Why Projects Take Longer

with children.

In spite of the fact that our bathrooms are big enough to suit the Taj Mahal, we have always found it hard to place our laundry baskets in a convenient location. Behind the door? Then the door is always bouncing shut. Under the towel bar? Then they're in the way. Between the windows? Then you have to walk in an S-pattern to get to the sink. This five-year-old problem, however, was eased by the removal of the glass block quarter-walls around the toilet, because now we could bring up some cheap white cabinets that needed a new home, and get creative.

We decided to cut holes in the top of one cabinet which would house the laundry baskets (one for whites, one for colors). The baskets would be out of sight (and out of the way), but we just have to pitch our dirty clothes into the holes and they are sorted for laundering. Finally that middle-school compass came in handy for design work:

Some way into the project, I discovered that the final installation was complicated by a three-year-old who really wanted to "help"--that is, wanted to be involved. In the middle. Obstructive.

Even though she hadn't finished her lunch break yet (that's an apple whose juice she's smearing all over the project):

I had no idea that a cabinet with holes would be such a fun toy. (Why do we buy her plastic trinkets again?) It turns out that as much fun as I've had on the mallet end of Whack-A-Mole, Gwendolyn has on the hole end.

It's fun to hide and wait for Daddy to find you by looking down from above, then screaming like a little girl when he peeks over the edge:

No matter how much my work ethic butts up against three-year-old playfulness, I eventually discover every time that it's wiser to join in than try to win. So when my daughter insisted on trying to fit us both into the laundry playhouse, I went for it.

Yes. More fun than getting the project done on time.

 Much more fun.

~ emrys