Sunday, November 9, 2014

NaBloPoMo Day9 - Everybody Grab a Rake!




Why do we have to rake? Why, indeed. All I know is that I am not going to grumble and groan about having a house to take care of. I am grateful for the shelter and the guarantee of a warm place to call home. My children, on the other hand, don't see it through the eyes of gratitude, the way I do.

Raking Duty was this afternoon, also known as time to ask mom why we can't live with leaves all over the place. I told them to google why, but to do it later, because right now, Everybody grab a rake.

If you would have been with us this afternoon, you would have been treated to the pearls leaving my children's mouths, like these:

Are my hands cold, or warm? I can't tell anymore.

I feel like I need a piece of chicken or something.

Are we doing this right? Because the neighbors are looking at us.

Doing this makes me feel sad. I feel so sad.

You know what's annoying, mom, when dad knocks on the window from the inside and gives us the thumbs up. 

There's some animal poop here and we don't have animals that poop so I don't want to be doing this side anymore. 

This is dumb. The leaves just keep coming back.

If I knew why we have to do this I would do it but I don't, so why are we out here for six hours?

I want do be done now. 

Man, mom, the way you're raking it's like you're mad at somebody.

He keeps putting my leaves onto his pile so it looks like he did more but you can see, look! My arms are shaky from all my work!

Why can't the trees just keep their leaves?

Hey! If we pretend we're ice-picking it's kind of fun. Forget it, it only works for five minutes.

I'm just going to be done when I decide I'm done, I'm not going to wait for you to tell me.

Why can't we use the leaf blower? And don't say saving energy, we need to exercise, our bodies work or any of your usual reasons!

We're not going to be doing this until dark again are we, because last night that lady across the street came out and slammed her garage door really loud.

That's it, mom. All of us talked. We are done. You keep doing other stuff and we are raking and so we are done.

In the defense of my grumbling children, they were outside with me from 10 a.m. until 1 p.m. today. The three of us, three hours altogether, that's a lot of work. They're good kids, and I'm just going to pretend the reason they helped me was love for their mother, and not the story I told them about how raccoons look for leaf piles to hide in so they can jump out on the person who takes out the garbage at night.

Shazaam! Leaf piles, removed!
 
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7 comments:

  1. We raked for two hours this weekend. We're 10% done! At the end of those two hours I broke my rake. I think that was very clever of me.

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  2. Here's how I rake:
    1) Leaves! Let's rake!
    2) I really feel like I am making progress here, raking up leaves to unveil the grass beneath.
    3) This is tiring work. I'm tired.
    4) Why is our yard so big? Imma take a break.
    5) [About a month later] Oh look! There's that pile I started to rake about a month ago! Yup. Still there.

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  3. Think of those fab biceps you're getting No leave falling in Arizona, nope. None.

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  4. This was really touching. In a quite hilarious sort of way.

    This sentence has me giggling: "I feel like I need a piece of chicken or something."

    Say what? ;) I never rake. I don't even know if we own one. But I would probably do it the way Leigh Ann said she did! ^

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  5. I love every one of these lines. Because I'm in that phase of motherhood where I've gone from siding with Calvin to siding with his parents. I used to say things like this. Now I roll my eyes and tell them to keep raking.

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  6. Naptime: you need to cut this foolishness out and come live with me.
    Andrea: you know, you always make me feel like a million bucks.
    Mrs. Tuna: it is a pain in the butt!!
    Leigh Ann: It takes SO MUCH WORK and is such SLOW work.
    Sarah: Wouldn't work here, my husband has 5 rakes in the garage. No, 6.

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  7. LOL, where were you when I needed a great motivator for my kids to rake?? :)

    ReplyDelete

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