Because sometimes you just need to get shit done.

I’m not big on housecleaning. I pretty much hate to do it.

And I can live with a certain amount of chaos and disorder.

When you have lots of kids and five of them are under ten years old, you don’t really have a choice.

I will choose doing something with the kids or exercise or grocery shopping or pretty much anything before I voluntarily clean anything.

But today things had gotten too out of control even for me to handle.

You couldn’t see the floor of the playroom and my room was such a mess that I was wasting an embarrassing amount of time every day just trying to find stuff.

This morning, all the kids were at school except for Number 6.

I really needed to establish a little order.

So I gave Number 6 the Kindle.

And I let him play on it the whole time I cleaned up.

For two and a half hours, Number 6 sat in that chair and stared at the Kindle.

None of that screen time was educational.

He played Minecraft and watched videos and played more Minecraft and watched more videos.

And if I didn’t need to leave in order to take him to school and pick up Number 7, I would have let him stare at that thing for four hours.

Or more.

Now if I did that every day, it would be unhealthy and I wouldn’t be doing the job I’d like to be doing as a mom.

But sometimes you need to get some shit done.

And today was one of those days.

Not only did I get my room and the playroom cleaned, I also took a shower and found eleven,

yes,

eleven shoes that had no matches.

I found clothes I forgot I had and some that fit now that didn’t fit the last time I cleaned my room. Which didn’t suck.

I found a bathing suit for Number 7 (who was in desperate need of  a new one) that someone had sent to me and I didn’t even know I had.

Now I can think straight.

And tomorrow I won’t waste fifteen minutes trying to find a pair of socks, and the kids will have a place to play without tripping over a bunch of toys.

It was totally effective and totally worth it.

And in another couple weeks, I will do the same thing again.

Before any of you old-timers pipe in about how you used to get crap done around your house without the use of electronics, remember that you didn’t use car seats or even buckle your kids’ seat belts or put sunscreen on your kids or make them wear helmets and you smoked and drank booze and buckets of coffee and ate soft cheese and lunch meat when you were pregnant.

And if you could have gotten your hands on a Kindle back then, well, your kids would have been sitting in that blue chair while you got shit done, too.

Please keep voting!