Kids Save the strangest things

Jack had a rough morning. The day basically started with him being put into time out. But for some reason, he rebounded. Im not sure if he was imitating me or what was going on. I was hell bent on getting the floor not only swept but mopped as well after naps. This is a very tricky task in timing and managing locations of all three kids. In hopes of having no walk throughs I put the two big kids outside in the backyard and Noah in a swing. I managed to pick up all the toys and miscellaneous debris from the floor and announced to the kids as they were walking out the back door that everything on the floor would be getting swept up and thrown away, and if they wanted any of it to claim it now or let it go. Nothing was claimed. I guess the lure of the outdoors was too much, and out they went. Maddie lasted about 15 minutes. Long enough for me to get the living room and kitchen swept clean. At least she will watch a movie and sit still while I mop. In went 'The Princess and The Frog' (a 2nd birthday gift) and commence mopping. In walk Jack as Im getting the dirt pile into the dustpan…WAIT!!! He needed to rescue things from the garbage first; a birthday card envelope, a memory match game card, a tiny plastic Frisbee from the carnival that morning. Life changing items. Once he sifted through the dirty pile he disappeared into his room. I actually got to mop the whole living room and kitchen in one attempt!! This is victorious, truly…the planets must be aligned or something. But even as I finished I knew that it was odd that I hadn't seen or heard from Jack in the 5-6 minutes it took to complete the mop job. I went to check on him (of course Maddie is still sitting still on her chair with her feet up, and Noah is doing a great job of eating the plastic rings dangling in front of him). I find him…get this…putting his clothes away. Yes. That is right. On his own, he was separating the large pile of clean folded laundry that I'd placed in his room the night before, into small piles of like items. This is the way we do it when I help him with this task. He was actually doing a wonderful job of this and I had a mommy-moment before I went in to offer a compliment. Before I could even tell him how cool this was, he roped me into helping him. He took on my usual role of sorting the big pile and handing me all similar items to put away together. He even had been throwing the jammies into the corner to be dealt with last as I do. It was very cute and sweet and I did eventually get to offer him a huge compliment of how proud of him I was and just how big he is getting. Then we put away the jammies and I noticed that he had done some re-arranging. One of his drawers he told me was dedicated to all of "my paperwork". He has been a paper collector forever and would have small piles all over the house. Apparently he needed one central spot for all of his paperwork. He proudly showed me each treasured piece of paper that he has been saving. Art projects from school, newspaper ads, flyers, etc. Along with the paper were other important things. Random chess pieces, a wrapper from gum (which he saves and calls his "guys"), puzzle pieces, a rock or two. Im glad to say that I just took this in and smiled again at how very sweet this act is and tried to burn into my head his pride with all of his saved and prized paperwork.