Various things I'm liable to trip over

The other night I was having some trouble sleeping and so I decided to come out to the couch to sleep. That sometimes helps me. I noticed that the computer was on and came over to turn it off. As I was walking back to the couch, I tripped over the rocking chair. There really isn't anywhere to keep the rocking chair, but we don't want to get rid of it. It tends to just sit out in the middle of the room. I gave myself a pretty nasty bruise and rather than yell (all were asleep), I started thinking creatively. "I should make a list of all the things I trip over, " I thought. And it kept me going until the pain subsided.

1. Books. My library card which allows 50 books to be checked out is always maxed. My kids all have a card and will usually have between 5-10 books checked. That's a lot of books. They get spread all over the floor.

2. Hot Wheels cars. Brigham loves these things and is usually carting 2-5 cars around with him all the time, leaving them here and there when he picks others up. Definitely something I trip over.

3. Shoes. Our side entryway comes in on a landing. Just to the left, there are two steps up to the kitchen. We use this place to dump our shoes. There are usually anywhere from10-20 pairs of shoes sitting around that area. It can be deadly when I'm carrying the laundry basket downstairs to sort laundry!

4. Clothing. Do your kids just strip their socks off and leave them all over, or change in the middle of the living room and just dump the cloths there waiting for the laundry fairy to pick them up?

5. Cello. Oh no! We have no where safe to keep Nathan's cello. I keep it on top of my bed during the day, but at night we have to set it on the floor. I'm constantly saying, "Be careful of the cello." "Watch out for the cello!" One day I was finishing making my bed and placed the cello on the bed as Nathan was walking in the room. "What?" he said, "Why was that on the floor?" "Do you want me to sleep with it on my bed all night?" I asked. Never, never trip over a cello. Costly mistake.

6. Rocks. There will never be enough rocks in my house it seems. With our crushed limestone driveway and occasional trips to look for and collect rocks and fossils, the kids are constantly bringing new piles of rocks in the house. I will find piles of rocks on the floor of the living room, bedrooms, on top of dressers, on the bathroom counter, kitchen counter, washing machine. You name it, every surface has been home to a rock at one time or another.

7. Train tracks and accessories. Being a two year old boy, Brigham loves that stuff. I try to keep this only to his room, so I only have to trip on that when I take my sleeping boy up to his bed each night in the dark.

8. Basement storage room....Don't even get me started on that!!

So, what do you trip over at your house? :)