The Days Are Just Filled...

On Wednesday we had Tali's 6 month follow up cardiology appointment. She had another echo and ekg and our sweet cardiologist said everything looked good but that Tali had to go home with a Halter monitor, which straps on her chest and captures her rhythm for 24 hours, just to make sure the surgery didn't cause any arrhythmias and such.

She did great through the echo and the technicians kept commenting on it but I'm pretty sure relaxing on a pillowed table watching Mickey Mouse and getting slathered with warm gel sure beats whatever she got in China. By the time they started sticking on the tabs for the EKG, she had had enough. She kept saying "No" forcefully in her sweet little tinny voice.

A couple weeks ago Jack asked me to email our cardiologist to ask her if she could please see if there was a pediatric heart surgeon available to talk with Jack. Have I mentioned how much I love our doctor? She told Jack that there was a heart surgeon whose case was canceled that morning and he was waiting for us. How awesome is that? We trooped across the street to the main hospital and made our way to the doctors' building.

The surgeon was super sweet and kind, taking lots of time to answer Jack's questions. Apparently our cardiologist told the surgeon about Jack's surgical tools and he asked to see them. Jack pulled them out of the diaper bag and spread them on his desk. He went through each one, showing Jack how to use them. He and Jack discussed oxygen distribution to the various organs and how much education is involved in becoming a surgeon. My favorite part was when he went through the questions and got to "What's your favorite part about your job?" and he got this look of contentment on his face and stated "When the patient wakes up after surgery and they get to go home with their families and live their life." That is good stuff.

He made Jack promise to come back to visit every year and keep him informed of how he was doing in his quest to become a surgeon. This guy is one of the good ones.

The surgeon was really smiley, I just didn't capture it.

We ate lunch at the hospital's Chik-Fil-A (Jack about had a coronary about a fast food place in a hospital) but we made it better by sharing fries and nuggets and drinking water. Looking forward to meeting him every year at Tali's appointment!

Later that day we had small group at our house. As soon as people were filtering in, a friend in the group pointed out the fact that Noah had no underwear on and was walking around with...evidence of a certain body function hanging from his behind. We rushed to get him cleaned up. I'm in the bathroom, desperately cleaning water and toilet paper off the floor and wiping down the toilet seat with Lysol (Noah tries to get to the toilet and it gets a little sloppy) while I am calling out a welcoming greeting to people coming in. Oh, and the septic was still sluggish from all the rain we've had so it was hard to hide the evidence.

Later in the evening we noticed Tali had wiggled out of her diaper and was strolling around the group members cool and free. We are just classy like that. I began the day shaking hands with a heart surgeon and ended it chasing toddlers around with baby wipes. Yes indeed.

Adventures with Toddlers: Potty-Training Edition

Yesterday morning I sat down at the computer and was looking up information on Mali (because we're all intellectual and multi-cultural like that) when Jack called out for me. He didn't sound desperate so I asked him what he needed. He then nonchalantly strolled into the homeschool room and let me know something had happened in the bathroom involving Noah and a certain bodily function. I sprinted past him, as fast as my flannel pajama pants would take me.

Remember that scene in Princess Bride in the Pit of Despair? The horror, the shrieking? It was like that. Feces and urine and water. All over the floor. A toilet roll was slowly absorbing the mess; a toilet bowl brush was laying on its side, defeated. Poop on the wall, the stool, the outside of the toilet. Noah has no pants and has taken off down the hallway in order to prove his absolute innocence - despite the copious amounts of fecal matter on his legs. No matter - run away, run away! She'll never guess it was you!

Talitha is standing sans pants in the mess - happily brushing her teeth with one of the big kid's brush. There is poop on her shirt. She is laughing. I put both toddlers in the bathtub (Noah is wrangled and most likely perplexed as to how I figured out the culprit - boy, that mom is good...) and have Kate wash them up while I start the cleaning process. One of the side effects of potty-training is that the stock of Bounty paper towels has gone up considerably. You're welcome, economy. But..not environment, I guess. It's a wash. 

There I was, mopping up my dignity along with unspeakable things. I was really upset because it's right next to the toilet, c'mon now. So I was working up some pretty strong words, which in our family amounts to things like "Gosh darn it!" and "Why the heck did you do this?" I know - powerful.

I got it cleaned and vowed to write a really nice letter to whoever invented Lysol. Noah made it through his nap time in his underwear and then we headed off to the store. He dutifully told me he had to go to the bathroom so we hustled into the family bathroom. He does his thing and I wash his hands and then tell him not to touch anything because store bathrooms are yucky. I wash my hands and he strolls right over to the toilet and starts picking up the seat and touching the rim. I quickly yell "No!" and run to grab him to wash his hands again. He proceeds to throw a monster fit face down on the floor in the Walmart bathroom (If I remember correctly, one of Dante's circles of Hell takes place in a Walmart bathroom). He literally has to be carried out of the bathroom yelling and then strapped into a grocery cart (at this point we now have two carts, one for each toddler. We're like a parade but with no balloons or happiness).

Today it was a downpour all morning and our fantastic septic system stopped working around 2 pm (when I walked in on Tali and Noah in our bathroom, playing in the seat-high water in the toilet bowl).  I was really hoping to get through the afternoon with nary a bowel movement. I'm looking in the fridge "Now let's see, what causes constipation?" I tried just having Noah pee into the yard along with Jack but it's like taking out a chihuahua - Ooh, this patch of grass looks nice - No, this one! - Oh look, a bird!

After 20 minutes of standing out in the rain with him, I stomped back inside and slapped a diaper on him.

I've probably just obliterated the training done this last week, holding a single gummy bear in my hand so that he'll pee in the toilet. These things tend to happen just as I'm feeling smug. By the third child I feel like I've got this - sleeping through the night, potty-training, eating vegetables. Just when I feel like I can sail through solely on my experience and, let's be honest, intellectual prowess, bam! You're elbow deep on the bathroom floor, mopping up a mixture of fecal matter and pee, wondering where it all went so terribly wrong. You think you're pretty awesome at this whole parenting thing and then a toddler comes along and suddenly you're Googling "How to get Vaseline out of a Shop Vac."

I was such a good parent before I had kids. The best. Now? I just don't know.