Our Kitchen

This week I have been thinking about our kitchen, which in our house is the kitchen/dining room with the original wall between the two torn down.

We eat in this room.  We home school in this room.  We create in this room.  We edit photos in this room.  We listen to music in this room.  We pretend in this room.  We laugh in this room.  We fight in this room.  We color, cut, and paste.  We use play doh.  We spill things.  We trip over things.  We yell at the dog.  We get haircuts.  We play games.  We shave the dog.  We visit with friends.

It is where all 8 of us spend 90 percent of our time.  (Well, Violet spends a lot of time in her crib.)

We have 9 other rooms in our house.  We could choose to spread out.  Yet we always end up together in the kitchen.  The vast majority of learning in my children's lives takes place in the square footage of my kitchen.

When you are all together so much of the time, and your days seem to run together, time plays tricks on you.  Time seems to be slow one minute and racing past the next.  In my mind I know it is moving at exactly the same speed, but there is some kind of phenomenon that makes it seem to speed up and slow down.

Wasn't it just a few months ago that we came to see this house when it was for sale and talked about tearing down this load bearing wall to separate the kitchen and dining room?  My children ran around and Juliet sat in her infant car seat?  And today she is using scissors and writing and making jokes?

Time moves, and my children grow up without my consent.  It is maddening.  It won't be long and it will be a rare occurrence that all of us will even be in the same room.  I try to live in the moment and soak it all up because I know it is fleeting.  When I have the right perspective, I want the kitchen to last forever.  But in all honesty, it is a loud, crazy place that I prefer to escape sometimes.

May I love the crazy and choose to turn up the music of my life.  And embrace the kitchen for the wonderful chaos it is.