 3-year-old, the 9-year-old paired up with the other 3-year-old, the 5-year-old was capable, and I was able to find a quiet corner and nurse my baby leaving children alone with markers, glue, and even scissors!

Then the two oldest boys had to do some of their homeschooling work. So I mentioned that it was time for that and we cheerfully cleaned up the art project and they skittered off to work with nary a complaint. I was starting to feel like I was in the Twilight Zone (but a good one!).

I set up the two three-year-olds and the baby to play in one of the bedrooms, where they played very peaceably for a long time and I sat there bored.

The boys being done with their work, we ate a snack, played hide-and-seek as a group, then I divided up the kids again, having the boys play rough and tumble in the boys' room and the two preschoolers doing some more art, followed by reading them a half dozen books. I don't know who these little girls were to sit quietly through half a dozen books in a row, but it was wonderful. My baby toddled around the room peaceably.

Then the mama came home. There were only three incidents of tears among all the children all morning and that is a great number as far as I am concerned.

I need to get me some of those big kids.

My mama-friend and I talked about it and she emphasized that I'm at the hardest time right now, with three kids and their being five years and younger. The five-year-old can do more than ever, but it still really isn't very much that is truly useful--and he's forging his own path instead of following the path of older siblings whom he wants to imitate. And the schooling of the three- and five-year-olds still requires my 100% participation, while simultaneously occupying the baby--whereas once you have a child who can read his own instructions, much of homeschooling becomes setting them up and letting them free to work.

I was so excited to watch how even my little ones wanted to imitate the big boys in their chores. While at home, having John clear the table requires asking him every single meal and sometimes results in grumbling, today at breakfast, he leapt up and said, "I can clear the table too!" He desperately wanted to be a big kid. Then Mary found the hot pink Dust Buster and vacuumed the entire dining room floor (very well, I might add) instead of my having to sweep it up (hours later when frazzled mama can get to it)!

(Husband, dear, guess what I'll be ordering from Amazon.com right away?)

And this lovely lady's home--it was so neat!!! I have begun to pick her brain and I promise you I'll be doing more of that. For example, one of her tactics is that each of the four children gets one plastic bin (each about the size of four shoe boxes) for all their toys. This allows the child to have only so many toys as even a two-year-old can pick up. This relieves the child from being burdened with more belongings than he can possibly care for, relieves him from being shrieked at by his mother for not picking them up (a task too big for him anyway), and relieves the mother of becoming a martyr and picking them up herself. (Plus the family has a chock-full closet of homeschooling games, a closet full of family board games, and outdoor big toys--really, the kids are not deprived.) This theme of very few toys (by American standards) is one I've seen repeated among bigger families. So instead of picking up toys once or a couple times a week, this mama can very easily ask her kids to pick up their toys numerous times per day and it takes all of five minutes max.

Pretty nice system.

Clothing similarly is very limited. Fewer clothes, less mess. Fewer choices, less fighting about wardrobes. And, oh yes, the kids start doing laundry independently by about seven years old.

I don't mean to make it sound like this mama is sitting around eating bon bons because, trust me, she isn't! But I am starting to see more clearly that the work of the mama shifts away from this intense focus on bodily needs, the physical care of the home and the children. When mama is the only competent pair of hands in the house all day, caring for numerous small people, the physical workload is crushing.

I can see a glimpse into the future of getting to do the other work more easily, such as cooking, planning school work, decorating, and so forth--all the things that seem nearly impossible when one is up to one's elbows in diapers, dishes, and doldrums much of the time.

And now I am going to take these last few minutes of my children napping (all three simultaneously! it's like a miracle!) to further de-clutter my house, since I am so inspired by this woman's peacefully neat home.

Bonus Reading: This recent post on Destruction-Proofing Your Family by Leila is in a similar vein. I like her point about the first decade of a family and the second decade of a family.