Sometimes it feels like having a family means periodically living in a cesspool of grody-ness. No matter how much you clean, there is always another accident, another mess, around the corner. I was deep-cleaning the fridge the other day and came across a small bowl of egg salad undergoing mitosis. I'd missed it during my habitual fridge-cleaning the last couple weeks. Wilbur was dilly-dallying around my feet as I cleaned, and made me stumble and drop part of the gelid, slimy mass. He gobbled it up with relish, leaving me gagging at the sink.
A few days later, I was engaged in the Sisyphean task of cleaning the kitchen floor while Clara used the potty. I'd set her potty up near the kitchen table so I'd be near if she needed help. She finished and I grabbed the wipes for her.
"No, Mommy! My turn!! Baby does this!"
She kicked off her pull-ups and dissembled the top of the potty, like she's seen me do a thousand times. Then she reached for the purple catch-pan.
"No, Honey, let Mommy do this. This is yucky."
"NO! No, no, no! MY TURN!"
Well, maybe she could carry it, if I hovered closely. It was only liquid, and there wasn't a whole lot in there. The pan tilted a little, but she righted it. Then, out of nowhere, she casually flicked her wrist. The contents of the catch pan sloshed in an arc across the throw rug by the front door, the floor, and part of the wall.
I lost my ability to speak for a few seconds, but regained it when I remembered I had a new three-pack of Soft Scrub under the kitchen sink.
It's times like these that make me feel I should fashion myself a holster for the Clorox. Have it always handy.
Since the potty's catch-pan was mostly empty by this time, I let her carry it to the basement bathroom, where she dumped the nonexistent contents into the toilet and flushed it.
"Yay! Bye pee-pee! Bye!"she cheered.
When we got new carpet earlier this year, we chose a kind that masks dirt and stains. Potty training makes me paranoid. What if something rolls out the side of an undergarment and rolls under the couch or something? Just like that meatball that somebody lost when somebody else sneezed? And then, because of the clever carpeting, I can't find that thing under the couch in the playroom? And then we have guests over, and their kid goes down to our playroom and, guess what? He finds the thing I've missed under the couch and brings it up to his parents in his cute little toddler hands.
Potty training is a messy business.
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