precious time

Summer is going full speed ahead. Dreams about doing nothing in the summer, spending all the time in the world with our kids, reading to them, going places - sound usually like New Years Resolutions... After a day at work I come home and I close my eyes to mess, to dishes. I am so happy to see my kids, they are running to meet me, happy that I'm home, telling me what they did during the day and how much fun they had.
Everything in the last sentence except for both "happy" is a lie!
Seeing the mess, I make the kids drop everything they did and clean. It takes so much energy to fight after stressful day. Though I know we should pick our battles, it is not easy to follow this golden advice in reality:)
It always seemed to me that when time is precious, best way to use it is for something worthwhile. Of course, it's important to teach the kids life skills, including cleaning of the house...Still, I found that just like I remember the way my parents were with us kids rather than what was around us, so my kids will likely remember us, the parents. So having written this for the blog, I hope it will help me too :) to spend more quality time with my kids.
As for cleaning, we'll learn it as a family activity!