Character study

Last night, I had four kids at my house, sleeping over - the usual gang, Jamie and Lydia, plus Lydias two friends, Emma and Robin. I got them a simple craft - one of those black papers where you can scrape off the black covering and there is a rainbow-coloured sheet underneath, so whatever you draw (or stencil) is rainbow on a black background. Now, Robin, the oldest, she is 8. She quietly immersed herself in this, carefully filling in all the nooks and crannies of the stencils and making sure the stencil stayed in the same place. Lydia, the ham, created about four pictures in the time it took Robin to do one, haphazardly slapping it together and then immediately running to her room and putting it up on her wall, wanting to see the end result and get praise and attention from me for it; after that, she returned to the craft table and bossed everyone around, making sure everybody have only their share of the black papers (knowing that whatever is left over will ultimately be hers - the little brat). Emma, 6, is a blissfully happy child, she didnt really care if the stencil was perfect, and didnt really care if I approve - she worked on it for exactly as long as she felt like it, leaving the picture somewhat unfinished and moving on to the next entertainment, unphased. Jamie, the little one, almost four, wanted my and Dereks involvement the whole time, explaining what he was doing and what he will be doing next, and after that and after THAT, trying to claim more than his share of the black sheets and stencils, but accepting the overrule of the rest of us. After supper and play, I took Jamie for a car ride, where he passed out after about two minutes. I brought him home and put him down on his bed and gazed at him for a while, he is SO adorable (when he sleeps - LOL). The girls then settled in for a movie on my bed and fell asleep around midnight, after much giggling and chatter. That was last night. This morning, though, war broke out, everybodys nerves are a bit frazzled because of the late night (including mine). After a total disaster of a pancake breakfast (note to self - next time you have four kids over for breakfast, cold cereal or toaster waffles would work better), whereas Jamie picked up an entire pancake, dripping with syrup, and walked around with it in the living room (until I caught up with him with a wet kitchen towel), the girls fought over juice and syrup, and Lydia, trying to be helpful, poured out juice on the kitchen floor. Then, while I took a blissful break, washing the dishes and trying not to listen to the squabbles through the running water and clattering plates. After I turned the water off, though, I could hear the arguments heating up, and Lydia was downright hostile and nasty to Jamie, so I had to interfere, basically separating them. Jamie played on the computer for a while, and the girls played puppies upstairs (Jamie didnt want to be a puppy, and they wouldnt let him be a duck - I have no idea why). Then, of course, Jamie felt left out, and just as the girls decided to play on the Xbox, he wanted to join them. Of course, that turned out to be an unpopular decision with the girls, as they are all lightyears ahead of Jamie in skill and maturity for that game. Again, mommy stepped in as a referee, thinking Ill never get a freakin shower, and is it noon yet, when I can drop the gang off to their prospective mothers!!!!!! But alas, its only ten, and I already intervened in three wars, cleaned up all kinds of mess, and almost cried when I looked at my bedroom (the girls slept in here, with all their animals and blankets and all their clothes on the floor). So, I decided to just blog and write it out of my system.... Its quiet upstairs right now, so maybe I can slip in the shower, unnoticed, for a quiet 5 minutes.