I am home alone with the 4 boys this weekend (I think this was my first time home alone with all 4!) while David and his mom went to pick up her car and other belongings in Ohio. In years past, I'm pretty sure I looked at a weekend alone with the kids as being more stressful and exhausting than fun and enjoyable. But this time I adjusted my attitude ahead of time and that really did make a difference. We had a great day. I like the fact that I am raising four children that I genuinely enjoy spending time with :). I know, it's supposed to be that way, but it's a neat feeling nonetheless!
Today I set out to have some enjoyable one-on-four time with the boys and also to get some chores done, and we succeeded on both counts! We: watched Saturday morning cartoons, ate french toast picnic-style, played 2 board games, tried to start a fire in the fireplace (we didn't succeed at keeping it lit, but we had fun and made lots of smoke trying), brought a box of emergency firewood into the garage, cleared a space in the garage for David's mom's things, organized the space where Mom and Dad will stay when they visit next week, vacuumed, cleaned dining room chairs, had popcorn and hot chocolate while watching Animusic, printed out interesting Lego instructions which the boys used to start new creations, filed their existing Lego instructions, conquered my Mount Paperwork, gave baths to 4 boys, made pizza, ate pizza in pajamas and sleeping bags while watching a movie, and attempted to allow the boys to have a "sleepover" with their sleeping bags on their bedroom floor. This last one was a flop since they were making a ruckus and keeping each other up way too late, but otherwise ot was a full and productive day, and I had lots of big boy help getting the chores done.
