Evidence of Invasion!

Boy, it just gets harder and harder, day after day, to try to establish and to KEEP some order here.

Six people in one three bedroom house with a fourth makeshift bedroom and space becomes really limited, ya know. Not enough closet space. Not near enough room for chests and such in which to stash other items of clothing or lines and things.

And with two small children -ages (almost) 6 and 3 -well there are days when I do believe we are being overrun by toys. Do these things maybe multiply overnight? Sometimes, it definitely does seems that way.

About the only thing we don't have an abundance of is preschool furniture.

That's not to say that we don't have any furnishings along those lines - we do have a fuschia-colored plush Barney chair. Blends in so nicely it does, with the rest of the living room furnishings in its position of honor (much of the time) perched atop the back of the loveseat and in front then of one of the windows in the bow window. I have no clue as to which one of the two little ones came up with the idea that this particular spot would be the ideal place to set that chair. Somehow, I don't see this as a decorating fad that will take hold -just in case that child is thinking of interior decoration as a career choice, ya know.

There is also a table with two small chairs here someplace too. I think it has made its way now to the basement though and occupies a choice spot in their Dad's "private" space down there. That area that we affectionately have dubbed as "Bill's Bat Cave."

The radiator along the front wall of the living room has become the garage now for several smallish toy school buses, an airplane, a blue Volkswagon bug, a small tractor, fire engines -there are two of these that get parked there -and a couple other little car/truck type toys.

The toy chest is filled to overflowing -so much so that trying to put the lid on it is an impossibility.

Yard sale time is pretty much over and done with. There is a birthday coming up on the 18th of next month for a little girl and then looming in the distance after that, of course, is Christmas.

Really, the last thing these kids do need is more toys but you and I both know that there will be more coming in to suck up the space that is left here.

And whatever is left after that -I'm figuring there probably will be a few new clothing items added to the already burgeoning wardrobes these kids have now at their disposal.

I think back to when I was a kid and my toys got stored in a cardboard box. My clothes -all neatly placed in dressers and chests or hung -after careful ironing too by my Grandmother -in the small closet in the medium-sized bedroom I shared with my Mom. That closet also held some of her clothes and special items, like winter coats, in the summer time. Things like that.

At the rate this stuff is accumulating here, we may have to put in a mobile home or something just to have a place to sleep and then, come back into the house to ride herd on the kids as they drag out one toy after the other and lose interest in it as soon as it hits the floor.

Certainly does show how times -and purchasing -has changed over the years, doesn't it?