Storytime

Man, this is some crappy weather we're having. To cheer you up, let me tell you a story. Unfortunately, it's a story I've told before, otherwise I'd never get out of the house to leave for work. Plus, it's one of my favorite stories ever:

One morning when my older son was 2, he and I were playing with construction paper. He went through a major construction paper phase. He started out drawing on it, then moved on to cutting it (yes, I let my 2-year-old use scissors, which turned out to be kind of dumb because he got very good at them very quickly), then to cutting and gluing it. We'd work on our living room floor on the rug with a big stash of newspapers down as a work area.

On this particular morning, we'd run out of Elmer's glue and had to break out the backup bottle of glue, the Pentel stuff that's that vaguely blue translucent color. It wasn't flowing at all, so I unscrewed the top so he could get it out of the bottle*. He glued some cut construction paper. I got up to go to the bathroom**.

When I came back, he was coloring his glued paper. Then he asked me, "Mama, where's the glue?" Uh, oh. "Where did you put it?" I asked. "On the chair!" he replied helpfully. Then I turned my head (in slooooow moootion) to see that he had, indeed, carefully placed the topless glue bottle on the cushion of the armchair, but the armchair seat tilted toward the back of the chair. So the glue bottle had tipped over, and almost an entire bottle of glue had flowed out of the bottle, forming a translucent blue puddle all around our elderly, sleeping, long-furred cat.

At that moment, only one thought went through my head:

"Why am I the only adult here right now?"

I spent about 5 seconds assessing the situation. If the cat woke up, she'd freak out and track glue all over the entire apartment. My only hope was to get her into the tub and wash out the glue without getting glue anywhere else, and then come back to clean the chair. So I turned on the TV and said (in my least concerned voice), "Hey, would you like to watch a kids' show?" Of course my son did, so I put him on the couch and turned on Noggin. Then I went into the bathroom and filled the tub halfway with tepid water and stacked two clean towels by the tub. I got another towel and snuck up on the cat, grabbed her and rolled her in the towel so she couldn't escape, hustled her to the bathroom, and unrolled her into the tub of water.

Here was where the plan could have fallen apart: I'm not that familiar with the properties of Pentel glue. If it had been Elmer's I wouldn't have been worried. But I was a little scared that Pentel wouldn't wash out of the cat's fur without a big fight. I was ready to do a bunch of shampoos with the health food store baby shampoo if I had to. I'm not a big fan of declawing cats, but I was suddenly very glad that my cat's first human servants had declawed her.

When she hit the water she was pissed off. And not in a good way. She fought me like only a 4-pound, declawed, geriatric cat with a thyroid condition can. By fighting so hard, though, she helped wash the glue out of her fur more quickly and the traumatic degluing only took a few minutes. (In hindsight I think the Pentel probably washed out more easily than Elmer's would have. So remember that if you need to glue any cat fur.) Then I toweled her off (she looked like a drowned rat, poor thing) and let her go sulk near the radiator.

The hardest part was over, so I got a bunch of rags and a bucket of water to go attack the glue on the armchair.

When I got back to the living room, my son had forgotten about the mess and moved closer to the TV. He was sitting smack dab in the puddle of glue.

* I am the kind of person who can't watch movies such as Jurassic Park because I get so angry at the plot points that are so clearly bad ideas. When they decided to inject the dinosaur DNA into the fly I was screaming "This is a bad idea! It will not end well!" at the screen. My friend made me leave the theater (I've still never seen the movie all the way through). So you'd think I would have stopped myself from unscrewing the top of the glue bottle for a 2 1/2 year-old. And yet, somehow I didn't.

** See * above.

Anyone else like to share a story?

Comments

[Sar]

Oh my! I have tears streaming down my face! I've been up with the little one since 4.10 am, it's his 1st birthday and I'm exhausted and I so needed this! Thanks so much for the laugh!!!!!!!

[rowan+keaton+mama]

Quiet prayerful reflection at Easter Sunday Mass. The consecration. Deafening, squirting poop that only a two month old breast fed baby can produce after the 3rd day of a poop strike, echoes throughout in the silence. And for, I don't know, maybe the 2 parishioners that didn't hear it- they certainly heard the 2 year old yell "I call him a stinkweed cause he poops a lot!" Churches have excellent acoustics...

[Today Wendy]

This one happened a few months ago. We'd had a whole lot of not sleeping going around and were doing some prep work for getting Elli to sleep in her own room...so my husband was sleeping on the sofa right by the kitchen. I was just getting up, and Elli was signing for a drink, so I handed her a cup of water, she hates sippy cups so it was a regular cup, and she heads right over the the sofa to give her dad a drink. Except that he's lying down. Asleep. Turns out that having a toddler wake you up by pouring a cup of cold water on your face isn't a recipe for cheerful.
Then she came right back over to me and asked for a refill...

[lydia]

This one happened just yesterday. Always be prepared when leaving the house with kids who are 3 and 1, that's my motto....now. My car keys disappeared (?!?!) on the way out of our music class.

As I mentally ran through my options I realized: my cell phone was home on it's charger, the stroller was in the driveway. I didn't even have any money for the bus. Or a fresh diaper for the baby who had just pooped.

My only redemption was that I HAD packed a snack for both kids (and that I WAS able to reach my husband on a borrowed cell phone, who was able to leave work with a spare key.)

Finally, in all my confusion, I lost track of the baby for one very horrifying moment. What the parents in the class after ours must have thought, I don't know.

So, not my favorite story, in fact I'm still trying to recover. I may leave the house again next year.

[noodlemama]

For those of you concerned about the relative dearth of scatological anecdotes:
It was a couple of months into mat leave, on one of those rare days that I felt semi-competent at parenting and the noodle was especially cheerful. I managed to get her down for a nap *not* on me and even had a load of wash going. It looked like we'd make it to my PT appt on time for once (FWIW, anyone who anticipates a c-section saving them from major pelvic trauma, I would recommend having it *before* going through 27 hours of labor with the child's cranium at a +2, screwed into your cervix like a lightbulb in a socket. ahem. anyway...).

I popped some leftovers easily eaten single-handed with a fork into the microwave while congratulating myself on synching the BFing so Lefty was next up, so I could feed the kid after the nap while feeding myself with my free right hand. Went out to put the laundry in the dryer and the diaper bag in the car.

Came back in to scoop the noodle up from the rapidly ending nap. Changed diaper, put going-out clothes on. Heard an explosive poop. Got ready to change her diaper again. Decided, since she had just pooped and peed and since her butt was looking a little red today, why not use this moment to multi-task and give her tummy-time and naked-butt time simultaneously while I finished getting ready to go?

Set the noodle up on a water-proof mat w/ tummy toy in front of her and little heater/fan blowing delicious warm air over her naked tuchus from behind. Ran to hit start on the microwave and quickly pee.
Wondered, distractedly, what might happen on the off chance that actual sh-t were to hit an actual fan. Heard yet another explosive BF'd poop sound just before I hit the flush on the toilet. Pulled up my pants and ran in to learn the answer.

Thank goodness the artillery was offset about 15 degrees: the poop landed as far as five feet away, *past* the fan, and fortunately almost entirely onto the hardwood floor and (already) yellow parts of the rug. Resolved to never attempt to multitask again.

Also, as much as it seemed like sort of a blessing that the noodle was on a poop strike during the entire 7 day vacation we took when she was four months old, the karma boomeranged when the strike ended in the airport just before we got on the plane: poop up to her ears, literally. I didn't even mind the horrified looks of the stream of moms who came into the bathroom in hopes of using the changing table we were in the process of defiling, because at least it didn't happen 20 minutes later on the plane.

[zgma]

1) My older son has a tendency to only half wake when he needs to pee, and consequently he can be somewhat disoriented. Once he came out and started to pee in the dining room trash can. Another time he was about to pee on the couch, and my husband sitting on it (but luckily my husband led him to the bathroom in time). I apparently did this as a kid too, and once when my parents had company, I went out to the living room and peed on the rug in front of everyone.

2) one day when my now-toddler was 6 months old or so, and teething, he was on the floor, and my husband and I weren't paying that close attention except that both of us thought, when he stopped fussing, "Oh good, he's gotten distracted from his teething."

Well, after a while we looked over and realized what it was that was distracting him.... it was one of the dog's dirty, chewed up rawhide bones. When I looked over, A. was happily munching on it, going "mmm... mmm... mmm..." with every munch. Ewww!!!!!! I ran over and took it out of his mouth, and he had clearly been working on it for a while because the end of it was all soft.

Afterwards, I realized I should have gotten a picture of it - for posterity, something to show his girlfriends in 15 years, etc. I even thought of staging it - i.e., giving him back the disgusting bone to chew on, just so I could get a picture of it, but I was so grossed out by the whole thing that I couldn't bring myself to do it.

[zgma]

1) My older son has a tendency to only half wake when he needs to pee, and consequently he can be somewhat disoriented. Once he came out and started to pee in the dining room trash can. Another time he was about to pee on the couch, and my husband sitting on it (but luckily my husband led him to the bathroom in time). I apparently did this as a kid too, and once when my parents had company, I went out to the living room and peed on the rug in front of everyone.

2) one day when my now-toddler was 6 months old or so, and teething, he was on the floor, and my husband and I weren't paying that close attention except that both of us thought, when he stopped fussing, "Oh good, he's gotten distracted from his teething."

Well, after a while we looked over and realized what it was that was distracting him.... it was one of the dog's dirty, chewed up rawhide bones. When I looked over, A. was happily munching on it, going "mmm... mmm... mmm..." with every munch. Ewww!!!!!! I ran over and took it out of his mouth, and he had clearly been working on it for a while because the end of it was all soft.

Afterwards, I realized I should have gotten a picture of it - for posterity, something to show his girlfriends in 15 years, etc. I even thought of staging it - i.e., giving him back the disgusting bone to chew on, just so I could get a picture of it, but I was so grossed out by the whole thing that I couldn't bring myself to do it.

[Aaron]

@zgma - I relayed a story about our daughter trying to eat the dog food ealier in this post. Well, after reading your idea of staging your son and taking a pic I have to admit that the next time she b-lined for the dog dishes I sent my DH running for the camera and we let her get a few in her mouth and got some pics before fishing them out. Does that make us bad parents :~) ??

[Cathy]

Heya Moxie, well I guess your story inspires me to tell a quick one about my cats and getting "slimed", so to speak.

My husband and I were repainting our entire upstairs and of course were very careful to have the cats downstairs whilst we toiled, so as to not let them get near wet paint. Well, one night, we had just a bit left to do in the utility room so we just kinda quickly whipped out all the necessaries, started to go to town on that last little section. Midway through, I headed downstairs to switch over a load of laundry from wash to dry. As I'm heading back up our oak stairs, I see little itty-bitty gray paw prints that had just preceded me. Still wet. Ick, oh boy, so we have to proceed to look for that cat, but he was pretty easy to find as he had left a trail, all up and down the oak stairs, into the garage, up my husband's black Ford Ranger (windshield and hood), and then all across my BRAND NEW Passat Station Wagon, and there he sat in all his goopy glory, at the top of my hood, with a definite shite eating grin. I know, right?

Well, it was pretty hard to decide what to panic and wipe down first, but we opted for the cat. He was, surprisingly good about it, (this cat really is a good vet goer and other surprising things, let's you pick ticks right off, no squirming, no nothing), so that was the easy part. Suffice it to say, that part of the room never got painted that night as we labored over easily 500 little footprints in numerous pricey areas of our collective net worth. And a good time was had by all, (not really). Thanks for the springboard to amusing memories.

[Amy]

I'm late again, damn internet.

When you can't find your 7 year old's tooth under his pillow, you might casually ask him if he put it somewhere besides under his pillow. It is no fun to call the doctor 4 days later when word finally gets back to you through the grandparents that he placed said tooth in his EAR... and it is still there.

[Mandy]

I share this story on my mom's behalf, as I don't (yet) have a better one to share about my own kids.

I was about 2 1/2 she says, and fascinated with letters. She'd been working in the kitchen and realized it had been quiet for some time and she wasn't exactly sure where I was.

As she walked down the hall toward the bedrooms she heard "here's an A.....there's a Z....and a P.....OH! Here's a D..."

She realized I was in the bathroom, walked around the corner, startled me when she started to ask "what are you..."

FLUSH!!!!

Down the drain went the boggle game.

When she finished her question, I told her I was making alphabet soup.

Thankfully, she caught me before I was done cooking.

[wynlatte]

This was yesterday. DS, 9 months old, was cruising around in his walker on the back patio. He stops at one of the patio chairs with a cushion on it. His back is to me. One of the dogs is sitting next to the chair. DS LOVES his puppies and when one is still enough and close enough for him to pet, he usually squeals with delight. But he's very quiet right now. This is my 3rd boy and I know that quiet is not good. So I go over to him to find him gnawing on a dead lizard. Obviously, I "freak right out" (ask Moxie would say), yank it away from him and try to wash his happy, giggling mouth out. Apparently, the dog had killed it and given it to the baby. I knew the baby and dog had begun offering each other their toys, but REALLY.