Do you ever look at photos of "kid-friendly spaces" in design blogs or magazines and marvel over their cleanliness, lack of clutter, and artful presentation of lovingly hand-crafted wooden toys? Do you ever wonder why your own house, in comparison, is an eternal shitpit filled with broken Happy Meal figurines and unwashed laundry?
I don't need to wonder, actually, because it's clear why my house is a disaster zone: I live with pint-sized human versions of the Tasmanian Devil from Looney Tunes. I'm generally okay with the fact that my home will never be featured in a fancy lifestyle magazine, but there are a few things that consistently drive me up a wall. No matter how much I nag, or how much cleaning I do on my own, these messes are always there. ALWAYS.
Behold, my biggest kid-clutter irritants:
There is always a sock. Wherever you look, a sock is there. WHAT THE EFF IS WITH THE SOCKS.
Oh hey how about a jumble of shoes in front of the door that must be navigated at 3 AM when the cat yowls to be let out? Have a nice trip! See you next fall!
Pretty much what 8,000 images in my photo library look like. Thanks for the (nebulous, space-hogging) memories, crappy kid apps!
"Why is the tape out here? And this pen? Guys? Guys?" *guilty silence*
This is my 6-year-old's nightstand. He's either a magpie or a hoarder, I'm not sure yet.
The toilet. Let us not speak of it.
Apparently the laundry basket has a complicated and powerful force field surrounding it that both repels its contents and turns every single goddamned article of clothing inside out.
Speaking of laundry, every load of clothes comes with a surprise in the bottom of the washer!
The good news is that the couch doesn't always look like that. The bad news is that 99.9% of the time, it looks even worse.
What's that searing pain in the tender instep of your foot? A.F.L.! (Another Fucking LEGO.)
Are any of these scenes familiar to you? What kid clutter drives you crazy?
Images via Linda Sharps
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Comments 75
You're awesome, Linda. :) By the way, don't forget the stickers...stickers that are either purposely stuck to furniture or that have somehow made their way out of my daughter's bedroom and are stuck on the hardwood floor or randomly stuck to my hairdryer. :)
OMG this is my life. I'm pretty sure my 6 year old dd is a magpie too! And I'm releived to see that your laundry baskets have that garment flipping force feild too.
Legos.......Little Pet Shop.......Skylanders.......anything relatively small can make walking through the house an obstacle course......
what upsets me the most is that we have carpeting and they tend to leave their books open on the carpeting....when I am half asleep it's like walking suddenly turns sliding on slippery ice.....one foot goes one way, the other foot the other way...I can honestly say I am getting too old for the splits!! I screwed up my ankle already on a coloring book.....ugh.
OMG my house is like this! I have 3 kids and my son who is 5 thinks its his job to make messes, my girls are pretty good about cleaning up (not allways) but he makes enough mess for all of them! I can get our home looking great, but it never lasts.
I find the socks everywhere too, but they're mostly my husband's. Ha!
Let us moms of daughters not forget Barbie shoes. Just as bad as Legos, sometimes.