Too Much Daycare

I have taken this week (the week before the long weekend in August) as a vacation for the past sixteen years. I didn't correlate it at first but there is an exhaustion that has seeped into the very core of my being. I am calling it my body, mind and soul's desperate need for a vacation.

I have little planned for my two week vacation this year. I have two days of appointments booked, the opportunity for a weekend mountain retreat and I will spend some time to spend at Mom's with time to see some friends while I'm there. I'm already concerned that sixteen days will not be enough.

I am craving a "one year leave of absence" from all responsibilities and duties. One year. What could I do with a year off that I can't fit into my regularly scheduled life?

I would tackle this house one room at a time. No puttering through and just glossing over the top of things. I would empty a room in its entirety, paint it, decide what that room's specific purpose is meant to be and critically cull everything that does not fit.

Our house is having an identity crisis. Maybe it's not. Maybe its identity is "Daycare" because everything I use for my daycare is sprinkled generously throughout the house. This daycare identity is stripping the identity of "home" from our house. The minute I wrote the words, I related this to how I felt when my bookkeeping job overtook all of the living areas of our home. I felt depleted because my work was everywhere. This is exactly where my daycare is at right now.

The kitchen is completely daycare oriented. From the totally uncomfortable bench seating to the booster chair and two high chairs, accessorized with baby wipes, kid's wash clothes and the present collection of toys that are driving me crazy sitting atop the fridge.

Let's move onto the living room. The ball house, Little Tykes kitchen, toy cupboard, "princess corner" and various Rubbermaid containers and small chairs my son suggested we add to the already overrun room to encourage imaginative play and "sharing". This is adorned by baby gates everywhere, to keep my busy one-year-old within the kid approved areas to play.

Each and every upstairs bedroom has at least one playpen set up and used daily. The "quiet room" has an additional set of three cots for my older nappers.

This is my "office", presently taken over by my new little one-year-old, filled with his soothing music making CD player and car seat which seems to calm him when he is restless and fussy (I should have tried that yesterday)

My guest room comes complete with a playpen, this shot doesn't include the extra booster chair and pile of excess that must be sold or given away.

This is our "quiet room" - supposedly for quiet computer time, book reading and movie watching. Presently this area is used to accommodate my 2 to 3 year olds at nap time.

The bathroom is lined with diapers, wipes and a change of clothing for each child so we don't bring the sandbox back inside with us at the end of our morning's play.

The downstairs? Don't even get me started. It looks like a junk heap or a daycare hoarder's nightmare.

This view doesn't capture the half of it - there are toys hidden behind the dresser; Rubbermaid containers filled with toys to the right and a storage area within the laundry room filled with toys.

I wandered through the house, snapping pictures to illustrate my story here and I found the source of my depleted state. I live in a daycare centre. There are few to no adult areas within our home. It is no wonder I can't wait to run downstairs to my never-been-touched-by-daycare bedroom which is my oasis. The reason I live to sleep.

Yes. This house needs a makeover. Badly. I would love the HGTV crew to move in and create "convertible spaces" for me. Storage and seating that would slide out of sight with a flick of a wrist. Then while they are at it, maybe they could accommodate any renovations so I can easily transition into renting out the main floor of our house (and we would live downstairs) when I move out of the daycare business altogether.

I need a little less "daycare" and a little more "generic, no-name me" sprinkled around this place. Less is more. And in this case, less "stuff" will equate to more energy and enthusiasm as I walk through these days of mine.