My Glamorous Life

I made a decision this morning that I wasn't going to follow my initial gut reaction to tell you this story, but bath time tonight presented me with a situation that leaves me no choice but to go ahead and tell it.  I wasn't going to because it's possible it crosses some sort of line...I pictured Zoe reading it as an adult and decided that if I were her reading it as an adult I'd be embarrassed (and not in a cute "we were all kids once" sort of way) so I couldn't very well do that to her.  I had wanted to tell it because it's such a typical "this is my life" mom story and it's always hard to pass those up but I was going to resist the urge in the name of my relationship with the future Zoe....anyway, since I received "the sign" during bath time that it was, in fact, necessary that I relay the story, I feel I have to preemptively even the score by telling a similarly embarrassing story about my own childhood so....

I pooped in the tub once.  Yes, I know I'm not the only one but, although I was young, I was old enough to remember it which I think officially means I was too old to be doing such things.  In fact, I was just telling Zoe about that a couple of nights ago during bath time.  I'm not sure why I did but chances are it naturally fit into the conversation we were having at the time (that fact is it's own tiny "this is my life" mom anecdote actually)...I told her I'd done it and that I've never forgotten the sight of my Dad scooping it out while yelling "If you have to go, you get OUT of the TUB and GET ON THE TOILET."  I immediately regretted my decision to tell her because she would. not. stop. asking. me. about. it.  I had a fleeting fearful feeling that she would somehow see this as permission to do the same thing sometime, but I immediately put that to rest knowing that there's no way she would want to.  Still though, I had a sinking feeling that SOMEHOW the choice to tell her this story would come back to haunt me in some way.

Which brings me to today...a beautiful, sunny, warm day...a pleasant morning was being followed by a quiet lunch with the kids.  As happens almost EVERY time we sit down for a meal, Zoe announced: "I have to go poop, will you come with me?" and I responded as I always do: "I can't go with you because Owen is eating and I need to stay down here with him to make sure he doesn't choke."  Now, a couple of things are going on here..1) I do feel comfortable leaving Owen alone for a couple of minutes while he's eating but I know she can go by herself and I think she's just trying to control the situation by waiting until I'm busy to ask me to keep her company.  We find ourselves in this particular standoff almost daily, but also 2) even though I know she can and should be wiping her own bum by now I can't seem to let it go.  Of course it's not because I LIKE doing it but I just can't imagine she'd be very successful and I can't give up the control.  I think she must sense this, which is why she throws down the challenge for me so often...so although I'm encouraging her to go up and go potty by herself, part of me cringes at the thought.  When I win the standoff and she goes by herself I sit downstairs imagining the carnage upstairs in the bathroom and the germs that will inevitably be spread if she doesn't thoroughly wash her hands (she often does not).   Anyway, I won the standoff today and I sat downstairs anxiously wondering if I should just go up and help her.  Just as I had decided to give in and go up, she started coming down the stairs...I was unpleasantly surprised because I hadn't heard the toilet flush or the faucet running but I knew she'd gone poop.  I was trying to get the story from a smirking, very unnerving, sly looking Zoe when she turned around and said "I haaaave something for yooooou, Mommy".  Still confused, I said "Huh? What?" as she pulled down her tights and underwear, revealing a large piece of toilet paper wedged into her bum.  As I jumped out of my chair yelling "OH!  EW!  ZOE!  EW!" I scurried her up the stairs, somehow dislodging the toilet paper in the confusion.  I saw it falling to the kitchen floor (next to Owen's high chair where he was happily eating a non-germ infested lunch) and just kept yelling "OH! ZOE! EW! GROSS!!  EW EW EW!!"...all of this fuss actually hurt her feelings because she explained that she had felt proud of this genius plan of hers.  She had put the toilet paper there in case she'd missed some poop while wiping herself, that way it wouldn't get on her underwear.  Why she felt the need to show it to me right there in the kitchen, I have no idea but we had a conversation about it for sure.  I suppose this all means I should just start insisting she wipe her own bum, but I'm not sure if I'M ready for that...time will tell and I promise, I'll try.

So, the rest of the day went along just fine and the kids were having a silly, happy-go-lucky bath right before bed...Owen was all washed and Zoe was busy dunking her head, washing shampoo out of her hair when she started scrambling to stand up yelling "OWEN POOPED!!" and there, dancing around these two formerly squeaky clean kiddos was a big, old floater.  Owen just laughed and luckily, Zoe did too.  As they stood there shivering in their towels, watching the water drain from the tub and waiting for me to wipe it out, refill it and rewash both of them Zoe quietly said "Awk-waaard."

This is my life.

This is too though, so it's not all totally gone to shit...highlights from this week:

A Cozy Saturday Morning

A Beautiful, Quiet Morning..making a "tree" from sticks, dried leaves, pine cones, etc...

My 4 Year Old Tween...complete with iPod shuffle and shades

Zoe's VERY FIRST HAIRCUT

Giving Baby a Bath (thanks for the idea, Pink and Green Mama!)

  Coffee Filter Flowers

We did coffee filter eggs last spring and this year wanted to do flowers...Cut coffee filters into shapes, color with washable markers, spray with water, let dry and hang in your window!  So easy...we used our spray bottle filled with "Monster Spray"...a combination of lavender and water..monsters are repelled by it so it can also be sprayed around a dark upstairs at any time.  Perfect for these because they smell nice too!

 Original Cookie Recipe a la Zoe (inspired by TinkerLab)

The initial collection of ingredients: cheddar cheese, honey peanut butter, salt, vegetable oil and food coloring

1/4 cup of salt (!)

Searching for more inspiration: "Is this food, Mommy?  What about this?  Can you eat this?"

Preeetty sticky

Topping them off with chocolate chips

Hmmmmm......

Excited to taste test and then....

...the reaction.  That's all she ate.  I tried really hard to eat a whole one but I just couldn't do it...threw it in the trash when she turned her back...oh well, it was fun!