Nagging Feeling

Today the girls and I went to see my friend's daughter compete in a Highland Dance Competition. It was the first time I had really seen that style of dancing and it was so cool! Very heavy on technique, timing and discipline and not a lot of room for error. The dancing that my girls do is so very different, it was neat for them to see!

After the competition, my friend and her daughter came over to our house for a playdate. But here is the thing.... I hadn't really expected them; so I hadn't done the "pre-company-coming-over-rush-around-cleaning-like-a-mad-woman" thing. And to make matters worse, Adam had spent the morning in the manly pursuit of home improvement. Meaning he cut stuff up with his saw, tracked sawdust all around the house, then sanded some stuff... covering most surfaces in a fine white dust. So not only was my house messy... it was dirty.

Now I am going to admit something. We aren't a very tidy family. In fact, most of the time, it looks like a family of destructive pigs lives here. Or like a very angry burglar has just ransacked the place after finding nothing of value here. But it is usually clean at least... my penchant for sanitization ensures that. So today when my tidy friend and her daughter came over, I was pretty ashamed of myself and my house. The nice thing about my friend Lisa though? (among other things) is that she is real. I like that she was mildly horrified by that state of my house, but didn't judge me for it. I like that we can mutually feed our offspring McDonald's for lunch without trying to pretend to each other that it is a rare treat. I like that she reprimands my kids unabashedly when they are being naughty or annoying (and not in some passive-aggressive "my-kids-are-better-behaved-than-yours" kind of way). I may not have as many friends as some... but I sure like the ones I've got.

Which brings me to the title of my post. After they left, I got down to business and started cleaning my house. But I just had this nagging feeling deep down that no matter what I did, it wasn't going to be good enough. You see, this coming week, the kids have a playdate with a family who has never been here before, and the mom is coming too. I really like them, but I have this feeling (probably due to conversations I have had in the past with the mom) that she will be horrified by my early 1970's house that still is only halfway renovated. And that she will probably drop that horror into conversations with other parents. So I guess it just got me thinking, I am thankful for all my friends and family who accept us... for the messy pigs that we are. And maybe I need to stop caring so much what other people think of me and my house.

Speaking of messy, here are a couple pics of the kids at the playground today.

Laina is showing off her new gap from a lost tooth:

Evie in some messy MJ