I don't know how long it will last

The girls are both asleep at the same time, Suzi curled up on the love seat and Ivey on a blanket on the floor. It's like getting surprise roses, or a giant basket of tomatoes you know you'll never be able to use before they go bad.

Yesterday we discovered that, for me, shopping a consignment sale only on 50% off day is the best strategy. I love our local sale, and there are such great things at it, but unfortunately I have a hard time understanding that all the great things do not have to come home with me. Going to the presale requires that I arrange childcare for four hours of volunteering and at least three hours for the sale itself. Then I go and spend at least $200, and go back to half-price day (and get in early for volunteering) and drop another $100. It's insane. Yesterday Jordan and I went to the general public 50% off sale while my parents kept the girls. We shopped for about an hour, spent $84, and got all the clothes Suzi will need for this fall/winter and much more. The selection didn't seem picked over at all to me. The closet is packed and I haven't even processed it all yet. For Ivey we only needed to sort through hand-me-downs, which is super because it's like shopping for free and of course I love all the clothes, which I picked out the first time.

Consignment sale shopping and hand-me-down sorting added considerable height to our already huge laundry hill and I wanted to take care of that today, but the girls would rather it remained in a big nasty pile. I failed to get a head-start on them this morning. Ivey has fallen twice and bumped her forehead and cheek, and there will be bruises. Poor little girl. After lunch I decided to run the girls a warm bath, throw some toys in, and let them play in the tub for over an hour. When your babies are having a hard day and driving you crazy, there is nothing like letting them play in the tub to lighten the mood. When Ivey's teeth started chattering we ended the bath and moved on to naptime, which is where we are now. There's not much I can do without possibly waking the girls up, and I can't go upstairs and leave them down here alone, so I sit here typing and wondering: Have I been doing enough? Is this a reasonable amount of laundry and straightening and cleaning to expect and I am just lazy? Do other people's houses look like this when no one's visiting, too? Do their one-year-olds play in the toilet when they aren't looking?

I love naptime on days like today. I'd like to freeze it and keep it in my pocket for when I need it most. I want it to last as long as a good nap should, but children's naps are such fickle things. They wither away in no time for any reason and give way to whining.

I love naps, but I never did like getting roses.

Prefer tomatoes.