Adventures in Babysitting

'Tis the season to be giving, right?  Well, Jaron and I thought we'd start a Christmas tradition of offering our babysitting services to the families we Home and Visit teach...all on the same night!  In a community with lots of graduate students and residents, free babysitting is a hot commodity!  So we considered it a big party, and I planned to decorate Christmas cookies and watch a Christmas movie with all the kids.  Well, it was a great idea, and then all of the sudden we had 13 kids in our home, 4 of them one-year-olds (who don't all do stairs, and we don't have baby gates yet!), and a lot of noise.  Oh, and I can't forget to mention that when Jaron came home from work (which was when the kids started arriving), we realized that he HAD to shovel the ice from our driveway and sidewalk--it's a city ordinance that it must be done 24 hrs after a storm or we get fined.  SOOOO, the kids start rolling in and Jaron has to run to Lowe's for an ice-chopper, and I'm giving Spencer any incentive I can think of to help with all the madness (he did an amazing job, by the way).  Since the parents all dropped off/picked up their kids at different times, I would joke with them not to pay any mind to the "controlled chaos" going on in the basement or kitchen.  None of them seemed too concerned, though; I think they were just grateful to have a night out and that their kids actually survived the ordeal!  And Jaron busted out the scraping and shoveling and was able to help out inside before anyone got mortally wounded.  It was certainly a party, and while pretty crazy at times, it really was fun, and it made us feel good to do something for other families. (ps...please noboby call CPS on us for exceeding the 5:1 child-to-caregiver ratio!)