Trouble stories

Having Trouble, I now understand why so many things have been invented. Did anyone see Modern Family when they went to Disneyland and Lily was on a leash? I totally get it. We have a runner too. There are little child safety tabs on our windows that let the window only be opened a certain height so a child can't push the screen and fall out the window. I get it. We have a lock at the top of our front door. I get it. Child safety locks on cars, buckles on carseats, buckles on carts, gates at the top of stairs... those are mainly used for the safety of a child. For Trouble, they're used as restraint, to keep him in the cart, in the carseat, down the steps, in the car. Here are a few Trouble stories from the past week.

When my kids are playing together, I hear, 'Mommy, Trouble is doing ____' (something bad), or 'Trouble is going to throw ____ at me', or 'Trouble is climbing on the _____' about 100 times. To be totally honest, I ignore them a lot because they all tattle on each other. Usually what I hear when they are playing outside is, 'Trouble threw the ___ over the fence'. Yesterday it was his juice cup over one side of the fence, the basketball into the other neighbor's yard, and a dump truck over the back fence. Princess climbed over for the truck, and I lifted Pirate over to get the things from our neighbors' yards. (Our neighbors probably hate us.) A few minutes after everything was recovered from over the fence, Princess and Pirate both started yelling for me. Princess was holding onto Trouble, who was halfway up the fence. So, the two year old can climb the fence. Pirate would never attempt to climb the fence at almost five years old, but Trouble is doing it at 2. I shouldn't be surprised. He's been a climber as long as he's been walking. He was the first of the kids to climb out of the crib.  He was climbing onto the dining room table  grabbing the chandelier when he was not even 2. I guess I never thought about the fence though. I figured he was safe in our back yard. We even have a padlock on the gate because we thought he might eventually open the gate to escape. There's really no stopping the climbing. Hopefully he outgrows it or gets bored with it.

It's never a good sign when your kid comes up to you and says, "Can I have a wipe?", especially when your child is Trouble. He always does something bad at the most inopportune times too. This particular occasion was while I was feeding 5 his bottle. Trouble came up the steps holding out his hand asking for a wipe. In my experience, this is usually a sign that there is a "bid dween booder (big green booger) on his hand that needs to be wiped off. Silver lining - at least he's not eating them. With a kid like Trouble you have to look for the positive in all situations. Anyway, this was not a big green booger on his hand. His hand had melted chocolate all over it. Only it wasn't melted chocolate. Or pudding. Or any sort of food. It was indeed poop. On his hand. This gives a whole new meaning to Poop Hand. I have no clue why, but he had stuck his hand in the back of his Pull Up after pooping in it. It was so incredibly gross. I had to stop feeding 5 and clean scrub Trouble's hand, cut his nails, and scrub his nails with a nailbrush to make sure there was no poop left hiding anywhere.  I don't understand why he refuses to poop on the potty.

Yesterday it was raining all day. It was really humid, and although it wasn't hot out, the air had that sticky feeling to it. Normally I'd turn the air conditioning on in this kind of weather, but our A/C wasn't working right. (A sweet $400 later and it's fixed.) Anyway, I had all the windows open as well as the sliding door that leads to the deck. Trouble barely napped, which always sucks for me because I'm getting ripped off of my break from him. I sat down at the kitchen table to eat lunch in the 3 spare minutes I had. My husband called so I could fill him in on the A/C situation, and while I was talking to him, I saw something out of the corner of my eye on the deck. It was Trouble. Standing on the deck. In the rain. With no shoes on. I didn't even hear him open the screen door and walk outside, and I was only 5 feet away. He was just outside to see if it was raining, is his explanation.

These are only a few recent stories about Trouble, and they have all taken place in the past week. There are many more, and I have a feeling tons more are in my future.