This is the shower curtain in the kids’ bathroom. It was a nice canvas shower curtain from Restoration Hardware.
Now it’s covered in grubby Campbell-sized hand and face prints.
Knittergran said that at least I have evidence that he’s washing his hands.
But given the amount of grime he’s leaving behind, I’m not too convinced he’s doing a very thorough job of washing.
During the past few weeks I’ve been attempting to make Campbell into a more productive member of our family, instead of the little prince he thinks he is. This means he is now expected to clear his own plate after dinner and to help his sisters sweep under the kitchen table.
I’m also trying to get him to clean up his own messes.
At school he willingly picks up toys and puzzles when his teacher asks him to. So I figured he could do it at home, too.
Things went well at first. One afternoon I told him to clean up his Legos, and when he informed me that he couldn’t, I pulled out the Santa threat – “Santa Claus doesn’t bring presents to little boys who don’t pick up their Legos.” Worked like a charm. He had his mess cleaned up in record time.
But my success was short lived.
On Monday I tasked the big girls and Campbell with cleaning up the front bedroom, which was an unholy mess. The girls whined and moaned but mostly did what they were asked.
Campbell, on the other hand, informed me that he was too tired/cold/hot/sick to help. I tried the Santa line – no luck. We had to bolt out the door to meet some friends, so I told Campbell he’d have to help clean up later.
Hours and lots of fun later, I told Campbell he had to pick up his toys in the bedroom. Again, I got the tired/cold/hot/sick excuses.
So I pulled out the biggest threat I could think of and told Campbell that if he didn’t clean up, he’d have to go to bed without dinner. He looked at me for a second and then, to my surprise, climbed into bed. I reminded him that no matter how hungry he got, he wouldn’t be getting any dinner. He pulled the covers up to his chin in response.
I kissed him goodnight and turned out the light, figuring that was that.
But an hour later, he started yelling from the bedroom that he was hungry. I ignored him for a while but then went in and reminded Campbell why he was in bed. In response he informed me that he had “wots of energy to pway, but not wots of energy to cwean.” I told him that he had to stay in bed. For two hours, he went back and forth between yelling that he wanted to come out and play and whining that he was hungry.
It was a long night, but I had hope that Campbell had learned his lesson.
Foolish, foolish me.
Yesterday I told him to pick up his Legos, which were scattered across the floor. He told me he was too tired/hot/cold/sick. I replied that if he didn’t pick them up, I’d take the Legos and put them up for three days.
“That’s OK, Momom. They’re boring anyway.”
Sonofabitch.
So I picked up the Legos and put them on the highest shelf in the hall closet, and Campbell skipped away.
I’m wondering how many toys he’s going to have to lose and how many dinners he’s going to miss before Campbell gets a clue.
I’m guessing it’s going to be a lot.
Earlier this week, at the beginning of my solo parenting gig, I told the big girls that if they were helpful and extra good this week, I’d get them pet hermit crabs. We all mostly survived the week, and the girls were mostly good, so we trekked to the pet store yesterday and picked out our new family members.
Introducing
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Quigley – he is Ella’s crab. She looks unhappy in the picture because she was convinced he was going to pinch her.
And Fred – Lily’s crab. Lily, my animal lover, desperately wants to hug him, and squeeze him and call him George, but Fred isn’t cooperating. I have to stop her from opening the tank and poking Fred 20 times an hour.
Turns out hermit crabs don’t do much, at least not during the day. The sand in their tank was covered in tracks this morning, so they apparently explored every nook and cranny during the night.
My idea, which wasn’t a brilliant one as it turns out, was that the kids would SHARE the hermit crabs. But since Ella and Lily have each claimed and named a crab, Campbell wants one, too. So I’ll be going back to the pet store for the 4th time – if I include the 2 trips it took to get the hermit crabs for Campbell’s class, which I do – in seven days. I don’t think I went to the pet store four times in the entire 13 years we had a dog.
My next goal is to find a permanent place in the house for Quigley and Fred. Right now they’re in the living room on a table, entirely too close to Elizabeth’s little hands for my comfort. Each time one of the big kids climbs on the arm of the sofa to check on the crabs, she’s right there behind them. I’m afraid I’m going to walk in the living room and find Elizabeth with a crab in her mouth.
B’s suggestion was that now that we can’t hold getting crabs out as a bribe, we can threaten to have a crab boil if the girls don’t behave. I knew I married him for a reason.
My two littlest kids go to a wonderful little preschool that is housed in a church on the campus of The University of Texas. The very same campus that yesterday had a gunman walk into a library and kill himself after walking several blocks and firing his AK-47 randomly.
Yesterday morning was one for the books.
I was scheduled to be the “helping parent” in Campbell’s class, which meant we had to be at school by 8:15. As I was turning across Guadalupe into the parking lot, police cars came flying down the street, lights and sirens going. It looked like something out of a movie. When we got inside, one of the school moms was standing in the entry talking about a gunman on campus.
All the parents there, myself included, immediately reached for their phones to find information online, only to be disappointed. One of the teachers turned on a radio in her class, and the morning DJs were talking about a hot sauce festival. We had no idea what was going on.
Slowly the news filtered in that there was indeed a gunman and that the campus was on “In Shelter” mode, which meant that everyone was to stay put and lock the doors. Our little school went into lockdown mode – all the doors and windows were closed and locked, the kids weren’t allowed on the playground, and two dads were stationed by the entrance to let people in and keep them in.
This meant that all the parents who were at the school to drop their kids off had to stay there. They all wandered the halls, cell phones in hand, calling and texting work and family and whomever. I sent texts to B and to some friends and took a call from my dad, who was in South Carolina listening to our local NPR station and had heard the news. He had more information on what was happening than any of us in the school did.
Our school director, who has only been on the job for a month, did an incredible job handling a stressful situation. She kept the teachers and parents informed of the latest developments and worked to make sure the kids had no idea what was going on. I could tell some of the kids in the school were picking up on their parents’ stress, but everyone in our classroom was just fine.
Things did get slightly surreal at times. Like when we were singing the “Hokey Pokey” with the kids as the campus air raid sirens were sounding. The sirens went off every half our, each time followed by a booming announcement telling people to stay indoors. At one point I was upstairs in the church kitchen washing up the snack dishes and looked out the window to see helicopters hovering at roof-top height. It was all very unnerving, to say the least.
I was amazed, though, to see a parade of students walking and biking in to campus. Apparently they hadn’t gotten the word about the University’s being shut down, although given the number of e-mails, tweets, and Facebook updates that were flying through the interwebs, I’m not sure how that’s possible. And when I watched news coverage later in the day, I was stunned at the number of gawkers hanging out on the other side of the police tape watching the action. Did they think that being on the far side of the tape made them safe somehow?
A little after noon the All Clear was sounded, and everyone at the school breathed a huge sigh of relief. The director made the decision to shut the school down for the rest of day because UT was also closed.
As stressful as it was to be at the school, too close for comfort to the action, I am grateful I was there instead of at home and not able to get to my kids. The few parents who had dropped their kids off before the lockdown must have been just frantic. I’m not sure what I would have done had I been in their position – I think I might have disobeyed the lockdown and driven to school just to be there with them. But I’ll never know.
I spent the rest of the day pretty rattled, pondering the might-have-beens of the situation and feeling profoundly grateful that everyone except the gunman was safe and sound.
And I hope to never have to go through such a situation ever again.
Ella is in 4th grade, which doesn't seem possible. I remember being in 4th grade. I met my bestest friend in 4th grade. I'm still friends with kids from 4th grade. How did she get so old? Ella picked out her outfit and was quite pleased when I told her none of it matched. She especially loves her new Converse All-Stars. 
Lily is in 2nd grade. She, of course, had to pick out a dress for the first day. And I have to admit, she looked darn cute in it. Her teacher is one of the best at the school, and we're thrilled she has him. Lily cracked me up when we were walking through the halls on the first day. She was like the little mayor of the school, saying hi to and chatting up everyone she saw. She is definitely my little social butterfly. 
Campbell now goes to preschool five mornings a week, thank the baby jeebus. He needs more activities and stimulation that I can give him. He insisted on wearing his new sunglasses to school. We've started calling him The Dude. And he does indeed abide.
And finally, mah baybee. Elizabeth started a mother's day out program and goes to school Tuesday and Thursday mornings. She has the same divine teacher all of the other kids have had, which made dropping her off much easier. I was able to hand Elizabeth off to Miss Katherine and leave, knowing that she was in the best possible care. 
He didn't even care that the big kids were off doing their own thing. Campbell was his own best company. I was too far away to hear what he was saying, but he was chattering away the whole time. 
I took a few of all four kids but gave up on my goal of getting one good picture of all of them. Campbell wouldn't take his hands away from his eyes, and I couldn't get Lily to keep looking at the camera. 
Campbell took off to run up and down the hill almost immediately, so I took some of the girls together. It didn't last long, though. Elizabeth didn't like being in the flowers and grass, and Lily started sobbing that a thorn was poking her bottom. So I set them all loose to just run around, and I took pictures while they did it.
Campbell had the best time running up and down the hill. He only fell a few times and popped up laughing every time he did. He liked exploring the paths that other people had already trampled in the field. 
Ella mostly just wandered around looking at the flowers. The shorts with the dress are just so lovely. Sigh.
Lily, of course, twirled and twirled in the flowers are she ran around. The girl was just meant to pose for pictures in fields of flowers.
Maybe next year I'll get one good photo of all four. But I doubt it.
color
every single
I don't know how Lily and Campbell managed to set these critters up so quickly, but there they were. And when I asked the kids to move the menagerie so that I could put sheets on the bed, they told me I had to wait because they were going to the moon to have a party. Lily was already dressed in a party ensemble, complete with lacy socks and dressy shoes. Campbell was in underpants and a t-shirt. They have very different ideas of what constitutes formal attire.
This one little stunt bought him a day's worth of forgiveness for all the messes he's getting into.
