The Flies

After the ants were mostly gone, I started to relax, and I finally stopped sleeping with the Windex bottle. I thought we were finished from annoying bugs once and for all, but I was wrong. One morning I woke up and came downstairs for breakfast to find 6 or 7 flies swarming around the kitchen and living room. We had been married for 4 years, and had still never purchased a fly swatter. I’d seen Kasey kill the flies with a towel before, so I attempted to do the same. It turned out to be a lot harder than it looked. I spent close to a half hour chasing one fly around. Finally I saw it land on the cupboard and I moved in for the attack. Before that fly knew what hit him, he was on the counter, dead… well almost. The humane thing would have been to just kill the poor guy, but I didn’t want to smash him with toilet paper because then I could feel it squish between my fingers and I hate that feeling. So I did what any sensible girl would have done, and covered it with a glass. I’m pretty sure it died a few seconds later, but then I still had the problem of a dead fly on my counter, and I would still have to pick it up with some toilet paper or something. So after several minutes of contemplating the dead fly under the glass, I made the decision to leave it there until Kasey arrived home from work.

The next few weeks were spent fighting the flies. Our battle strategy consisted of following the flies around with our eyes until they landed, then smacking them as hard as we could with a wet rag. The kids became just as obsessed with it as Kasey and I. Cody would run around the house with a rag screaming, “Where is it Mom?! Where is it?!” Then he would pretend to find the fly, fling the rag into the air, and bend down to pick up the phantom bug. Throughout the day, Isabella would randomly point in the air and yell, “Right there! Right there!” About this same time, Cody had two incidences where he was stung right on the face by bees. Surprisingly, he still wasn’t terrified of flying insects, but they definitely made him very uncomfortable. Now every time he saw a fly, he would freak out and shout, “There’s a bee!!”

The laundry was starting to be filled up with fly rags so fast that I couldn’t keep up with it all. We would go through seven or eight in one afternoon. I had a fly swatter on my grocery list every single week, but I would somehow forget to grab one every time I went to the store. So one Saturday night we spent our date time searching for a fly swatter, combing the entire Walmart, and asking every sales associate we could find. Each helpful Walmart employee had another suggestion of where we could look, but we were continually disappointed at every new department. Our search was in vain, so we continued to fight our war with nothing but rags.

the Ants

When we first moved into our new town home, we loved everything about it, except for one thing: the ants. We had ants everywhere. One morning we woke up and there was a huge train of ants crawling across our living room carpet from the front door clear into the kitchen. I think the entire ant hill had shown up for the party. The first day or so we contacted our landlord who told us that the pest control man would be coming in a few days and the problem should be resolved. So we decided not to buy any expensive product to rid ourselves of the obnoxious insects, and just endure for a few days. We did, however, try every home remedy we could find. The only thing that seemed to work a little was putting Comet in all the corners and cracks where the walls met the floor. Windex, we found, also kills ants on site. I constantly had a bottle of Windex in my hand. I ran around all day squirting ants like a maniac. Finally the day of the pest control man arrived. We anxiously awaited the hour when all the ants would magical disappear. Apparently, that is not how pest control works. The day following the service, the ants were worse than ever. There were now ants coming out of the carpet in the middle of the floor where there was not even any access to outside. I had no idea how that was even possible. And the worst was yet to come. I was making ramen noodles for Cody and Isabella’s lunch. Ramen is their favorite lunch time meal and it had been a long time since we had it so they were bouncing up and down with excitement. The noodles were done and I poured it into their individual bowls and added an ice cube. As I was stirring, I noticed little black flakes throughout the noodles. I decided it was probably some of the spices in the spice packet, but when I lifted the spoon to my lips I saw a boiled, shriveled, dead ant about to go in my mouth. Naturally, I screamed, and made both of the babies start to cry. After calming them down, I looked through the rest of the noodles and saw that there were dead ants throughout the entire package. I threw the noodles down the drain and ran to check the rest of the ramen packages I had bought. The entire box had been raided by little ants who were now enjoying Cody and Isabella’s noodles. In frustration I tossed the box outside onto the back porch and sprayed the whole bottle of Windex on it. When Kasey got home I forgot to tell him to go take care of the contaminated Ramen box so it sat there for several days. We finally broke down and spent a few bucks on some ant traps, and almost immediately the ant issue was resolved. I shouldn’t be complaining because I have never had cockroaches, rats, tarantulas, scorpions, or any other really disgusting and dangerous pests. I should be happy that ants are the worst living things that penetrate the walls of my house. But somehow, it’s hard for me to be excited about an army of ants invading my personal space and eating all of my Ramen noodles.

Midnight Madness

One summer night Cody woke up with a hacking cough. This had become a regular occurrence, and I got up to try to calm him down. The only one thing that consistently seemed to stop the cough was to help him drink a sip of water every time he felt the need to cough. But even that was not working. I finally decided to take him downstairs and rock him until he could relax and go back to sleep.

Groggily, Kasey came staggering out of our room to try to help. Kasey is usually a very kind, gentle, understanding father, but when he gets woke up late at night, I would rather face an angry grizzly bear. So while I was desperately trying to keep Cody calm, Kasey was chasing him around the house and threatening him. He kept saying things like, “If you don’t stop coughing and crying, I’m going to drop you on your head!” This just upset Cody all the worse. He started running around in circles, whimpering like a little puppy, and trying to hide between my legs.

The one miracle of the night was that although Isabella shares a room with Cody, she stayed sound asleep in her crib the entire night. She was zonked, spread eagle on her tummy with her little head on the opposite end as the pillow, and her cheek pressed right up against the hard plastic head of her little dollie.

Kasey finally pulled himself together enough to start making comments that were at least halfway helpful rather than just empty threats. He looked at Cody and calmly said, “Cody, you have to stop coughing or you are going to make yourself throw up.” Right as he said this, Cody coughed especially hard and Kasey’s prophecy was fulfilled. Both Cody and I had to go change our pajamas. Luckily, my shirt caught most of the throw up and at least the carpet was saved.

After we got cleaned up, I took him in my arms and had a sweet moment with my son. I cradled him close and sang to him the songs I used to sing while I rocked him to sleep as an infant. At that moment I realized again how quickly life goes by and how precious it really is. About an hour later, Cody finally relaxed and fell asleep in my arms. I kissed his forehead and laid him gently back in his little toddler bed. I crawled back into my own bed and immediately started dreaming.

I was again awoken, this time by a blood curdling scream and, once again, bolted out of bed. I ran in to see what was going on. Cody was dancing around his bed shouting, “OWIE! OWIE!” I could tell that he was not fully awake, but I tried to talk to him anyway, and ask him where he was hurting. After a few tries, I finally figured out that he was hurting under his diaper. He is fully potty trained, but after drinking so much water earlier to try and stop the cough, I decided it would be safest to put on a diaper. I laid him down on the bed and opened the diaper to try and figure out the cause of his discomfort. And then, the unexpected happened. While my brain was very slowly registering what was going on, (it was very late after all) I felt a warm wet spray of liquid soak my new shirt. I had previously experienced this sensation, around the same time of night, about two years before. In fact, it happened often to my husband and I as new parents of a baby boy. My brain finally told my hands what to do, and I threw the diaper back around him. When he was finished peeing, I took his clothes off and ran to go change my own shirt, again. Kasey had gotten up in the meantime and when I came back into Cody’s room, he was staring at me incredulously and asked, “Why in the world is Cody in here by himself without any clothes on!??” Kasey often has the same problem that Cody just experienced of only waking up half way in the middle of the night so, try as he might, he could not figure out what I was telling him. I turned him back around and told him to please just go back to bed. He obeyed, and I proceeded to strip the sheets off the bed and get some new ones. Of course, none of the sheets that I could find were satisfactory to Cody, so we spent a few minutes trying to find something that he would be happy with. Finally I got him all settled back in bed, and just as he was about to slip into a deep slumber, he started coughing again.

The Dishwasher

I went to the dishwasher and opened it slowly. With a two and a half year old and an 18 month old, you never know what you’ll find when you open the dishwasher to unload it. This day wasn’t too bad. I only found a sheriff car stuffed in the box where the silverware goes. What you find in the dishwasher can never be as bad as what shows up in the dryer, however. A blue crayon or new tube of chapstick does much more damage to a load of white clothes than a small metal car can do to a plate.

So I called for Cody and Isabella to come help me empty the dish washer like I do every day. Or three or four times a day, depending on how many loads of dishes I end up doing. Today was not unusual. The two toddlers came running in, excited and ready to help.

We always start with the silverware, because if I’m not watching, the silverware can quickly become more than just eating utensils. Cody thinks everything should be a weapon of some sort. I never knew how destructive a seemingly innocent butter knife could be until it got in the hands of a curious two year old. So far I’ve managed to keep it away from anything that could be destroyed too badly by it… like Isabella’s eyes. But I have had to use the phrase, “We NEVER use silverware to fight” more than I ever expected.

After the silverware is safely stored in the highest drawer, we move on to the plates and cups and other various dishware items. I have to move fast here too. If I don’t, I often find one of my nicest glassware pieces hanging precariously from little Isabella’s pinky finger, or one of my nice plates balanced on top of Cody’s head.

We finished up the job with minimal damage, and moved on to another activity. Later in the evening I went to set the table and noticed that there were no serving spoons in the silverware tray. After looking for several minutes in all the drawers I could think of, Cody waltzed into the kitchen, gave a little bow, and said, “Here you go my lady,” as he handed me the entire supply of large spoons that had apparently been resting in the back of his fire truck/ bicycle that he rides around the kitchen terrorizing Isabella by threatening to run over her little toes. It’s never done in anger or cruelty, he just thinks it’s funny to watch her run for her life and yell like there is a snarling Rottweiler behind her.

By this time, you’re probably asking why I would ever let my two little children help me empty the dishwasher. By this time, I’m actually asking myself the same question.