Out of my four daughters, only Greta is exceptionally clean. She really appreciates cleanliness and hygiene; she showers every other day and very thoroughly. She's an obsessive hand-washer. She keeps her drawer organized the Kon-Mari way, picks up toys without being asked (not always, but frequently,) and has been known to wash the dishes for me. But her really big thing is laundry. She likes to have all her clothes clean and in her drawers, at all times. (Impossible. Sorry, G.) She isn't tall enough to reach the knobs for the washer (we have an apartment size stack unit,) or the detergent, but she IS able to climb up and get the clothes out of the dryer, then put the wet clothes in to dry. And sometimes she helps me fold clothes, especially if she's feeling upset about something, it's always been kind of her way to hang out with me and talk things out.
Laundry is only halfway my favorite part of housework. I really enjoy the DOING of the laundry--the sorting, the washing, the switching, the drying, and so on--but when it comes to folding and putting away... I suck. And while I may have the World's Tiniest Washing Machine, I make up for that by having the World's Most Enormous Laundry Basket! And it's usually OVERFLOWING.
So, a few days ago--who knows what I was doing all day--it was the first day of our official summer break from homeschool. It was a little funny because the girls didn't know quite what to do with themselves without our morning school routine, but I guess I had plenty to do, because I did not experience the same level of boredom. Toward the end of the day it somehow comes out that all day long Greta had been folding clothes... THE ENTIRE CONTENTS OF THE LAUNDRY BASKET. Matched socks, undies put away, each person with her own pile, then tucked nicely into each assigned drawer. IT WAS INCREDIBLE. It was a total gift, and I gave her all the tremendous thanks she very much deserved, but on the inside, I was weeping. I felt like the laziest slug of all. How could a NINE YEAR OLD finish the chore that had been hanging over me SINCE CHRISTMAS?!? How could I have gone so long without accomplishing that simple piece of work? It took Greta a big part of the day, but SHE DID IT. Why couldn't I do it? It wasn't just that I was lazy... Every day I woke up staring at that overflowing laundry basket and every day I vowed to tackle it, and to conquer it once and for all. And every night I'd got to my bed, and there that laundry basket would be. Just sitting there. Still full. Laughing at me. WHY WAS IT SO HARD TO JUST GET THE LAUNDRY FOLDED?!?!?
I did mention my regret over this aloud in front of the girls. I couldn't keep it in, I felt SO BAD. And do you know what I was met with? Greta told me it was just her way of helping out because she didn't know what to do all day without having any school work to do, and Elka chimed in saying that I don't have time to fold the laundry because I'm busy doing so much other work during the day.
It really was a comfort to hear that, but at the same time, I was doubtful. I mean, truly, WHAT am I getting accomplished in my days? I have four children who are almost entirely independent. I have no diapers, no nap times, I can let them play outside by themselves, they can even get their own cups of water when they're thirsty. SO WHAT AM I DOING!??
After a few days of thinking it over and really observing my days, I've figured it out: I do nothing. So much of my day is filled with mundane nothing tasks. The little girls still like me to stay in the bathroom with them, so I end up spending SO MUCH TIME just standing in my bathroom, usually listening to weird stories or dreams from the night before. I spend a lot of time trying in vain to fix Unfixable Objects--broken toys, broken sticks, broken bananas. More listening to dreams. I make food... Oh my gosh, SO MUCH FOOD. Then I clean up the food. And while the food is still being consumed, Elka always drops her fork at least three times. I sort drawings into "keep" or "toss" piles. I watch. So much watching. I watch people stand on one leg and hop. I watch people make funny faces in the mirror. I watch people ride their bikes with their legs sticking out. I also read freshly written stories and am privileged to view new dollhouses made of empty butter boxes. I vacuum a million times a day because #NEWFOUNDLANDLIFE.
All that food prep and clearing creates dishes to be washed. Martin usually calls in the afternoon to talk, during his break between work clients. Elka and Ingrid still love finding pictures in their food, so I spend an absolutely ridiculous amount of my days observing (and taking pictures of!) bits of food that look (to only them) like funny objects.
I admit that I do a lot of daily yard work. Our yard is a wild beast that needs tamed and it's very hard to keep up with. Slowly I've been taming it--basically turning the whole thing into garden beds. I do this while the girls play outside, and from the yard I can't see my laundry basket.
Ingrid, being only freshly four, is still very enthusiastic about things like swimsuits and fancy dress-up dresses, but she needs some assistance with the straps and clasps and zippers and whatnot. And of course, with arms through leg holes and heads through arm holes, comes lots of crying. And comforting.
Then, a lot of the days, I actually take them places.
(At Happy Hollow Park)
Or help them navigate domestic experiments.
(Elka and Anja made their own sourdough starters from scratch... Elka's is doing REALLY well.)
And there's still the set up and light monitoring that comes with our normal, every day activities. 
(Painting. Always.)
And really, when I think about it, my house is a lot cleaner than it was when I was holding babies all day every day.
So, gosh, what DO I do all day? So little. So much. There are many days when I think I could probably slip away and these girls could run the house themselves perfectly smoothly. The only thing that would be really lacking (besides nutritious food, because let's face it, my girls' favorite thing to cook is chocolate cake and if I were out of the picture they'd be eating chocolate cake for breakfast, lunch, and dinner) is the watching and the affirmation. And even still, sometimes once they're tucked into bed at the end of the day, I feel like I didn't watch them enough. I didn't pay close enough attention to that newly learned somersault, or I didn't really listen so carefully to that exceedingly drawn out story of something funny that had just happened. I'm here listening and watching all day long, and still it doesn't always feel like enough. I often wish I could find the time in a day to write down every cute thing they do all day long because tomorrow they won't be doing it anymore. I'm so busy soaking up their childhoods spent with me that I guess I don't care about the laundry as much as it should. That's what it comes down to.
I am SO appreciative of the work Greta put in to help give me a restart on my laundry debacle. I've vowed to keep up with it and quickly fold each tiny load as it comes out of the dryer instead of saving it for later until it builds up to be an insurmountable task. And Greta learned about giving and helping and gifts of service and love, so that's hard to regret. But in thinking it over, I see that my days are full of very important tasks of listening and loving, and if that means Mount Laundry gets a little scary, well, so be it. I have plenty of years ahead of me to sit and fold laundry quietly without missing out on anything else. For now, I might just let it grow right alongside these funny girls.
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