This house, my car, and these children are beyond me at this point. I cannot keep on top of the mess at all. Chris and I will have the place spotless and within an hour, with them both home, things are just everywhere and I'm still trying to clean up from say, breakfast.
Conversations we've had lately, "Chris- can you bring me the carrot in the living room?"
"Huh?"
"The carrot. Isn't there a carrot in the living room?"
Rummaging. Chris appears with the carrot, "why is there a carrot in the living room?"
"Because Vivian was holding it in Whole Foods because she is teething, and then she was chewing on it... why are you asking?"
"I don't know. Silly question?"
A few days later, I open the cutlery drawer to get a fork. There is a strawberry in the cutlery drawer. It appears to have been there for a while.
"Who put the strawberry in the cutlery drawer?"
Sam replies, "not me!"
Vivian yells something unintelligible. Then I remember her "helping" me unload the dishwasher this morning before work holding a strawberry.
"Maybe it was Annie," Sam offers.
Sometime in the past few weeks, I went to run a bath for the kids and find about 20 veggie chips in the bathtub and the cat licking at puddles of water. "Why are there veggie chips in the bathtub?"
"Vivian did it!" Chris and Sam call back. Everyone knows, but they are still there?
Chris and Sam try to tell me the back story, involving Sam needing to poop and eating a snack and then Vivian taking the snack, etc. I am picking veggie chips out of the tub and stop listening.
Usually the kids move from one activity to another faster than I can get them to clean up. Sam at least understands cleaning up. Vivian is still in the dumping phase. She's staring to get the concept of cleaning up, though every time we complete a task, she then immediately dumps it again, unless I snatch it away. For instance, we get all the blocks back in the container, and she's upended them again, and walked away or thrown at least five across the room. I've taken to giving Sam chocolate to clean up after Vivian on nights when I'm trying to do other things.
Today I got home from work and the house was fairly clean, since the house cleaner came yesterday. Then Sam wanted to go in the sandbox. Vivian took the pile of grass that Chris raked up over the weekend and rolled in it and then threw it in the air. Then she and Sam hoed a pile of mud with a kiddie hoe.
When we came inside I tried to brush them off. As I was making dinner, Vivian emptied the drawer containing rolling pins and tea bags. Sam walked into the kitchen and ran behind me (which he isn't supposed to do while I'm cooking) and slipped on a rolling pin. He wailed, "Vivian blocked the kitchen with a rolling pin! I'm not playing with her anymore! I slipped!"
I calm him down, pick Vivian up, who is now getting cranky because she's hungry. She's eating a tea bag. I take the tea bag and she screams. Sam is now negotiating for a snack because he "forgot he didn't have one."
Ten minutes later he's had a snack- (there's only so much I can deal with), their hands are washed and they're seated for dinner. A screw falls out of Vivian's high chair, Sam drops his fork, and Vivian throws her potatoes across the kitchen. I love dinnertime SO much. Vivian rejects the fish I made, Sam rejects the potatoes. No one will touch the peas and carrots. They both eat apple and banana for dinner with Saltine crackers. I sit down and Vivian hands me her peas one by one. This is an improvement, usually she throws whatever is on her tray. I take about two bites of food and she cries to get up. Sam drops his fish, napkin, and peas in no particular order. Vivian gets down and eats the same peas off the floor that she would not eat at the table. Then she poops.
I give up on eating and drink my wine while I clean up the kitchen and their lunch things from earlier that day. Sam gets down and goes in the living room to play. As I'm washing the dishes, Vivian plays with the tea bags. She goes to see Sam and comes back. There is now a trail of teabags from the kitchen to the living room. I can hear Sam playing with some kind of toy with motor, so he's fine.
Then he starts wailing because he bumped his head. I go to check. He is suspiciously blocking the area behind the couch and the wall. I move to look. I'm not really sure what I'm looking at, it's mushy and a yellowish brown in a little plastic bowl. Then I see the toy mixer in his hand.
"What are you doing?"
"Nothing. Did you see anything Mom?"
"Yes, Sam, that's why I'm wondering what you're doing."
Pause.
"Cooking you a birthday cake?" He's good.
"Made of?"
"Vivian's banana from the floor."
Ahh...
He also appears to have several new temporary tattoos.
One hour until everyone is in bed. The dishes are half done, but I give up on them and get Sam and Viv ready for baths. I call them into the bathroom and Vivian appears with a tea bag and a toy baby bottle. She peers into the bathtub and immediately throws the tea bag in. I should have seen that one coming. I reach to pluck it out and turn as she is depositing the baby bottle into the toilet. I catch it at the last second and make a mental note get lock for toilet seat lid. As I take her clothes off, dried grass falls out and onto the clean bathmat. When Sam undresses, a layer of sand coats that. I go into the hall to get a clean washcloth.
"Vivian! Don't poke my belly! Haha!! That's my BUTT! Vivian poked my butt!" They are both laughing hysterically. She's one year old and she gets butt humor?
Chris comes home and finishes bathing Sam, which is helpful. I get Vivian down and then retrace her steps through the house retrieving tea bags. I get the kitchen cleaned up and read Sam his stories. Now they are both sleeping and I cannot find the bowl of mashed banana anywhere, though I did find the toy mixer, a rolling pin handle, numerous mashed peas and fish, and Sam's lunchbox that was missing.
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