In general, Jamie is a great help around the house except for one area: the kitchen. He has always been opposed to doing dishes. His mother has tales of him hiding them under his bed for weeks in an effort to avoid the unpleasantness of taking two seconds to load them in the dishwasher.
I just happen to be an obsessive clean freak about my kitchen and practically have a panic attack when anything is left in the sink more than 3.5 seconds. For this reason, I take extra efforts to ensure the dishwasher is always unloaded so in the off chance he miraculously decides to progress one step beyond putting his dishes in the sink that they’ll find a happy new home in the dishwasher.
Last night, we were sitting around the kitchen table devouring a chocolate chipper sundae delight I whipped up. Haddie, as usual, was making a mess with the melted chocolate. And I, as usual, was hovering nearby, ready to spring at the first attempt she made to smear it everywhere. I had grabbed one of our kitchen rags and frequently wiped her fingers off.
“You know that’s really gross, Amber.”
“What’s gross? I’m cleaning up after Hadley.”
“Just look at that cloth you’re using. It’s utterly old and disgusting.”
“FYI, I wash all my rags every couple of days. It’s clean.”
“It looks like it’s 100 years old. Throw it out now! I refuse to touch that thing with a 10-foot pole.”
“Oh really? That’s because you refuse to clean the kitchen.”
“That’s beside the point, Honey.”
**From the immortal words of a magnet on my mother-in-law’s fridge:**
“No woman ever shot a man while he was doing the dishes.”
I'm a Canadian-born mom of two, former Denver Post columnist, family travel writer, editor of MileHighMamas.com and 9News contributor. Expert on all things Utah, Denver, family and travel. Lover of laughter and life. Happily married to a man obsessed with growing The Great Pumpkin. 