My ship. She sank.

I am barely staying afloat this week. I've had two sick kiddos and no sleep. Sarah has been up every night (except last night...THANK YOU). She screams, she fights, she turns those teary baby blue eyes on me and says "Mama" in the most pitiful voice ever. Nicholas mopes around here. It's his tummy and his throat and he doesn't feel good. And the husband has been tired and in a mood having some sort of identity crisis. On top of which we've had stress over the house. Should we? Shouldn't we? What do we do? So all week it has simply been put one foot in front of the other, get another cup of coffee and move ahead. Encourage. Hug. Sympathize. Advise. Watch 600 episodes of Elmo. Change 800 nasty diapers. Fix hot tea and lunches that just get thrown away. Stare at a mountain of laundry and weep. Fantasize about a giant bonfire and throwing half the crap in this house into it. I'm overwhelmed with STUFF. Stuff everywhere. Papers, boxes, books, sheets, blankets, pillows, toys, toys, toys. The weather won't make up its mind. There are sweatshirts and shorts and people are changing clothes 3 times a day. I'd go on strike but I'd just end up with more work to do. Yesterday I got out my Dyson and just started vacuuming. I just used it to push the toys and babies out of my way. I am not sure I've ever seen Sarah move that fast. She had her tea cart and was throwing toys on it as fast as her little legs would go. I guess she was afraid I was going to sweep them up. And, let's be honest, I might have. I went down to Nicholas' room to get something out of his closet and I nearly blew my stack at the mess. I couldn't even get to the closet. But there he was, sitting on the couch looking fevered and miserable and letting his baby sister play with his Kindle fire and some sort of barn animal app. So, his room is still a mess. I intend to drop the hammer on him today, though. There isn't enough sweetness in the world for me to let that mess slide another day. And so this morning the kids are getting canned cinnamon rolls. They need to eat SOMETHING and those are a pretty certain bet. I packed Jamie a 3rd graders lunch of PBJ, chips and cookies. I intend to roll up my sleeves and take my house back today. Murphy's Oil Soap, the steam mop, and me. I'm going to chain Jamie in the garage this weekend until he gets it cleaned up, too. I need a place to stack all this crap that is going in the yard sale. Boxes and boxes of it. Yes, I need him to clean the garage so I can trash it. Just like I empty the hamper so they can fill it back up again. At some point this weekend we're going to do something fun. Take a drive. Go shopping. Eat ice cream. I don't know but something. The kids are stirring. Time to toss in the cinnamon rolls! Edited to add: It's all run together! Where are my paragraphs? Stupid Blogger.