Memories

My 4 year old "princess" trying to help me find her dad's shirts at the cleaners...

I gave several different versions of his name because I wasn't sure how they had filed them; she told a shocked looking laundry lady that, "We also call him Prince Eric!" (She wasn't kidding! Her playful dad would often play prince to her princess in whatever the current Disney movie was at the time. It just so happened that she was "The Little Mermaid" and he was indeed "Prince Eric" around the house at that point in time.)

My 2 year old knocking over the Christmas tree TWICE in one Christmas season...

For the grand finale he bit into a string of plugged in Christmas lights...sparks flew from his mouth (and later, his bottom). Lucky for him, Santa thought he was too darn cute to be put on the naughty list,and he ended up getting his presents anyway. Lucky for us, he has turned out to be a great kid despite his rocky beginning.


Another "Little Princess" (are you beginning to see a pattern here?) in a very, very stinky public restroom... declared loudly with fingers pinching her nose shut that "Princesses should NOT have to smell poo-poo."

Sitting in the drive thru lane of our school among Cadillacs, BMW's, and Convertibles with a tube sock on the windshield wiper of my minivan...I was out running errands in the pouring rain when the rubber part of my wiper flew completely off the car. It was almost time to pick up the kids, but I simply could not endure the screeching metal sound against my windshield. It was worse than fingernails on a blackboard! So, inspiration hit! I dashed home, grabbed one of my husband's tube socks, fit it nicely over the wiper blade, and "wa-la": a smooth, silent wiper. I was so proud of my ingenuity...until I was sitting there in the parking lot watching my husband's tube sock slosh ninety to nothing across my windshield, thinking: "Boy, I am one classy gal!"

Another great invention: men's underwear on my dog...No one told me when I got my golden retriever that female dogs have periods too. She is an "inside dog," and therefore dripping spots of blood around my house was not good. Hence, my great idea: I grabbed an old pair of men's underwear and put it on her. The hole in the front was perfect for her tail to poke through, and it kept my carpet clean. Of course, the folks who came to my door that week were a little disconcerted to see a dog wearing underwear...but, hey, it worked!

The realization that children do not digest rubber bands...another little one came to me crying one day because she had gone to the restroom, but was not able to get herself entirely clean. I told her to lay down on the floor, and I got some baby wipes and proceeded to clean her. There was one particular long, stringy bit of poop hanging on. I got a wad of wipes and attempted to extricate it, but to my surprise it slipped out of the wipe and hit her bottom with a "BOING." I couldn't believe what I was seeing. I tried again. "BOING!" Finally, it hit me..."Honey, did you eat a rubber band?"