Gagging

As a two year old, Isabella had the most sensitive gag reflex of any one I have ever met. She would gag over anything and everything. I would be sitting next to her and eating something that she thought looked gross and she would start gagging, even if it was something she had never tried before! She would gag if she got too much food in her mouth, or if she was tired of what she was eating. She would gag over any little smell as well.

After we potty trained Bell, we always had her call for us to come and wipe her, especially if she had pooped. One day, about two months after she was officially potty trained, she decided to be independent and get off her princess fairy potty seat by herself. I found her walking into the kitchen with poop all down her leg and on her hand. I immediately rushed her back into the bathroom and made her stand by the toilet while I cleaned her up. She had made quite the mess. Not only was it on her hand and legs, but she had somehow slid off the seat so the whole toilet was covered as well as the step stool and some of the wall. It wasn’t exactly a scentless poop either. It had been a really long, tiring, frustrating day, but still, I was managing to be fairly patient with Bell. As we were cleaning her all off she yelled, “Mom it stinks!” and proceeded to gag several times in a row. I knew what was coming next and before I could stop her, she gagged so hard that she threw up all over the floor. I now had poop and throw up covering the entire bathroom. I ended up just throwing her in the bath and using almost an entire container of Clorox wipes for the bathroom.

One night Bellie and Cody were in the bathtub together. I was washing Bellie’s hair while Cody was playing nicely in the water with his bath toys. All of the sudden he laid down in the water and folded his whole body in half so the only thing that was facing us was his little bum. I couldn’t figure out why he was doing that and I told him to sit up. A couple of seconds later Bell started to gag like crazy. Then I smelled it too. We figured out pretty quick what he was doing in that position, and both of us girls were not very happy about it. Cody had been known to have some pretty rank toots, but this one topped them all. We both started yelling at him and Bellie couldn’t stop gagging. I decided I better get her mind off of it quick or she would throw up again, so I changed the subject as fast as I could. Luckily it worked, and we avoided another vomiting incident. 

Plant Killer

Some people have black thumbs. Some people have very green thumbs. My mom, for instance, could keep any plant alive and thriving no matter what. She would have the same non-flowering plant for ten years, one day decide she wanted it to blossom, the next day cast her magic, and the next day have a beautiful fragrant, flowering blossom! I, unfortunately, did not inherit this useful trait. My thumb isn’t quite black, it’s more like a dirty brownish-grey. I can keep a plant alive, but just barely. All my plants are always hanging on for dear life and preparing themselves to see their last day of sunshine, only to find themselves waking up the next morning in the same, miserable, wilting state. I think if plants really had emotions, what I do to them would be considered cruel and unusual punishment.

I’ve never mean to be a plant torturer. I try to water them faithfully and give them sunlight and oxygen, but somehow, plants never thrive under my care. I had a daisy that I kept in a happy yellow pot for four years and the little plant never bloomed once after I started taking care of it.

When Kasey and I first were married we bought a “love fern”. I got the idea from a movie I liked as a teenager. If our love fern was any indication of how our marriage would turn out, we were in serious trouble. I had to keep buying new ones because they kept dying on me. Finally I just gave up on ferns altogether.

My family always had a large beautiful garden growing up. So one summer I decided it was time for our family to try a small one. We were very transient college students so for three years our garden consisted of a few pots with one tomato plant, one parsley plant, and a basil plant. The first year I got four tomatoes from my plant. Two of them got eaten by some nasty bug before they were even ripe, one of them was spread proudly on a green salad, and the other sat in the window sill waiting for me to use it until it went rotten and I had to throw it away. The second year wasn’t much different. The fourth year we had some crazy neighbor children and they came and picked all of the tomatoes when they were just baby tomatoes so we didn’t get a single one.

The worst luck I had with plants was when Cody or Bell would come home from some activity with a little bean seed in a cup. I always dreaded seeing their little happy excited faces with a cup of dirt in their hands, because I knew they would only be disappointed when I couldn’t get the darn thing to sprout. I did get lucky one time and the seed actually turned into a plant and started to grow. Cody was thrilled, but after several days of forgetting to water it, it started to wilt and eventually was nothing more than a brown stub. A few days after we had to throw the poor little bean plant away, we were walking past our “garden”, and Cody noticed that some of the plants were looking a little brownish. He immediately stopped in his tracks and shouted, “Mom, you are a plant killer!! You have to water the flowers!” I felt so bad, but of course, he was right.

I still am a plant killer. Maybe I should just give it up, but having something green and growing under my care is very appealing to me. I’ll probably try the rest of my life, and just keep on killing things, but who knows, maybe someday I’ll get lucky and find my green thumb.

When You Can’t Hear Any Music, Dance to the Washing Machine

We were having one of those quieter, more boring days, the kind of day that sometimes made me wonder what great adventures my friends I just graduated with were experiencing. What places were they seeing, what things were they learning, and what kinds of interesting people were they meeting in their new successful careers?

Cody and Isabella were finishing lunch and I had just started yet another load of laundry. The kids were both eating and a little tired, so all was quiet for a moment.  I was standing across the counter from Cody eating a turkey sandwich. He was eating his peanut butter and jelly and staring off into space. As I watched him I noticed that he was bouncing and kind of shaking his head. At the same moment I realized that I was doing the exact same thing. I wondered why we would both be unconsciously moving the same way when no music was playing.

Our laundry room shared a wall with our kitchen and it hit me that the washing machine was chugging a little beat as the clothes swished around inside. Cody and I were both moving to the beat of the washing machine! I started to move a little more and got both the kids down from their seats. The three of us had a full-on dance party right there in the middle of the kitchen with only the laundry to accompany us. After that day, every laundry day lunch time was a party. We started dancing to other beats we heard as well. We moved to the beat as I chopped carrots or onions in my manual food processor, danced to the dishwasher, and occasionally even boogied as we brushed our teeth.

As I put the babies down for their naps after lunch that first day, I thought again about all the adventures my friends were having and realized that I was having the greatest adventure of all. Sometimes it’s hard to hear the music and see past the dull routine of day to day tasks, but maybe all we need to do is listen a little harder. Maybe the sound of the washing machine is really the best beat of all.

Sleeping Babies

There is something undeniably perfect about a sleeping baby. Maybe it’s the way their little lips set in the most kissable position, the way their fingers curl into a little fist, or their tousled hair. Even their cheeks seem a little squishier as they dream.  

My babies always seemed so close to Heaven in their sleep. It didn’t matter how naughty they were, how many times they hit and screamed, or how many “NO’s!” I heard that day. Somehow, the second they fell asleep, they turned into beautiful little angels again.

My favorite time of night was when I would go into my children’s room and watch them sleep. Each time, my frustrations from the day would quickly melt away, and I remembered how much I truly loved those sweet innocent little spirits. As I readjusted their blankets or gently kissed their soft warm cheek, I would gain renewed courage to wake up and try harder to be a better mom the next morning. 

Play Dough

Isabella was always intrigued by the idea of sticking objects up her nose. I had heard horror stories of kids sticking beans up their noses and having them sprout and other similar tales, so I was always very paranoid whenever she got anything close to her face. She had made several attempts at shoving items up her nostrils, but I always caught her and thwarted her plans before they actually made it up.

One day, Cody, Isabella, and I were sitting at the kitchen table playing a game. Isabella got bored of the game before Cody did, so I gave her a little bit of play dough to play with while we sat there. She was perfectly content for several minutes, and I didn’t pay a lot of attention to what she was doing until she suddenly shouted, “MOM! I have play dough up my nose!”

I looked up her nose and didn’t see anything so I said, “No, I don’t think you have anything up there Bellie.”

“YES I DO!” She replied in a panicked tone.

I told Cody to run upstairs and get his little flashlight. He came running back down, flashlight in hand, and I used it to see if I could spot anything farther up. Sure enough, there was a rather large piece of light purple play dough lodged in Isabella’s right nostril.

I wasn’t sure what to do at this point, so I grabbed a tissue and told her to blow. The problem was that whenever she blew her nose, she would make the blowing sound, but she was actually sucking air in through her nose, rather than out. After a few attempts with the tissue, I realized that it was very possible that she was sucking the play dough farther and farther back and making the problem worse.

I didn’t want to stick anything up there because I was afraid of pushing it farther up her nose myself. I called my sister, because I thought I remembered a nose incident she had with my little niece a couple of years before. Her advice was to call the doctor.

The second Isabella heard the word “doctor” the hysteria began. She begged me not to call the doctor and assured me over and over that she was NOT sick. Bell had always been terrified of doctors. Even when we took her with us to Cody’s doctor appointments, she would scream the entire time while Cody was happily being poked and prodded.

I called the doctor and set up an appointment. After I hung up, I called Kasey at work to see what he thought about it. Kasey usually has really good ideas, but not always. His first idea was a good one. He suggested that I get the “booger-getter-outer” as we had affectionately named it, and try sucking it out with that. The booger-getter-outer was the rubber bulb thing that is used to suck mucous out of babies noses. When that failed, he told me to try sucking the play dough out of her nose with the carpet vacuum.  Initially I thought he was joking, but he wasn’t.  I was convinced that there was not anyway a vacuum could suck play dough out of a two year old’s tiny little nose, but I decided that I would feel  really stupid if I spent all the time and effort to go to the doctor if the vacuum was all it took. 

I got the vacuum out, laid Bellie down, place the hose attachment right under her nose, plugged up the clear nostril, and turned it on. I’m not really sure how to describe the way her nostril got sucked onto the side of the vacuum hose, or the look of shock and disbelief on her face, but it was priceless. I tried twice more with no success.

I accepted the fact that we were just going to have to let the doctor take care of it and made dinner for us to quickly eat before we went. As she was eating her chicken nuggets, Isabella leaned over the side of her high chair and blew her nose. I looked down and saw a ball of play dough, mixed with some other slimy substances, sliding down the side of her seat.

“I blew it out!” Bell proudly announced. I grabbed the flashlight to see if it was all gone. Her nostril was clear. I called the doctor and cancelled the appointment.

Brushing Teeth

I snuck the toothbrush Isabella’s mouth, just long enough for the bristles to barely touch two of her little teeth before she arched her back again and yanked the toothbrush out of my hand and threw it across the bathroom. Brushing a stubborn 18 month old’s teeth has never been my idea of fun. I always wondered if it really did any good anyway because they can’t even have toothpaste until they are at least two. But, being the paranoid mother that I am, I sat Isabella on the bathroom counter every night and went through the same fight. Most of the time she won and I would finally give an exhausted sigh, sneak one more little brush in, and put the toothbrush back into its holder until the next night.

Isabella eventually got used to the idea and by the time she was two, she was ecstatic about the idea that she could now use real toothpaste to brush her teeth. It’s incredible how much thrill can come from something as simple as using toothpaste for the first time. The night of her birthday arrived and I applied a small amount of toothpaste to her toothbrush. I brushed for a moment then gave her a chance to spit. She leaned over the sink, swallowed, then made a sound like she had heard Cody making every time we brush his teeth. I tried to explain to her that she couldn’t swallow, she had to let all the spit go into the sink. “Ok mommy, I will.” She promised as I began to brush again. When we were finished I helped her over the sink, she swallowed, then made the same sound.

Throughout the next week, Isabella and I had “spitting practices”. I gave her a sip of water and then helped her let it go out of her mouth before she actually swallowed it. I showed her how I did it, I had Cody show her how he did it, we talked about spitting technique, and everything else I could possibly think of. Nothing seemed to work. I never had to do any of this with Cody. The first time we brushed his teeth, he spit out the excess toothpaste and that was that.

After several days I finally realized the problem.  I was the wrong person to teach her! I was a terrible spitter and a girl. I didn’t ever spit unless I absolutely had to. I decided the best course of action would be to turn the spitting lessons over to a much more experience and qualified teacher. That night, Kasey sat her on the counter and helped her brush her teeth. After a few moments, I heard from the other room Kasey and Cody cheering over Isabella’s first spitting success. 

Imagination

There’s something about a little boy’s mind that allows him to be anything in the world that he could ever want to be. My 3 year old was one of the most imaginative little people I have ever met. He would be “Cody” so infrequently that he had to announce when he was being himself. His favorite thing to be was a tiger. He would walk around on all fours roaring every few seconds. He also enjoyed being a cougar, lion, wolf, or dragon. The problem with this variety of animal is that they all made similar sounds, (at least in Cody’s mind,) and he would expect me to know at any given second which animal he was. If I didn’t guess right he would get very frustrated and “attack” me with his razor sharp claws and fierce growls. In the morning, I always knew Cody was awake because I would hear howling at the top of the stairs.  

Every once in a while, Cody would be a kitty or a dog, Kung Fu Panda, or a knight in shining armor. I preferred those species because they were easier to distinguish and much less ferocious. Most of the time he pretended to be a “mean animal” but sometimes he would let me know that, “he was a nice tiger now.” And instead of roaring, he would growl quietly and snuggle in between my legs while I was trying to walk.

Isabella loved Cody so much that she always wanted to do exactly what he was doing. So more often than not, I had two tigers, two lions, or two wolfs. After a few months of this, though, she got tired of being fierce so she would often be the baby animal and would want loves and snuggles, while Cody only wanted me to “run for my life” screaming every second of every day.

Many times in his battles with dragons as a brave knight Cody would suddenly fall over and die. It seemed like Cody always chose the most inopportune times to die. It always happened when we were trying to get ready to go somewhere, or when dinner was getting cold on the table. Nothing we did could ever convince Cody that he wasn’t dead anymore. We would try tickling him, pinching him, picking him up to make him stand on his own, etc. etc. A magic kiss woke him up on occasion, but most of the time we just had to wait 10 or 20 minutes until he was sick of being dead. He would then groggily stand up and grab his sword and shield to resume the fight. Isabella got so used to him dying that she would notice him on the floor, and calmly shout, “Mom! Cody’s dead.” Most of the time she would try to kiss him a few times to see if that would wake him, but after a few unsuccessful attempts, she would keep right on walking or resume playing with her dollies.

I loved everything about Cody’s imagination, but there were times that I got sick of talking to a tiger and we made a rule that he at least had to come give me a hug and kiss in the morning before he started growling at me, even if it was a “tiger kiss” or a “cougar hug”.

The Blue Sippy

For a long time Cody had a certain sippy cup that he preferred over all the others… even though the sippy cups were all exactly the same except for color. He always wanted a blue cup with the matching blue lid. Sometimes it was important enough to him that he would throw a major tantrum over it. We would always tell him that he was being so silly and that it doesn’t matter what color the cup was, they are all the same and it wouldn’t make his drink taste any different if his cup was green!

One day after a big brawl over this exact issue I realized that I was that way about a LOT of things! For instance, I never like to wear some shades of brown, but I love to wear other shades. I would never buy a pink lamp shade, even though pink is my favorite color. We got bright yellow towels for our wedding and we refuse to put them in our bathroom. So, I had to ask myself, why do we get so upset when Cody demands a certain color of cup? The truth is, I even prefer certain cups depending on what beverage I am drinking. I despise drinking milk out of a plastic cup, I only like juice out of a smaller skinnier glasses, and I like water for dinner in a big clear glass with no ice, but at night with my snack I would rather have it in a large plastic cup with lots of ice.

Adults so often scoff at the silly whims of children, but the truth is, we all have things that we prefer. As adults we don’t have to announce them and beg for them, we just do it and feel satisfied. But children don’t have that luxury. Once I came to this realization, I tried to give Cody his blue cup whenever I possibly could. Maybe if I had a blue sippy that would be the only thing I would drink out of too.

The Dollar Theater

A few months after Cody turned 3 Kasey and I decided that it was time to take him to his first movie. Isabella was old enough that we thought she might do ok in the movie theater as well. We made the decision to go to a dollar theater because if one of the kids freaked out half way through, we could go home without spending too much money.

Dollar theaters are interesting places. I’ve only been to one or two that could really even be called a “theater”. The one we choose on this particular day was especially bad. The floor was so sticky that you had to practically use both hands to pry your shoe off of it with every step. We changed seats three different times because everywhere we tried had at least one broken seat. Eventually, I ended up sitting on a seat that had a broken spring and it poked me in the butt the entire movie anyway. I made the kids keep their hands in their pockets so they wouldn’t touch anything, and I probably sanitized their hands seven times before the movie even started. Thank heaven for pocket-size Purell.

We got to the movie a little bit early, and Kasey thought it might be best to let the kids walk around a little bit before the movie started so they could get all their wiggles out. I stayed and read my book to save our seats.

A few moments before the movie started Kasey and the kids walked back with a big bowl of popcorn. Kasey sat down and with wide eyes said, “You will never believe what just happened.”  He proceeded to tell me the following story. Kasey made the decision to take the kids into the bathroom with him before they went to get popcorn. Apparently the men’s bathroom was more disgusting than the whole rest of the theater combined and hadn’t been cleaned for days. I can’t imagine how gross a normal men’s bathroom is. You would have to pay me a lot of money to even walk into a “clean” men’s bathroom, let alone one at a nasty dollar theater that hadn’t been cleaned for a week.

Kasey was very insistent that the kids stay away from all the walls and made sure they didn’t touch anything, but as he was peeing, Isabella started walking over to him. Without warning, she ran over, opened her mouth, and latched on to the pee-crusted urinal. By this time in the story I tasted vomit in my mouth and I’m sure my look of absolute horror was priceless. Isabella had never done anything like that in her entire life! She never sucked on things, rarely put anything in her mouth, and had never gone up to something and just put her mouth on it! I was horrified. I still, to this day, do not understand why she would choose that time, that terrible location, and that revolting object to suck on.

The rest of the story was that Kasey immediately picked her up, without even doing up his pants, ran her over to the sink, and started rinsing out her mouth as fast as he possibly could. After several minutes of rinsing, they went and got some popcorn to give him time to gather up as much courage as he could to come and tell me. I could hardly even focus on the movie, because all I could think about was how disgusted I was, and since that day I have vowed to myself that I will never ever ever again let one of my baby girls enter the vile confines of a men’s restroom.

Avalon

Cody, Isabella, and I spent many Tuesday mornings at a care center by our house called Avalon Care Center. The activities director that we began working with wanted us to spend the majority of our time in the Alzheimer’s unit. It was a very interesting experience. We started going because I wanted the kids to gain some exposure to elderly people so that as they grew older, they would feel comfortable around that age group. I think we all have a lot to learn from people who have lived a long time. 

My initial image of what would happen as we visited each week was that we would have an adopted grandma or something that was sweet and happy and full of fun stories for the kids to hear. We would sing her songs and play games and cheer up her day. As we attended the Alzheimer’s unit each week, that image was quickly shattered.

 At first I felt like we were way in over our heads. Even I felt very uncomfortable and the kids almost died of fright the first few times. Many residents hardly spoke, and when they did it was incoherent and made no sense at all. Some would drool, spit, shout out randomly, or try to grab one of the kids’ arms or something. One man would just say whatever came to his mind, and it was often very offensive. I’m not sure why I made the decision to keep going back each week, but I did.

The more we went, the more comfortable we all became. We got to know some of the personalities that were often hidden behind a confused mind. They started responding to us better, and even though they didn’t know they remembered us, I could sense a feeling of recognition. We learned their names and saw their faces light up when we called them by name. We became quite attached to several of the residents there.  I started to understand them a little better and found that several of them actually had a good sense of humor.

One of the funniest things, though, was listening to them talk to each other. They would almost always respond to each other, but it never made any sense!  One of them would say something like, “You’re blanket is dragging.” And the other one would respond, “But I have to check on the dog!!” And the first person would respond to that by saying something like, “Yes, but this one is black and it looks better right here in front of me.”  It was very comical and I couldn’t hold back my laughter most of the time.

One day, one of our favorite ladies seemed very sad and sick. She sat in her wheel chair and slept while the kids and I sang songs to her. I don’t know for sure if she could hear us, but every once in a while I saw a small smile flit across her face. Another time, I went up to Susie and asked her how she was doing. She smiled and took my hand and kissed it. One day we talked to Anna while she rocked a small baby doll and told us little pieces of stories about real babies that I assumed were her own in days long gone. 

One of the most touching moments we experienced happened one day that we decided to stay for lunch. An older gentleman knocked on the door and I went over to let him in. He walked over to Susie and started gently talking to her. Susie’s Alzheimer’s seemed to be progressed further than many other residents,  and she didn’t respond very well to anything.  I never heard her say much more than yes and no. This kind gentleman, who was obviously her husband, sat down and proceeded to feed her. My heart ached for him and I wondered what it would be like to have a spouse who didn’t even know who I was. I had a hard time holding back my tears as I watched him care for her so tenderly. I thought of my own sweet husband and I knew that if we were that couple in fifty years, he would be doing the exact same for me. That man was a shining example of Christ-like love, patience, and devotion. 

I’ll never forget the time that we spent at the care center and the many lessons I learned each time we visited.  I’ll always look back on those days with fondness.