Nothing but the best for my kids.

It’s amazing what you can accomplish without children in the house. Moments after they left, I picked up all their toys, laundry and other debris. How are there always wrappers on the floor? How? I swear I give them 1/8 of the snacks for which these wrappers account. Do the wrappers breed? Are my children sneaking snacks they claim to be unable to open when I already give them all the snacks they want?

Whatever the case, once everything was picked up that first hour, my floors stayed clean for THREE DAYS.

You guys, I THOUGHT I wasn’t the one leaving wrappers and scraps of paper everywhere and now I have proof!

Without any effort, my living room, playroom and the children’s bedroom stayed clean for three days.

Within two hours of their arrival back home, all three of these rooms were trashed. I claim this as evidence that a) it’s absolutely pointless to try to have a tidy house when you live with a toddler and a preschooler and b) I’m nowhere near as bad of a housekeeper as I thought (or was before I had children). The kitchen was a bit more of a challenge to keep clean. Why must I eat? It was still easier without the kid food prep/clean-up. Even the bathroom stayed cleaner without those kids and was trashed by the next day. It’s amazing how much soap gets caked on the counter and sink while they are here.

Who can keep up with that? I know there are mothers who do and I admire you, but I would lose my mind if I even tried. Impossible.

Aside from enjoying the miracle of the house that stayed clean without effort, I did a lot of sleeping, reading, movie-watching, organizing and shopping kid-free. I went to the movies alone. I went to dinner with friends. I ate places my husband despises.

To pre-kid me this doesn’t sound like much of a vacation. For post-kid me, it was AMAZING. It was such a great break. I really enjoyed having the time alone. I did get a little bored and lonely toward the end, but what I wanted was my husband to share the freedom with. We hardly ever get to go on dates. What would it be like to be alone together for THREE WHOLE DAYS?! OMG, the possibilities.

We won’t be able to find out what that would be like for at least another 18 months due to our upcoming delivery. I won’t likely have another kid vacation of any form for at least that long, but it’s fun to dream.

For now, though, it’s nice to have my cuties home. It never gets boring while they are here. Annoying, messy and loud? Absolutely. Boring? No.

He doesn’t understand why this series of events turned him into a super hero or why all my mommy friends are making an example of him to their husbands. “Would YOU ever do this? You never would! You couldn’t handle it! Be more like Dr. Toy Warden!” = a lecture I know has happened in at least one of my friends’ homes.

The most excellent part of all of this was that I had THREE days without kids. This is the ONLY time I’ve been kid-free in the nearly 5 years since I had Lily. It was amazing, but I’ll write about that tomorrow.

Dr. Toy Warden claims the kids found the hotel the most exciting part of the trip. They loved running up and down the halls, climbing on furniture and most of all they loved the mirrored ceiling in the elevator. Every single time they got in the elevator, they lay on the floor and laughed at their reflections.

Who needs to do anything else on vacation when you have a mirrored elevator ceiling?

Me: Quit moving the moose. That’s the trash pile and the moose needs to go in the house.

Lily: I know. I don’t want that moose.

Me: But Emi gave you this moose! He’s a Canadian Mountie!

Lily: I don’t like that moose. We should give him away.

Me: Well, I guess we can give him to someone else…

Lily: Someone else might like him, but I don’t. We need to get rid of that moose.

She was really REALLY determined to get rid of this poor little cute stuffed moose my sister was nice enough to bring to her from Canada (and I was careless enough to lose under the backseat of the car for possibly years. Sorry, sis! We play with all your other gifts! I swear!).

The next day our neighbor was having a garage sale. When I explained to Lily what that meant, she said “We need to take the moose over there so they can sell it to someone else.”

We didn’t do that.

Every time she sees the moose sitting in our house, she reminds me that she wants to give it away. I finally got it out of her that she doesn’t like this perfectly cute stuffed animal because its clothes don’t come off. She’s used to being able to change the clothes on her dolls and Build-A-Bears, but this moose is forever stuck in a mountie uniform. Apparently, non-removable clothes are hate inducing.

Or she maybe she just really hates Canada.

And then everyone gets in the car to go home again. Over and over and over again.

I hope Lily’s not disappointed when this is not how things really play out when I go into labor. Chances are she will be hanging out with a family she barely knows while my mom gets her affairs in order 3.5 hours away and then drives here. My dad won’t come for a couple of days. We won’t all ride in the same car or see my grandparents. And the baby HOPEFULLY won’t be out of my belly until we get to the hospital, though I suppose that remains to be determined. I really don’t want an accidental homebirth, so let’s wait to come out until we get to the hospital, ok Violet?

For two years, this little doll represented Rose in Lily’s Little People universe. Around the time Rose turned 2 years old, this baby in a basket didn’t seem appropriate for her anymore. We bought a new “big girl Rose” to replace Baby Rose.

Baby Rose immediately disappeared. I don’t know what happened, but we couldn’t find her for the life of us. Lily wanted to play with BOTH Rose dolls at once, but no matter how many times I completely tore apart the playroom, Baby Rose wasn’t turning up. It was bizarre because Lily is VERY anal about her Little People. They all represent extended family members and live in their own houses in specific places around the playroom. Their houses represent how far away from us they live. They have to load into the car to visit each other at each other’s houses. She notices right away and gets upset if someone isn’t in their proper house or goes missing. We usually find them pretty quickly. For Baby Rose to go completely missing was truly a mystery.

Baby Rose had been missing for more than 6 months. We had all given up on her. Then last week I was reorganizing the playroom, which I do periodically. This was not the first time in the last six months. In fact, it was not the first time in the last month, which is why it was an utter miracle AND mystery that Baby Rose turned up when I moved aside a puzzle box. How on earth had she been hiding behind the same puzzle box for six months? Surely it’s been moved within that time period.

I shouted for joy and Lily and Rose came running over. Everyone was SUPER excited to see Baby Rose again. As you can see, Baby Rose and Big Girl Rose look exactly the same.

Lily declared that Baby Rose was now Baby Violet, even though we have other baby Little People. I’m sure half Asian/half Ashkenazi Jew Violet will have blonde hair just like her big sisters… don’t.

Anyway, the doll’s timing in reappearing was impeccable. The baby will be here in the next 4 weeks. We needed a Baby Violet SOON!

Stay tuned tomorrow to see the complex play that developed when Baby Violet got added into the family mix.

I wonder if the “mommy tiger” is due to give birth at the same time as I am?

Lily likes to make all three Woof Woofs ride the swing at the same time.

I wonder if Little Baby Woof Woof will have to come with us everywhere once Violet is born, but is still too little to care? Then I’ll be toting three Woof Woofs, one baby and a diaper bag.

We might have to get a full-sized van if this happens. The Woof Woofs may start requesting their own seatbelts and we can’t let them ride in an unsafe way.

Oh Rose, why can’t you go down the slide like a normal 2 year old?

This happened just yesterday. The girls had gotten up really late and probably finished eating breakfast at 9:30, so I thought we’d be in the clear to go outside to play at 11 without too many hunger issues. Still, I made sure to ask if they were hungry BEFORE we went outside.

They claimed they were full. I shouldn’t have believed them.

The next thing I knew, Lily had actually gone in to get her own cookies, which was fine by me. Anything to keep sitting. However, her sister followed her inside and took off her buckled sandals. I still had to get up to help Rose put on her shoes again.

So, yes, I had to haul my pregnant ass back inside to get some juiceboxes. While I was there, I got myself a snack. Considering the children had JUST eaten cookies (and, really, BREAKFAST), I thought I’d be ok. Just in case, I asked everyone if they wanted any more food while I was inside. Everyone said no.

But they lied.

Back inside I went to get Rose a cereal bar. Lily claimed she didn’t want anything else and that she was “so full”. Five minutes later she wanted a graham cracker. I sent her in to get her own stuff. Rose followed her.

I got up again to retrieve Rose. I asked again if anyone wanted anything else. Everyone said no.

And that’s when I lost it and ranted on and on about how people should have asked for EVERYTHING they wanted at once and how next time I’m only getting up ONCE and after that you don’t get other snack. I have trouble denying my underweight child (Lily) food, especially when she asks for an apple, but she will NOT be getting one the next time this happens.

And yes, I should have just fed them before we went outside, but they’d JUST eaten. In the future, I’m taking a bunch of snacks out with us no matter when they just ate so I can just SIT there as planned instead of attempting to induce pre-term labor.

We’ve been having a lot of episodes like this even inside and I’ve been mulling over instituting a rule that Lily can not have food for at least 30 minutes AFTER I asked her if she was hungry and she said no. I’m not a 24/7 line chef.