Errands, Poop, Parties, and More Poop...

...or, "Anecdotal Evidence of the Efficacy of Prunes."

We had a full schedule lined up for today, and with Joel working it was just me and the kids. Our schedule was: toy store, shoe store, lunch, hair cut, birthday party. This would keep us out of the house from approximately 9:45 am until about 3 pm. The kids both woke up promptly at 7 and this was unfortunate because I had to suffer through quite a bit of "can we go yet?" from Ben before I finally conceded, at 9:40, that yes we could go.

Wait, back up a minute. I forgot to mention two very important things. First, it was really cold this morning. I am not used to it being really cold, and I may have gone a little overboard in dressing Rebecca. I put her in knit tights, a onesie and jeans on over them, and a sweater. Second, Rebecca was cranky and constipated this morning. We fight a constant battle to keep her regular, thanks to her love of milk. It had been about 48 hours since her last poop. So I fed her two jars of apple-prune baby food at breakfast and hoped she'd poop before we left the house. She didn't. (At some point during the prune-feeding it did cross my mind that maybe two jars was a bit excessive. I'd never fed her two at once before).

Okay so we completed our first errand at the toy store uneventfully. We got a present for the birthday party we were going to later and had it gift wrapped, Ben picked out a little robotic bug that's actually pretty cool, and Becca picked out a monkey Beanie Baby.

Next door to the shoe store... I had Ben's feet measured and confirmed that the sneakers he was wearing were a full size too small. Whoops-- Bad Mommy! No wonder he was starting to say they hurt his feet... Picking out a new pair of shoes turned out to be a bit of a challenge because Ben has suddenly become very opinionated about his footwear. He wanted shoes that light up, but they didn't have any in his size (he's now a 12.5 or 13). Finally the sales lady brought out a pair of shoes he liked, because his friend Russell has the same ones and Russell is the fastest boy in the class. Convinced that Russell's athleticism stemmed from his footwear, Ben happily agreed to the shoes.

After solving the footwear issue I became aware that Rebecca, quietly wandering the store, had taken a Very Large Dump (henceforth known as a VLD). We vacated the shoe store and went to Wendy's for an early lunch. Changing Rebecca involved removing all her excessive layers of clothing, and I had to do this on the bathroom floor because there was no changing table (thank you Wendy's). I did have a changing pad though, a rather large and padded one, so it wasn't as totally gross and disgusting as it might have been.

After lunch I took Ben to his hair cut appointment, which was also uneventful, and then to his friend's birthday party. At some point during the party Rebecca took VLD#2. Again, off with the layers of clothing. This bathroom had a changing table, but it was propped up unassembled against the wall. Nice. Again, on the floor.

We finally got home at 3pm and I took Rebecca, who had fallen asleep in the car, up to her crib. About an hour and a half later I went to get her up because (with Joel having arrived home from work) we were getting ready to go out to dinner. There she was, wide awake, sitting in VLD#3 which was all over her... out of her diaper, all over her clothes, all over her crib sheet... and, when I picked her up, all over me. This time all her layers of clothing, and some of mine, went straight into the wash.

There could be so many morals to this story... but how about One Jar of Prunes is Plenty?