For those of you eagerly playing along at home, the score is now 4-for-4. And yes, this is the second post in a week dealing with bodily fluids.
Search bit another one of his friends this afternoon and served actual time in the official preschool penalty box.
It was one of those days. Continue reading
Do. Not. Like. Daylight Savings. Time change = bad.
Disclaimer: This post is not for the feint of heart. Also, I am well aware that the following is likely the result of my own actions. However, for the sake of consistency, we’re going to blame the time change. Continue reading
I know what you’re thinking. Today is Wednesday; bath night is Tuesday. For Search – bath night was both days this week. He had a blowout.
The muppets are getting so big so fast! Both are excitedly grasping at their toys and taking in the world around them in wonder. Thanks to the generosity of Santa and grandparents, there are a lot of new toys to inspire their little minds. Search’s new favorite is his jumper seat, which is highly conducive to his affinity for standing and bouncing.
This evening, when I got home, Destroy was working on his sitting ability with Dad while Search bounced happily away in his Baby Einstein Playful Piano Johnny Jumper. (He’s our budding rockstar.) I made a few final phone calls and sent out several work related follow-up emails. (A large portion of my job involves herding hamsters and chasing chickens.) Then I walked over to where my boys were enjoying some male bonding.
An odd smell wafted up through the air around me. Destroy looked up from Daddy’s lap, tooted, and grinned at me. Being the fabulous and loving wife and mother that I am, I offered to change his diaper. “You’re right – it really smells,” Jon agreed. “But I just checked and it’s only a tiny smear.” Hmmm, perhaps the odiferous culprit was his brother.
I scooped Search up out of the jumper and was practically knocked out by the noxious odor emanating from his nether regions. “It’s him,” I choked. We scurried upstairs toward the changing table, mass quantities of wipes and the likelihood of multiple new diapers.
I put Pig Pen down on the changing pad – one could practically see the smelly squiggles wriggling around him – unsnapped his jimmies and peeled his outfit off. There was no amount of wipes that was going to solve this situation. We marched back downstairs.
“Babe…we have a bit of a situation in here…” I called from where I was ruining more outfits, blankets, and washcloths in the bathroom. Jon rounded the corner and stumbled back out of the bathroom, overwhelmed by the stench (and pile of poop accumulating on the barrier blanket).
Even the size 3 diaper our little muppet recently graduated into couldn’t hold a candle to this blowout. Poop was smeared up to his neck. Thrilled with the attention, enjoying the unexpected naked time and preferring to stand instead of sit at any time of day, Search was all grins and giggles – even sharing his machine gun laugh with us.
When Jon was ready to shed the necessary hazmat suit and assist with the now exceedingly essential bath, Search was soaked from head to toe – literally. Now that out growing boys have begun experiences the joys of teething, the drool has begun to threaten a flood watch. Search has been sucking his thumb/hand with a furious vigor that can only be explained by the assumption that he is actually a changling that hasn’t yet realized he is no longer a swamp monster.
Then he peed on me. Overall, he was pretty pleased with himself today.
…and teardrops and sneezes. The muppets have experienced their first rainstorm. I do not think they liked it.
Now, the muppets didn’t actually venture out into dreary, drippy gloom, but they spent a very cranky day making their displeasure known. The day began with Destroy screaming for food at the top of his (rapidly growing) lungs. I quietly entered the nursery figuring Search was still asleep and I could feed both boys without rousing the rest of the house. Search was not asleep. Search was voraciously gnawing on his brother – which, in retrospect, may have also contributed to Destroy’s screaming.
It became readily apparent that they were going to have a “Hold Me” day. Not so bad, I thought – with the rain pounding down on the roof, we can sit back and cuddle in our jammies.
Nope.
We were having a “Hold Me and Do Something Entertaining” day. Problem was, neither Search nor Destroy could figure out precisely what they found entertaining.
Compounded the crankiness were two uncomfortable tummy aches. Destroy wouldn’t sit; he would arch his back and wail. Search kept scrunching up his legs into his tummy while his lower lip would pout and begin to quiver as he sobbed.
It suddenly became very clear. The muppets had to poop. Search’s last download was eight days ago – it was imminent. Sure enough, as Search squirmed around in his bouncy chair, GrammaJ and I heard the unmistakable sound of a young child airing out his insides. Shortly thereafter, the accompanying pungent aroma began slowly perfuming the room.
The dogs got up and left.
I clapped and cheered the accomplishment of this recent bodily function and scooped up the child for a now urgent diaper change. But he wasn’t finished. As I was finishing up with the first change, another wave of baby poo oozed out onto the second diaper – then a third. I reached over to grab the fourth diaper of this monumental change when I heard it. An explosion emerged from my son. I shrieked – poop cleared the diaper laid out on the changing table, spraying a bit onto the pad and splattered across the cardboard boxes holding high chairs in the corner of the nursery. Search looked up at me, his face breaking into a huge grin. Well done!
As I was telling this story, a friend interrupted me. “You ever have those moments where you stop and think, ‘I used to be cooler than this…and now look at me.’?” I responded with the appropriate cliché about how, considering everything we’ve been through with the muppets, dynamite poop couldn’t be cooler.
But the truth is, I was never cool. Life prior to the muppets often found me yelling at the dog for eating his own poop. Whereas I used to get home from work and ask, “What did the dog eat today,” now I get home to discover how many outfits have been changed due to a puking incident. (For curious readers, the records stand at the California Penal Code, leather boots, two baseball gloves and five respectively.)
What parenthood has brought me, are the stories to tell of things I never thought I’d hear myself saying or doing. “Sweetie, please don’t try to eat your brother.” And poop is cause for celebration.
