Vacuuming...

We're renovating our basement.
By "we", i mean that Neil is renovating the basement & that sometimes i go plop my chubby bum down on the bottom step & moan about how tired i am as i watch him meticulously paint, tidy, lay flooring, do baseboards...
Sometimes he grunts at me to acknowledge my presence.
Sometimes... if i'm feeling especially energetic at the end of a day, i'll fold laundry downstairs to keep him company.
The best thing is: our basement is getting renovated.
The worst thing is: i lost a very important piece of our vacuum.
When we decided to renovate, we (& by "we", i mostly mean Neil) moved everything from our living room into my laundry room, and the girls room. It's so jam packed in there, that sometimes if we have people over to our house i let them look in there, just so i can absorb the look of horror on their faces. It's truly terrible. It's no wonder i lost the pipe part of my vacuum.
So, shortly after the work began in the basement, i noticed that the carpets were getting crunchy. That's a sure sign that it's time to vacuum. i told Charter to go get the vacuum from the basement for me. (That's part of our phys. ed. program at Chrysalis Academy). Grunting and sweating, he brought me up the hose, so i sent him back down for the Power Head. i use that because it sounds more impressive when it's vacuuming than the regular head. He dutifully brought up the power head, but no handle. i vaguely wondered about vacuuming on my hands & knees pushing the head around rather than asking him to go back down... but i'm not that merciful. i sent the poor guy back down to that horrible, packed, messy room for one more go. He came back empty handed.
"ArG!" i roared like a pirate, raising my rotund body from it's comfy nest where i had been waiting for him to bring me the required pieces, "Do i have to do everything me-self??"
Down to the dungeon i ascended... where i searched for about 4 minutes before i was overcome with depression at the state of my basement & gave up.
For days, the crunchy carpets persisted.
i gave the kids crackers & dry cereal for snacks & they must've re enacted the story of Hansel & Gretel & scattered the crumbs up and down the stairs till i was sure that we could feed the city's hungry with what was lying mashed into our carpet.
Daily the reward for the vacuum piece grew...
"Charter, if you find the piece of the vacuum, i'll give you .25c!!"
"Peyton, whoever finds the piece of the vacuum gets $1!!!!!!!!"
"Find that blasted piece, and you can skip math today."
"Let's pray to Jesus that someone finds the vacuum & then we'll all go for slushies..."
Finally, in a last ditch effort, i sent them all to that dark room while i cleaned the upstairs. i told them to set the timer & search for 5 minutes. If, when the timer went off, the piece was still missing, i would vacuum on my hands and knees - fat belly aside, it would probably actually be good for me to get some exercise. i tidied the upstairs & heaved a sigh as i heard the timer go off.
& then...
With a halo as bright as the sun surrounding her golden hair, Sloanie angelically climbed the stairs holding that beautiful bright metal tube in her hands.
She instantly became my favourite.
i plugged the vacuum in, and waved it across the carpet. At first, i was sure that our house was the target of a drive by shooting, but no... it was just the huge amount of crap being sucked up into that hose. After several passes, the sound of machine gun fire subsided and i began to be able to see the surface of the carpet.
Two things i will tell you:
Turns out people with 6 kids shouldn't ever, ever take several days off from vacuuming.
Turns out our carpet is green. i had sort of forgotten that.