It's not the clothes that make the man....

.....it's the clothes that make the mother lose her mind!

Yes, friends, it's that time of year again. Amidst shopping for school supplies and last minute trips to the pool, we at the Franklin household are once again going through the kids' clothes. You think Michael Phelps has it hard trying for eight gold medals in Bejing? Try swimming through this tangled mess of shorts and T-shirts. Let me try to break it down for you.

First, we must go through the clothes that are currently in use. Or that are currently in the drawers, because not all of these clothes are getting worn. Which is why we are going through them. The children have to try on these clothes to see if they have outgrown them, or if we can get a few more months (weeks?) of wear out of them before the weather changes. We must also take into consideration the condition of the items as well. How ratty have they actually become? Can they be passed off as new back-to-school outfits? Or do they look like they have been slept in, wadded up, and tossed on the floor?

Once this process is complete (and please keep in mind that everything I am detailing for you is times 4), the clothes are then folded neatly (just like they are every week from the laundry, so why they are shoved into the drawers is beyond me) and replaced in the drawers. It is amazing how much room there is in these drawers when clothes are properly folded, a concept yet to be grasped by my children.

Now we must decide what to do with the discarded items of clothing. We must ask ourselves why the child will no longer be wearing it...is it stained and beyond help? If so, it is placed in a bag designated for whichever charity organization calls me first asking for donations. Has the item simply been outgrown? At this point, the clothes are set aside for Brooke or some other unsuspecting family to use. Brooke now has more clothes to try on, and we can only be grateful that she views this as simply getting new clothes and is not questioning the source, if you catch my drift. Even Leah made the comment that Brooke was "lucky" to automatically be getting new clothes. There is one bright spot in this dismal chore.

So, now that we have assorted bags to be given away lining the hallway and neat drawers with extra space, we can now move on to the three full bins of clothes that I have been collecting over the past months. I have always purchased things on clearance and put them away until the season warrants. We must now go through these items to see if they fit (there is a cool Nike basketball jersey that still comes down to Andrew's knees!). Once we have determined fit, we then need to decide if the item will be incorporated into the child's wardrobe, or if we will continue to hold it back until next spring. The reasoning behind this? There is a delicate balance between making good use of perfectly good clothes and having some new things for back-to-school. And when Brooke inherits about ten nice shirts from her big sisters, some of the new things can wait. You can see that this process requires some actual brain activity as well.

There are a couple environmental factors that contribute to the overall mood while working on this task as well. To begin with, it is important to make sure you are not allergic to anything in the room you are working in, i.e. the pet guinea pig's alfalfa hay. Because spending any extended period of time in close quarters with said allergens will lead to excessive sneezing and head aches, never good when trying to work. Secondly, one must also remember to be dressed appropriately. Clothes with an elastic waistband rather than an actual button go a long way towards making a more pleasant experience. The ability to stretch and expand is crucial.

To top it all off, once everything seems to be done (which it isn't, by the way), we then have to remind ourselves that we will be doing to very same thing in about eight weeks with the pants and sweaters. Steer clear of any brick walls at this point, because this is where the head banging begins.

So there you have it, a step-by-step dissertation as to why I will be having a huge bowl of ice cream tonight. Now where are my pajama pants?