The Basketball Star

I meant to share this yesterday, but you know how life goes. Your work computer breaks then you have to wait for them to overnight you a new one, and then you have to assemble it and redo all your shortcuts and bookmarked links, and before you know it the work day is over and you have to cook dinner. Geez … anyway ... sharing time!

Do the males in your life enjoy shooting garbage into the garbage can? You know basketball style … because mine do. And usually if it’s some wadded up paper I don’t have an issue with it – until Tuesday.

You’re going to love this. I promise.

Younger Boy did a walk by Tuesday informing me “I have to go poop.” He’s still telling me that he needs a wipe, in which I respond with “OK, You know how to wipe yourself.” We’ve developed a sort of step-by-step procedure.

Step One: Wipe
Step Two: Put dirty toilet paper in toilet.
Step Three: Wipe again just to make sure
Step Four: Put dirty toilet paper in toilet
Step Five: Pull up underwear and pants
Step Six: Flush toilet
Step Seven: Wash hands with soap.

I usually try to make it over there during the second wipe just to make sure that he’s getting it all. (And he’s been really good about getting it all too!) However when I wandered over there I got a great surprise. I peered around the corner just in time to watch Younger Boy shooting Poop Wads into the toilet.

I kid you not – the kid wiped, stood up, backed up across the bathroom floor, and threw a poop wad free throw over toward the toilet bowl. Except he missed! I kind of cringed as I imagined all the possible poop smears that I haven’t cleaned up yet. I also wondered where my Clorox Anywhere had gone to so that I could effectively clean up any poop smears or germs that ricocheted off the rim of the toilet bowl.

I couldn’t help it, but I had to end that practice of shooting poop wads into the toilet. Step Two and Step Four have now been revised to “Drop dirty toilet paper in toilet,” and luckily (as far as I know) Younger Boy has been complying.

I’ve considered drawing out these steps and taping them up on the bathroom wall to help him remember. (He’s still a little fuzzy on the washing hands with soap part.) I’ve yet to tell my fiancé about this incident. I keep forgetting, but hey, now he can read about it!

I’m wondering what other fun things Younger Boy has up his sleeve in terms of mystery bathroom activities.

Happy (Puking) Monday!

I don’t think that I enjoy Sunday’s anymore. The kids always pick Sunday night as the night to get sick. By “get sick” I mean to puke all night long, all over the place. And Monday morning hurts after a night of kids puking. If I’m not up helping to clean it up, I’m sleeping restlessly with an open ear to hear the “I’m about to puke” cough.

Younger Boy and Older Boy are both sick.

It started last night around 10-something in the PM while driving home from my parents house. My parents babysat the boys so that my fiancé and I could go out to dinner with an old friend from back in the day. Older Boy was complaining that his stomach hurt and that he felt sick. We weren’t quite sure what it was, but we were driving home. That’s when I heard that lovely “getting sick” cough. I turned around and there’s Younger Boy puking in his lap. We rolled the windows down and luckily we were near a gas station.

Unluckily the bathrooms were blocked off and out of order. Unluckily, we’d accidentally left the extra pair of Younger Boy’s clothes at my parents (he was in his pajamas). Unluckily that gas station sucked and didn’t carry hand wipes or anything useful for cleaning up and airing out the puke smell from the car. Luckily for us Younger Boy’s puking expedition was limited to his lap and his car seat.

We got home and Younger Boy got a shower. We tucked them all in, I gave my spiel about how ‘If you have to puke do it in this little garbage can here and come get us. And if you hear Younger Boy puking come get us.” I went into the bathroom to take my contacts out and washed my eye make up off. I came out to find Older Boy with his head in the trashcan (out in the kitchen) and was met by Middle Boy who informed me that Younger Boy had puked again.

We had another round of cleaning and everyone was off to bed. At this point I kind of chuckled to myself. My supervisor had told me “Kids puke all the time” as we were writing up my new job description before I left. I had taken that with a grain of salt, but considering all the puke I’ve been cleaning up the past week I’m wondering if there’s actual validity to it or if she jinxed/cursed me with her guarantee. Either way, I’m up to my elbows in puke today. Even better was when Fat Cat decided that she ought to puke too. Luckily I stopped her from jumping onto the carpet and made her puke on top of the table. At least table tops can be wiped up and then wiped down with Clorox Anywhere.

This morning I found Older Boy sitting on the couch. Just sitting there.

Me: You need to get back into bed.
OB: I threw up
Me: What do you mean you threw up? Where?
OB: I threw up on my bed
Me: You threw up on your bed and you decided to just sit on the couch and not tell us?
OB: *shrugs shoulders*
Me: Did you get any of it in the garbage can next to your bed?
OB: No
Me: What did we tell you last night? Do you remember?
OB: *Shakes head yes, in that confused diagonal yes but maybe no*
Me: What did we tell you last night?
OB: *stares at me like a deer caught in the headlights*
Me: You said you remembered. What did we tell you last night?
OB: To come get you if I puked.

I could not believe it. After the reminder of last night he managed to do nada of it. He threw up next to the garbage can, and the best is that he just went out to the living room and sat on the couch allowing the smell of puke to fill the room and sink into the bedsheets. Luckily I had cracked the window to air it out last night. The boy is almost nine years old and sometimes he acts like he's the least responsible of all of them. I understand that he's never been challenged to be independent before or to hold himself accountable, but in the last six/seven months that I've been here he's learned quite a bit that he now is.

He cleaned it up (was told that he had to clean it up). And after I gave him a good example of how to clean it up right he finished it up a lot sooner. He then was sent back to bed to sleep some more. He was not pleased, but neither were my future hubby and I.

Luckily for me, my fiancé is on vacation so he’s helping to take care of Middle Boy (who isn’t sick anymore). Older Boy and Younger Boy have been instructed to sleep and take it easy all day. I’m hoping and crossing my fingers that whatever they have is somewhat related to what Middle Boy suffered from last week. If so, then that means that they’ll be up and bouncing back to normal by tomorrow (after a day of soup and rest). If not then I’m not sure what we’ll do.

Older Boy’s birthday party is supposed to happen tomorrow. We’re supposed to leave for vacation Thursday. Our Engagement Photoshoot and Family Photoshoot are Sunday down in So Cal. (Sidenote – Younger Boy’s nose actually looks pretty decent and if there is redness I’m sure I can find a foundation to cover it with. I’ve already told my fiancé that the boy is getting make up on him.)

Welcome to Motherhood Crys! Just another one of those initiation rights of passage I guess. Right?

So that’s my Monday. (Can I have a glass of wine yet?) Happy Monday everyone! Hopefully yours is full of less puke than mine.

The Latest Adventure In Potty Training

Some Of My Favorite Things
Let me start off by saying that ever since I’ve become a stepmother I have made quite a few (a lot) of realizations (changes) about the most randomness things – particularly products and their effectiveness.

Here are some of my new found favorite things, and why.

OxyClean: I enjoyed your oxygen cleaning power before for doing laundry, but I had no idea how wonderful you really were for removing potential stain makers from my carpet. I mean, just look at my strong and brave beige carpet. I bet you wouldn’t be able to tell that it had previous encounters with cherry and grape popsicle juice, Flamin’ Hot Cheetos vomit, or chocolate frosting.

Distilled White Vinegar: Your are a fairly recent discovery and latest love of my life. You kill and removes mold oh so well! For details read this.

Scotch Brite Scrubbing Pads: How I love that I can cut you up into tiny, little pieces to scrub away the awfulness of mold, chewed bubble gum, sticky and wet lollypops and vomit. And I don’t feel guilty about throwing you away after one use. Gone are the days of watching my hard earn cash go into the trash when I had to use a dish washing sponge.

Clorox Anywhere Hard Surfaces: You are by far one of my favorites that I hold dear to my heart! In fact, I don’t know what I would do if you were not in my life (the thought is blasphemy against life itself!!!) You clean and sanitize Anything and Everything (well except Sharpe marker, but I can forgive you for that) off of my floors, counter tops, tables and chairs. Especially all the fresh and the somewhat dried foods and sauces that Younger Boy insists on decorating furniture with!

Clorox Disinfecting Wipes: You! Wonderful, Fabulous You! A tie with your hardworking sibling Clorox Anywhere Hard Surface as one that I hold dear to my heart! You have yet to let me down! (Except probably now that I have used the last of you and longingly stare at your empty carton wishing I could will more of you to form inside.)

And Clorox Disinfecting Wipes brings me to my latest instant mom experience and inspiration for this post my dear friends.

Past Occurrences
As you are all aware, I’ve been diligently potty-training Younger Boy. In fact, we’re working on wiping and leaving our pants on around our ankles instead of stripping down butt naked when needing to use the bathroom. In fact, I’m fairly convinced that Younger Boy is working rather intensely toward trying to make me lose my mind. (What he doesn’t know is that I already lost it a long ago and only pretend that I have one.) I say this because he really likes to wait for us to be alone to pull out whatever challenge he’s going to bust out for the day.

Past Occurrences include this, this, this, and oh yes, this.

Others include the infamous Cantaloupe Stand-Off. (If I’ve already told this story I apologize. You may skip down to The Latest Occurrence.) You see, Younger Boy very much enjoys stuffing his cheeks with food. I think he’s part squirrel or something and he’s saving up to snack on this hidden food later. Anyway, one day he shoved four small pieces of cantaloupe in his cheeks. He chewed that stuff for a good 15 to 20 minutes. Within those 15 to 20 minutes he proceeded to tell me reasons why he couldn’t possibly swallow it.

1.It was too hot.
2.It was too cold.
3.It hurt him.
4.It was too slimy/mushy
5.It’s just not fair *followed by a head down on the table and an exasperated sigh of frustration.*

I did, however, win that stand off. I offered a fresh (non-floating particle filled) glass of water in exchange for him swallowing it. He swallowed it.

The Latest Occurrence
I again, was listening in to my weekly meeting when I hear Younger Boy go running by me with his hands holding his butt wailing “I haaave to go pooooo pooooo.”

I responded with my usual, “Then go pooooo pooooo” and resumed listening in to my meeting. About 7 minutes had passed when I thought, “Hrm, I should go check on him. He hasn’t asked for help to wipe yet.” I round the corner to the bathroom, which had a closed door by the way. My heart began to race. I open it up, peer around and was lucky that the phone was on mute.

There he was, stamping my bathroom floor with beautiful, brown poop stamps. He’d already smeared it across the bathroom seat getting on and off (which leads me to believe it had started to poke out during his insistence of removing his pants and socks before climbing up on the toilet. And for some reason had plopped his poop covered little butt down on the floor, twice. Do I even dare mention that about 1/4 of the toilet paper roll was in the toilet?

I once again, my talented self, attended my meeting while I helped him clean up. At this point he’s actually a pro at taking showers and using soapy hands to wipe himself clean in the shower. All the while, with the assistance of my two favorite cleaning items from Clorox, I scrubbed and wiped and sanitized my bathroom.

Do I even dare mention that while I was assisting Younger Boy to get his hands all nice and soapy I turned around to find the cat examining one of the poop stamps? Oh yes, the cat was sniffing and was just about to examine it with his paw with I performed *now imagine this in slow motion* a swooping down motion with my hand to bat him away while saying “Nooo, Dooon’t touch thaaat you naaasty caaat.” All of this while holding the phone to my ear.

So there you go – my latest experience with Potty-Training Younger Boy, and a list of my favorite things that in my opinion anyone with kids (or pets) should most likely have in their home. I even took a photo for you so that you'll know exactly what products to look for.

Me Against The Green Fuzz

Whoa, has it been a whirlwind of a week. I’ve been trying to figure out just what to write about, as there is so much to write about.

I thought about venting about how we had to gently remind the kids of things they had forgotten after being at Jane’s for five days. In short, Younger Boy forgot how to use the bathroom for about a day and a half, Middle Boy forgot how to listen, and Older Boy forgot about the meaning of “being responsible for your things.” All, of which, have been re-established within the last three to four days.

I thought about sharing about Middle Boy’s last minute birthday party so that my almost-in-laws could attend. In short, my family and my fiancé’s family all met, got along well, and all fears of religious arguments (his mom is Mormon, the rest of his family isn’t very religious, my family was brought up Roman Catholic, yet now are more WBF Catholics (Wedding-Baptism-Funeral Catholics) and We-have-our-own-spiritual-ideas people.

I even considered venting about how during the party my almost-Mother-In-Law looked me square in the eye and said, “You know Crys, my boy didn’t start drinking until he met you…..We have alcoholism in our family….please keep an eye on him.” In short, I was proud of myself for holding my tongue and note telling her exactly how responsible and moderately her son does drink compared to the binge drinking I saw in college. I answered with a “He’s actually very responsible, doesn’t drink often, and I have alcoholism in my family too so we actually do make sure to be responsible about our drinking habits.” By that I mean I do enjoy a drink now and then; and a beer after a very hard day of work. We are, however, having a kid-free birthday bash in which I plan on getting pretty happy off of my champagne punch recipe.

But what I really want to tell you about is the green fuzz. And by “green fuzz” I mean “mold” on my window sills.

My apartment complex believes in using single-pane windows. And lately, it’s been cold. Not Michigan Winter Cold, but Northern California Cold so about 40 degrees Fahrenheit at the average cold. I put up thermal curtains to keep the cold out and the warmth in. Back to those single-pane windows, they participate in condensation like they’re getting paid by the hour to do it. Nestled behind those wonderful curtains caused a wonderful little Biology mold-growing experiment on the window sills and all around the side of the window. Well, I have asthma, and in addition to the kids being sick, I about freaked out.

My fiancé went down to the office to say something and instead got a 5-minute spiel about how “The entire complex experiences this” and even received tips on how to deal with it and prevent it. I told him that they either have this special spiel memorized, have already recited it quite a bit since the Northern California Cold set in, or a combination of the both.

I spent last night defending my family from the mold. I really needed a mask or something, but I did pull on the blue washing gloves. I also had to stop at some point because it was making my lungs hurt. It wasn't a major occupation of green fuzz, but a light sprinkling of it. Still, it sucked.

I did do a bit of research on natural remedies to kill and prevent mold. With all of us and the cats in the house, I didn’t want really harmful or strong chemicals flowing through our respiratory systems, especially since it was night time. Instead, I opted to use straight vinegar with some lavender essential oil mixed in. I highly recommend it if you ever need to fight off mold. It killed it, removed it, and the lavender oil helped subdue the bitter scent of vinegar.

Now my single-pane windows no longer have the curtains up. Those are being washed as I figure out a Mold-Free Prevention Plan of action against the green fuzz. I’m still debating whether to put them back up or not. I’m thinking of keeping them up in the bedrooms, but since the windows in the living room are a pain in my rear, I’m considering just freezing in the morning while I work and waiting for it to warm up by afternoon time.

As for my Mold-Free Prevention Plan, I’m really not excited about getting to wipe down windows that seem to drip with water and condensation all day long. I’m also not keen on getting to clean my windows with my vinegar lavender solution everyday in effort to keep it clean and mold-free. However, for my families’ health, I’ll do it.

So, does anyone have any experience in keeping windows dry?