Today I had a chance to put on real clothes, including red slingback heels…oh yes.  REAL shoes too.   I nearly broke my neck trying to find my old briefcase, dug into the back of the closet for my “professional” raincoat, and headed downtown to the Indiana Statehouse to meet our Lt. Governor for a Mommy Blogging Roundtable discussion.  Very interesting afternoon, and I will blog about it after I’ve had a sleep.  One must sleep on the gravity of meeting the Lt. Governor.  One need not sleep prior to blogging about mud.

I returned home to find the girls making, according to them, “The World’s Muddiest Mud”.  No 2 children could have been more dedicated to task.  There was a small divet left by a move of the slide, and by golly, they turned that small crevice into a swimming pool.  Imagine if we could REVERSE the mess-making energy into a clean-up energy.  I’d be living in a surgical suite.  But, then we’d throw off the balance of the Universe and the planets would be all whopper-jawed, so we’d better just leave it as is.  I live in total chaos.  Amen.

I sat on the back steps in my “real” shirt and skirt, and watched the girls jump about without jackets in February.  16th, to be exact.  Weren’t we buried under a mountain of ice this side of 2 weeks ago?  Today we were coatless at 5 pm, water spigot full blast, making mud.  After weeks of complaining that I am “parented out”, I couldn’t help but laugh uncontrollably at their joy-filled mud-making frenzy.  I had a sudden urge to throw on my actual REAL clothes, which resemble old jeans and tshirt, and thrash about in the mud with them.  Spring is within our reach!  The garden I put to sleep moments ago will awaken soon.  And this year…I’m growing those sweet peppers.  If cantaloupes come up again, someone needs to send me a Farmer’s Almanac.

I realized, I don’t need a break from parenting.  I need a break from winter.  As much as I love winter, this family needs more than 20 minutes of fresh air at a time.  We stayed out until dark, celebrating every last moment of this unusual day.  And as much as I enjoyed pretending to be an adult this afternoon, there is really no place I’d rather be than in my backyard.  We are on winter break for the next few days (again, on WINTER break, without coats, getting wet outside…it’s an Indiana miracle!), so if you need me, you know where I’ll be.  As a quick advert, I should tell you, our mud is the muddiest.  If you want unmuddy mud, you’ll need to shop elsewhere.  And we don’t bag.  You’ll need to carry it out the proper way: on your clothes and in your hair.  Enjoy!