Mud, glorious mud

Welcome to spring time, eh? Of course with the weather like it's been lately, it's hard to determine if its spring or summer, depends on the day. Anyways, I love spring time and all that comes with it, but with spring time in our house also comes the dreaded ... MUD!

Unfortunately for me and my washing machine, my two younger girls were born with some strange attraction to mud. I don't know if it's in their body chemical makeup or what, but if there's a mud pile within a ten mile radius, those girls will find it. And no matter how many times I say before they step outside, "Do NOT get in the mud!!" they inevitably, in some form or fashion, get in the mud.

At first, when they were little, I thought it was a "farm" thing since we lived out in the country and I was certain that when we moved in town, the whole "mud" thing would end. So long to muddy shoes and stained clothes, and good riddance to all those mud-caked toys. NOT! My younger girls have proven to me that no matter their living environment, they WILL find a way to get muddy, even if they have to produce it themselves. They'll even find it wherever we're visiting too, whether at Grandma's or just at a softball tournament. Never fails!

For some dumb reason, I thought since I had all girls that I would avoid this "dirty kid" issue. I thought that was just a boy thing. Girls are supposed to wear cute outfits with matching cute little shoes and have their hair in perfect ponytails, right?

Well, that's how it worked for my oldest daughter. She never had a separate dresser drawer just for play clothes and never ruined a pair of shoes just from playing outside. I never had to worry that she was messing in the water or burying toys in piles of mud cakes never to be seen again.

However, that is certainly not the case with Clyde and Clem. They each have a drawer full of hillbilly play clothes and several pairs of shoes that were previously ruined from mud adventures. Sometimes I'm so embarrassed when I see them playing out front and figure our neighbors always wonder why my girls are dressed so bizarre but I'm not gonna let them ruin another nice outfit. And they will and I guarantee it.

They fight me on it sometimes and beg not to change clothes, but I trust them just about as far as I could throw them ... not very far.

Neither one of them can really be defined as "tomboys" because although they may be covered in mud from head to toe, underneath that mud monster is a girl with pigtails in a skirt and sparkly tank top. And although they'll play trucks in the mud, they also have been known to put on quite the mud tea party for themselves and unwilling stuffed animals.

I've resorted to hiding their good tea sets for fear of more mud lattes to be served up, and those poor animals ... well, let's just say it wasn't pretty.

Those two mud hounds always try to tell me it was an "accident" but they're full of baloney. Like they didn't MEAN to bury their entire shoe in the mud or they didn't MEAN to paint the siding with mud.

Even if there isn't mud, they turn on the faucet and make mud. There's a whole yard full of grass and trees with a swing set and playhouse to play in, but they, like I mentioned before, physically cannot help but to be drawn to the mud. "Like flies on a rib roast," as Cousin Eddy use to say.

Call it instinctive or a strange addiction, maybe they'll grow out of it or maybe they'll have a career in it, but I look forward to the day I don't have to clean it!