Yikes!

I knew I shouldn't have relaxed!! Everything has caught up with me.

Sure enough, when company is coming there is a lot of things that you really have to leave to the last minute. Buying groceries and preparing the fruits and vegetables so they are easy to serve can't be done until the last minute. The house can't be given that one final clean up and 'kid stuff' put out of sight and extra tables and chairs put out, until the kids are gone.

But ... tidying up the guest room and giving the downstairs bathroom a quick clean up could have been done sooner. So could that last minute errand that I forgot all about. And I could have colored my hair sometime earlier than this morning.

Then ... comes the 'how does my house look to a visitor's eye?' question. This is when you notice a layer of dust on a valance that has been staring at you for months, but you just don't see it. Because you aren't looking through any one's eyes but your own. The paint on the baseboards, door moldings and cupboards that could be touched up. The bathroom floor (I have painted the ceramic tiles) could have used a coat of paint. The deck could have been stained. And why didn't I pick up those spare lawn chairs when they were on sale last fall??

On top of that ... the book keeping work that hasn't shown up all week? It arrived after 8:30 last night. My brain turns off at 9:00 and I was in the middle of cleaning vegetables when it arrived. So it sits.

And ... I got the call "Can (one extra child) come over for 3 or 4 hours tomorrow?" That one extra child can sometimes make the day go a whole lot better ... or a whole lot worse.

So here I sit, with my freshly colored hair (I'm so glad I waited until this morning ... it makes me feel all fresh and new in this dark, rich color that I'm sporting) with my second cup of coffee. A load of laundry in the washer, one in the dryer. And only 10 hours, with 6 kids underfoot to do my book keeping; give the upstairs one last surface cleaning; prepare supper and be ready for my guests that will be arriving as the last of my kids are departing.

There is nothing that I am doing today that could have been done any sooner (except the book keeping - that one threw me for a loop). Can I maintain the relaxed and casual demeanor that I was hoping to incorporate into entertaining my company? I shall try.