Championship house cleaner

This weekend I got to spend 24 hours alone lounging on the couch and eating chocolates. NOT EVEN!! I did spend 24 hours by myself, but the whole purpose of that was to clean my house from top to bottom. Dan took the girls to his sister's house where Maddie and Charlotte got to play with their cousins Hailey and Norah and have a sleep over. I can not tell you how excited Maddie was to go to Hailey's house, and I can not tell you how devastated she was when she had to come home. She didn't even want to come in the door.....not even to see her most beloved Mama whom she hadn't seen for 24 hours. She has repeatedly asked me when she is going to go back to Hailey's house, and she was just a tad bit melancholy tonight. She'll get it over it....she's gonna see Hailey at our house this Saturday, but it was sad for me to see her so sad.

From Saturday morning until 4:00 Sunday I cleaned 3 bathrooms from top to bottom, swept/vacuumed/mopped/polished 2700 square feet of flooring. I cleaned windows and base boards and picked up all the toys from all over the house. I took everything off the kitchen counters and sanitized everything and cleaned my stove. I cleaned the porch, dusted the furniture and removed small stains from the carpet and couch. I also did a few loads of laundry, but the enormous pile of clean clothes blocking my entrance into the laundry room is a totally different blog topic.....I'm not even going to talk about how much laundry I need to fold. I seriously need to barter with someone.....come fold all my laundry once a week and I'll do whatever you want once a week.....except folding laundry!!!!

So, my house is sparkling clean (minus the laundry that we are not discussing) and beautiful. I love the way a really clean house smells. All clean and stuff. It makes me kinda sad that everything is in tip top shape and it will only last for oh, 2 days. Maybe. I need to have some company over like RIGHT NOW so they can see how beautiful my house can be if only I had more hours in the day and 2 less toddlers. I wish that I had the energy and the drive to keep my house always looking clean, organized and put together. I guess that's something to look forward to as the kids get older.....I will be able to get some free manual labor out of them. lol While I had some alone time and a clean house I got my fall on. I put up a wreath on the inside of our front door, I placed the pumpkins that Dan's mom painted for the girls outside, I made a leaf garland for our mantle (I finished it yesterday, but it took me about a week to make) I bought some pretty button mums and I put out even more pumpkins. I don't decorate for halloween.....we barely do halloween, so my big decorating is for fall and I love to see my house covered in reds, yellows, browns and oranges. I love the pumpkins and the leaves. I'm looking forward to going to the pumpkin patch while my parents are in town (they arrive Wednesday) and getting even more pumpkins....you get one free with the purchase of a hay ride, so we'll have like 5 more pumpkins!!! Hooray.

Clean house of the year award acceptance speech:

My clean house would not be possible if it weren't for my loving family and their support of a clean living environment. So, I'd like to thank Dan for his encouragement, patience and his fly by the seat of his pants mentality. I'd like to thank Maddie for her great attitude and enthusiasm for being shipped away for the weekend. Being told over and over again, "Bye mama, I gotta go to Hailey's now," clued me in that you were okay with the plans I made for you. I'd like to thank Charlotte for being the cutest almost 17 month old I know. Even though you were a total maniac tonight because you didn't get a nap today, I still adore you! And lastly I'd like to thank Angela and the rest of the Watkins clan for accepting my husband and children into the fold and taking care of them while I was slaving away with cleaning products. Without your support my toilets would be gross, my furniture would be dusty and my floors would still be splattered from the blueberries that Charlotte chewed up and then spit out a couple days ago. Thank you!

My mother in law painted those pumpkins!
Crazy good huh?

My leaf garland
Each leaf was hand sewn with a loop stitch and stuffed

Quilted felt pumpkins
I did not make them, but I'm thinking about trying to.

Pumpkin made out of wood

Can't forget Jimmy and Jerry

Not a great pic, but I wanted to show you my big ol' S