Family Vacay without the fun ones

In the span of four days this is what I did: I swept and sprayed out the garage (Ethan's favorite game is putting things behind the car tires so we run over them. Mostly harmless stuff like apples and sidewalk chalk. Harmless, but messy) I cleaned out the wastebaskets. I updated all the scrapbooks. I never made dinner. I only turned on the dishwasher once. I had company over until midnight (so what if it was my sisters?) I did my visiting teaching. I returned two pair of shoes. I went to a baby shower. I registered my kids for school. I got mad at Noelle for stealing candy from the checkout stand at Walmart. I got mad at her again for stuffing a check minus its envelope into the mailbox. I watched The Today Show. I went on walks and only had to fill one water bottle.
All of this happened while my men were doing this:

Yes, I gallantly volunteered to stay home from Lake Powell this year with the two little girls. This meant that everyone on the houseboat could be loud during naptime and there were no toddler tantrums to listen to. Win-Win for us all. Not to mention how much extra packing room there is when you take out all the baby stuff. I felt sad about missing the good times, but I felt really good about missing the bad times with a baby on a hot, overly-populated houseboat. And did you see how much I got done? And that I didn't have to make dinner? (I just gave Noelle her multivitamins and called it good)

And in other news....this here is a picture of our silverware drawer. Ethan was just itching to play and emptied the diswhasher extra quickly this morning.
Me (upon opening the drawer): Ethan, what the heck is this about?
Ethan (in his best 'duh' voice): I empty a lot faster when I do it that way.

Gotta love 'im.