I've been practicing yoga for seven months now and still very much consider myself a 'newbie' when I think about all there is to learn.
One thing that has never stopped amazing me, is just how much sweat a body -- MY body can lose while doing a 90 minute Hot Vinyasa class. It pours off me in streams... on to my 'yoga towel' and on to the hardwood floor. It pools in neat little puddles on the side of my mat and completely (and I do mean completely) saturates my yoga clothes. For this reason, I choose my clothes carefully - wicking fiber, cami tops, and I've even started wearing yoga shorts which I told myself I'd never do - not because I've taken a negative position on 'shorts' per se, but I have leg issues - modesty, etc. It's just me... But I wear them now. Shorts. Despite my shrewd yoga clothing choices, when I come home from a class, I cannot WAIT to get out of my sweaty soaking clothes and into a shower. I find myself being impressed by my sweatiness, and also horrified... then impressed again. I have to peel the clothing off my body, because everybody knows when workout clothing is soaking wet, it sticks and clings to your skin in a most terrible way. I have to contort myself back into yoga poses just to remove the sticky heavy clothing.
This is all just an intro, really... For this very afternoon I found myself in this situation: Sweaty, shivering - because my clothes were sopping wet and it was 50 degrees outside (a far cry from the 100+ yoga studio), and desperately wanting a shower. Peyton and Quincy were playing "grocery store" downstairs with the play cart and plastic groceries. Brooklyn, of course, came upstairs as she always does to accompany me while I showered. Translation: Brooklyn came to seek and destroy in the bathroom while I showered.
I peeled and contorted and removed the impressively sopped clothing - and hung it up to dry, which I mused would probably take at least 24 hours. Just as I closed the shower door and let the steamy water warm me, Brooklyn shot like a little bullet from the bathroom. My mind went through the options of troublemaking she could commit while I showered. The list was long and sordid. I started soaping as quickly as I could, shampooing at the same time. I comforted myself with the notion that most likely she would occupy herself by changing into an array of dresses and bathing suits - a favorite and well known pastime of hers... Yes, that's what she'd do, I told myself. Just as I relaxed I heard a blood curdling scream... and then another one. One after the other. It was Brooklyn and she was screaming from somewhere in the house. "That is not the cry of a child putting on a bathing suit," I thought before bursting through the shower door with a full head of shampooed hair and Dove soap film sliding from my body. The Tylenol debacle was fresh in my memory as I sprinted into my bedroom, slipping on the hardwood floor and leaving soapy sloshing footprints behind me. I heard the scream again and I picked up the pace through the hallway. If somebody had been outside the house at that moment, they would have had the great misfortune of seeing me streak past the window, body parts and soap flying this way and that. I made it to Brooklyn's room and opened the door. She was standing in the center of the floor, trying with little success (hence the screaming) to untangle herself from the criss cross straps of her pink-polka-dotted bathing suit she had managed to twist herself in. When she saw me there, naked and dripping on her carpet, she pointed a little index finger at me and said, "I need your help right now." I love curse words. I do. But unfortunately I no longer can use them when they are most needed, so I said something like, "Oh my gracious, Brookie!" and I quickly fixed her straps and retraced my wet steps back to the shower. As I was warming myself back up and washing off the remaining soap, Brooklyn marched into the bathroom with an exasperated look on her face. She had on a dress now - over her suit, and she couldn't zip up the back, or tie the bow. "MOMMY!" She declared. "Zip my dress!"
Thursday, June 17, 2010
Monday, June 7, 2010
Never A Dull Moment...
If our life was a movie and the movie had a title, one option would surely be: "Never A Dull Moment," (starring the Hutchinsons). What it lacks in creativity, it makes up in truth. Since having kids, I simply cannot remember a time in the recent and/or distant past in which we've had "a dull moment."
This weekend was exemplary proof of just that. It actually started in a most fantastic way -- in an unsual way, to boot. I woke up with an immediate realization. The sun was out. It was Saturday, and the Sun. Was. Out. It was bright and orangey and happy... Do you know the song "Zippitee Doo Da?" When you live in Washington and you've endured months and months of perpetual rain... rain well into the month of June, even... In these circumstances, when you see the sun shining in a clear cornflower blue sky, you may want to sing "Zippitee Doo Da." I for one, did.
I opened the kitchen windows and made the girls breakfast. I brewed coffee and looked at the blue sky. It was magnificent. I told John I wanted to take a run by the lake, and that's just what I did. Everything seemed to glisten in the morning sun. I came back home in a better mood than when I left - endorphins fizzing and popping in my brain. We made plans for the day... First, a trip to the park to enjoy the beautiful day outside with the girls. Then home for Brooklyn's nap, and John's yardwork. When Brookie woke up, we'd go have dinner together and see an evening movie (Shrek).
I trotted upstairs to shower and get ready. Brookie, of course, followed. This child likes to be exactly where I am, exactly all the time. It doesn't matter if I am showering, going to the bathroom, cooking a 5 course meal (okay, this rarely happens) or vacuuming the stairs... She wants to be within arm's distance. The only exception (and pardon me for the tmi) is when she needs to, er... poop. This is the only time she will look at me frankly and say, "I NEED some privacy, Mom..." At which point I say, "OKAY!" and try and get something done in the 10 or 15 minutes of privacy she allots herself to poop. I will admit (perhaps a little guiltily) that I actually look forward to when she has to go, because I get a little respite of my own... A sad but true fact. Oh, the other thing... though she is potty trained in the sense that she knows when she has to go, she prefers to go in a pull-up. More tmi, but this is all critical to the story... so forgive me for dwelling, but you'll understand in a minute.
So into the shower I went, while Brooklyn stood on the other side of glass busying herself as she often does by pulling out hundreds of Q-tips, opening and closing all the drawers and cabinets, twirling toilet paper around her waist, climbing on the toilet seat, and turning the water faucet on and off -- all to the continuous sound of my loud (yet helpless) pleas from behind the steamy shower door, "Brookie! Don't Touch! No. Put that back. No more toilet paper. Stop flushing. That's DADDY's deodorant. Stop using Mommy's toothbrush, etc...!!!" So, when Brooklyn told me she "had to poop" when I exited the shower, it was with some degree of relief that I took her to her room and got her situated in a pull-up. Still dripping wet and in a robe, I began to leave her to do her business in her room. "Close the door." Brooklyn told (not asked) me. I gladly did and when the door was shut, I hightailed it back to my bathroom to get dry and dressed.
When I had some clothes on and my hair was semi-dry, I went to check on Brooklyn's progress. I opened her bedroom door to find the room empty. I almost turned and left, but heard something from behind the closet door. I opened it to discover Brooklyn in her poopy pull-up having a private tea party with the bottle of Children's Tylenol I had, just the night before, put high on her 5 foot high dresser. I think I gasped, or screamed, or did something completely unexpected because Brooklyn froze in place and looked at me with terrified saucer eyes. I grabbed the bottle from her, which was now completely empty, and tried to remember how much Tylenol was in there before Brooklyn helped herself to it. To my recollection, it had been nearly full. This is when the full-fledge panic hit. When I hit full-fledge panic mode, I get very, very calm. But before the calm came, I did manage to say to Brooklyn with all the fear and anger of a Mother who has seen her child do something extremely dangerous, "Nooooooo!!! NOOOOOO!!!" And with that I hoisted her stinky (and now crying) little self on my hip and ran downstairs to call poison control.
"Zippitee Doo Da" was officially off the playlist.
I told John what was going on and he immediately got on the phone with the Emergency Room close to home, but not before he did his own scared Daddy version of the, "Noooo!Noooo!" Brookie was bawling in earnest now, the full magnitude of her naughtiness weighing on her. While John was talking to the ER folks, I was on the phone with Poison Control. The woman on the phone, Debbie, who had a very calm way about her (which I was thankful for) told me there was nothing the ER could do for Brooklyn until it had been 4 hours since she injested the medicine. Apparently it takes that long for it to affect the liver -- which is what would suffer if she had a toxic amount of acetaminophen in her system. Liver failure snagged in my brain and rolled around while I tried to process what she was saying. Toxic. Liver shutting down... I was terrified. But Debbie said to keep her home for 4 hours. "The ER people will just twiddle their thumbs for 4 hours if you bring her there," Debbie told me. She encouraged me to get Brooklyn to eat and drink. I made a turkey and cheese sandwich and cut it into tiny squares and put one of the squares in Brooklyn's hand. She was flushed from crying and when I sat down on the couch with her she melted into my chest and wadded the sandwich into her fist. So much for the eating part. "Eat your little sandwich, Love..." I asked Brooklyn as gently as I could. She looked at it and whimpered. Both John and I sat watching her like a pot about to boil. Was she acting lethargic? Was that normal? Was she about to have a reaction? What would we do if she did? Was she too flushed? Hot? Ultimately, we decided we'd rather have her in the ER, regardless if there was to be some finger twiddling. We decided I would take Brooklyn (who was still clutching her mini-sandwich) while John stayed home with the older girls. Why take a family of 5 to the ER? we figured.
Around this time, Brooklyn got it. She heard the word: Doctor, and: Hospital... at which point the shrieking began. Let's make one thing abundantly clear... Brooklyn is horribly. terribly. freakishly. afraid of the Doctor. This, I believe, is a result of her early months when each and every time she'd visit her Doctor she'd be stuck with multiple needles, then subsequently feel awful for days. Saying "let's go to the Doctor," to her, would be much like saying "let's go swim with some Great White Sharks," to an adult. So she cried. Loudly. The entire drive to the ER (20 minutes) and the entire check in process, and the entire time we sat in the little room while the nurses took her vitals. The nurses asked me questions, which I only somewhat heard. I managed to yell over the cries what had happened in Brooklyn's closet with the Tylenol bottle. They entered some information in the computer and yelled back that the Doctor would be in "soon." I held Brooklyn close on the hospital bed. I told her she was safe and that everything would be okay. Her face and ears were bright red from crying. I continued to reassure her that I was 'there' and she was safe. Finally, she sighed... and the crying stopped - just as my head was about to implode.
An hour later the Doctor arrived - a Mister Rogers type who smiled and cracked jokes and kept calling me "Mom." He said there was nothing they could do until 4 hours had passed. He suggested we go home. I made him assure me twenty times that nothing would happen if we left the ER. He assured me. He told me when we returned they would need to do a blood draw to test for Toxic levels (that damn word again) of Acetaminophen in Brooklyn's system. If there was an issue, they would give her an antidote, which he said, was very effective. We drove home, in the golden light of the first sunny day in what seemed like eons. Brooklyn was exhausted. I was exhausted. I got her to eat, and then we needed to go back. For the blood draw.
If you think I was nervous about Brooklyn having blood drawn from her tiny little arm, then you're absolutely right. My stomach hurt. I was shaky and overly cheery. I told Brooklyn we were going to see Shrek after we were done far too many times. We checked back in at the ER and two nurses took us back to another room. This time Brooklyn wasn't crying. Thank God. One nurse was going to insert the needle, and the other was there to hold my baby down. I did a great deal of breathing in, but not nearly enough breathing out. Brookie looked so little on that hospital bed while the nurse checked her arms for suitable veins. It was time and just before the needle went in I said, "Brookie!!!" and she looked directly at me. "What?" she asked. "Do you want to see Shrek!?" The needle was in, and dark blood was filling the vial. She started to look at it, and I said, "BROOKIE!!!" and she said, "What?" Before I could answer, we were done. The nurse was putting a bandaid on her arm. "We're Done!" I told her. "You were so brave." No tears, and she looked at the bandaid proudly. "I'm gonna show Peyton and Quinny." She told me.
We had to wait for over an hour for the blood results. I let Brooklyn play with my iPhone, and she must have taken 100 pictures of the floor and my hands while I watched whatever Cartoon Disney show the nurses put on the television.
The Doctor arrived again, all smiles and cheesy humor, to reveal that Brooklyn was completely Toxic Free. He had numbers and a graph, both which revealed that my trouble making little angel was indeed, okay to go home. I told Brooklyn the news, "We're done!" She perked up and told me, "We can go home now!"
This weekend was exemplary proof of just that. It actually started in a most fantastic way -- in an unsual way, to boot. I woke up with an immediate realization. The sun was out. It was Saturday, and the Sun. Was. Out. It was bright and orangey and happy... Do you know the song "Zippitee Doo Da?" When you live in Washington and you've endured months and months of perpetual rain... rain well into the month of June, even... In these circumstances, when you see the sun shining in a clear cornflower blue sky, you may want to sing "Zippitee Doo Da." I for one, did.
I opened the kitchen windows and made the girls breakfast. I brewed coffee and looked at the blue sky. It was magnificent. I told John I wanted to take a run by the lake, and that's just what I did. Everything seemed to glisten in the morning sun. I came back home in a better mood than when I left - endorphins fizzing and popping in my brain. We made plans for the day... First, a trip to the park to enjoy the beautiful day outside with the girls. Then home for Brooklyn's nap, and John's yardwork. When Brookie woke up, we'd go have dinner together and see an evening movie (Shrek).
I trotted upstairs to shower and get ready. Brookie, of course, followed. This child likes to be exactly where I am, exactly all the time. It doesn't matter if I am showering, going to the bathroom, cooking a 5 course meal (okay, this rarely happens) or vacuuming the stairs... She wants to be within arm's distance. The only exception (and pardon me for the tmi) is when she needs to, er... poop. This is the only time she will look at me frankly and say, "I NEED some privacy, Mom..." At which point I say, "OKAY!" and try and get something done in the 10 or 15 minutes of privacy she allots herself to poop. I will admit (perhaps a little guiltily) that I actually look forward to when she has to go, because I get a little respite of my own... A sad but true fact. Oh, the other thing... though she is potty trained in the sense that she knows when she has to go, she prefers to go in a pull-up. More tmi, but this is all critical to the story... so forgive me for dwelling, but you'll understand in a minute.
So into the shower I went, while Brooklyn stood on the other side of glass busying herself as she often does by pulling out hundreds of Q-tips, opening and closing all the drawers and cabinets, twirling toilet paper around her waist, climbing on the toilet seat, and turning the water faucet on and off -- all to the continuous sound of my loud (yet helpless) pleas from behind the steamy shower door, "Brookie! Don't Touch! No. Put that back. No more toilet paper. Stop flushing. That's DADDY's deodorant. Stop using Mommy's toothbrush, etc...!!!" So, when Brooklyn told me she "had to poop" when I exited the shower, it was with some degree of relief that I took her to her room and got her situated in a pull-up. Still dripping wet and in a robe, I began to leave her to do her business in her room. "Close the door." Brooklyn told (not asked) me. I gladly did and when the door was shut, I hightailed it back to my bathroom to get dry and dressed.
When I had some clothes on and my hair was semi-dry, I went to check on Brooklyn's progress. I opened her bedroom door to find the room empty. I almost turned and left, but heard something from behind the closet door. I opened it to discover Brooklyn in her poopy pull-up having a private tea party with the bottle of Children's Tylenol I had, just the night before, put high on her 5 foot high dresser. I think I gasped, or screamed, or did something completely unexpected because Brooklyn froze in place and looked at me with terrified saucer eyes. I grabbed the bottle from her, which was now completely empty, and tried to remember how much Tylenol was in there before Brooklyn helped herself to it. To my recollection, it had been nearly full. This is when the full-fledge panic hit. When I hit full-fledge panic mode, I get very, very calm. But before the calm came, I did manage to say to Brooklyn with all the fear and anger of a Mother who has seen her child do something extremely dangerous, "Nooooooo!!! NOOOOOO!!!" And with that I hoisted her stinky (and now crying) little self on my hip and ran downstairs to call poison control.
"Zippitee Doo Da" was officially off the playlist.
I told John what was going on and he immediately got on the phone with the Emergency Room close to home, but not before he did his own scared Daddy version of the, "Noooo!Noooo!" Brookie was bawling in earnest now, the full magnitude of her naughtiness weighing on her. While John was talking to the ER folks, I was on the phone with Poison Control. The woman on the phone, Debbie, who had a very calm way about her (which I was thankful for) told me there was nothing the ER could do for Brooklyn until it had been 4 hours since she injested the medicine. Apparently it takes that long for it to affect the liver -- which is what would suffer if she had a toxic amount of acetaminophen in her system. Liver failure snagged in my brain and rolled around while I tried to process what she was saying. Toxic. Liver shutting down... I was terrified. But Debbie said to keep her home for 4 hours. "The ER people will just twiddle their thumbs for 4 hours if you bring her there," Debbie told me. She encouraged me to get Brooklyn to eat and drink. I made a turkey and cheese sandwich and cut it into tiny squares and put one of the squares in Brooklyn's hand. She was flushed from crying and when I sat down on the couch with her she melted into my chest and wadded the sandwich into her fist. So much for the eating part. "Eat your little sandwich, Love..." I asked Brooklyn as gently as I could. She looked at it and whimpered. Both John and I sat watching her like a pot about to boil. Was she acting lethargic? Was that normal? Was she about to have a reaction? What would we do if she did? Was she too flushed? Hot? Ultimately, we decided we'd rather have her in the ER, regardless if there was to be some finger twiddling. We decided I would take Brooklyn (who was still clutching her mini-sandwich) while John stayed home with the older girls. Why take a family of 5 to the ER? we figured.
Around this time, Brooklyn got it. She heard the word: Doctor, and: Hospital... at which point the shrieking began. Let's make one thing abundantly clear... Brooklyn is horribly. terribly. freakishly. afraid of the Doctor. This, I believe, is a result of her early months when each and every time she'd visit her Doctor she'd be stuck with multiple needles, then subsequently feel awful for days. Saying "let's go to the Doctor," to her, would be much like saying "let's go swim with some Great White Sharks," to an adult. So she cried. Loudly. The entire drive to the ER (20 minutes) and the entire check in process, and the entire time we sat in the little room while the nurses took her vitals. The nurses asked me questions, which I only somewhat heard. I managed to yell over the cries what had happened in Brooklyn's closet with the Tylenol bottle. They entered some information in the computer and yelled back that the Doctor would be in "soon." I held Brooklyn close on the hospital bed. I told her she was safe and that everything would be okay. Her face and ears were bright red from crying. I continued to reassure her that I was 'there' and she was safe. Finally, she sighed... and the crying stopped - just as my head was about to implode.
An hour later the Doctor arrived - a Mister Rogers type who smiled and cracked jokes and kept calling me "Mom." He said there was nothing they could do until 4 hours had passed. He suggested we go home. I made him assure me twenty times that nothing would happen if we left the ER. He assured me. He told me when we returned they would need to do a blood draw to test for Toxic levels (that damn word again) of Acetaminophen in Brooklyn's system. If there was an issue, they would give her an antidote, which he said, was very effective. We drove home, in the golden light of the first sunny day in what seemed like eons. Brooklyn was exhausted. I was exhausted. I got her to eat, and then we needed to go back. For the blood draw.
If you think I was nervous about Brooklyn having blood drawn from her tiny little arm, then you're absolutely right. My stomach hurt. I was shaky and overly cheery. I told Brooklyn we were going to see Shrek after we were done far too many times. We checked back in at the ER and two nurses took us back to another room. This time Brooklyn wasn't crying. Thank God. One nurse was going to insert the needle, and the other was there to hold my baby down. I did a great deal of breathing in, but not nearly enough breathing out. Brookie looked so little on that hospital bed while the nurse checked her arms for suitable veins. It was time and just before the needle went in I said, "Brookie!!!" and she looked directly at me. "What?" she asked. "Do you want to see Shrek!?" The needle was in, and dark blood was filling the vial. She started to look at it, and I said, "BROOKIE!!!" and she said, "What?" Before I could answer, we were done. The nurse was putting a bandaid on her arm. "We're Done!" I told her. "You were so brave." No tears, and she looked at the bandaid proudly. "I'm gonna show Peyton and Quinny." She told me.
We had to wait for over an hour for the blood results. I let Brooklyn play with my iPhone, and she must have taken 100 pictures of the floor and my hands while I watched whatever Cartoon Disney show the nurses put on the television.
The Doctor arrived again, all smiles and cheesy humor, to reveal that Brooklyn was completely Toxic Free. He had numbers and a graph, both which revealed that my trouble making little angel was indeed, okay to go home. I told Brooklyn the news, "We're done!" She perked up and told me, "We can go home now!"
Friday, June 4, 2010
High Fashion in the Hutchie House
All three girls decided they wanted to dress themselves this morning. Peyton, at age 8, does a fairly good job picking her outfits - usually. Today her choice didn't impress me, and it certainly did not rank in her top ten. With great thought, she decided on a pink tank top (it was raining outside) a fall-colored sweater poncho deal, and a beige cordouroy skirt. I managed to convince her to ace the poncho and switch out the skirt for some jeans, and go for a more weather-friendly shirt. I must do this with the diplomacy of skilled politicians, lest I insult her fashion sense.
Quincy was pretty much good to go in a pair of capri jeans and a long-sleeve tee. My "easy" child...
Brooklyn... Sweet little Brooklyn... the most determined and ridiculously dressed of the three came down in: a Mexican summer dress, a bathing suit top (this is a staple of her daily wardrobe) and not one, but two pairs of pants, and yes, they were inside out. For shoes she had on her black Christmas patent leather "high heels" as she calls them. Perfect.
Then there is hair to contend with. Three blonde heads line up at the bathroom sink - small to large. Each child is begging with a passion and zeal you'd have to hear to believe, to be "First" because among the three girls, going first is of utmost importance and significance. I go for the closest head in front of me: Brooklyn's. I work deftly, because any wasted time will result in only a partial brushing. She quickly becomes impatient with hair-dos and often times I find myself trying to pop a pretty on her head while she twists and runs out the bathroom door. I manage to get a rubberband and bow in her delicate little locks and count myself very successful.
Quincy is next. While I begin removing tangles from her hair, she decides to multi-task and starts brushing her teeth. I want to tell her to -wait- until I'm done with her hair, but I'm distracted by Peyton emptying all the clips and rubberbands onto the counter. I tell her to 'knock it off,' which isn't my favorite parenting request- or demand, rather... but it's efficient. Brooklyn decides her teeth need brushing too, so she follows suit standing atop the toilet seat. Peyton is telling me in great detail the kind of hair-do she wants... I'm wrestling with Quincy's hair while she spits toothpaste in the sink. Brooklyn spits her toothpaste too, and it lands directly on Quincy's hand and toothbrush which, I don't think I need to tell you, causes hysterics from Quincy. I manage to calm her from the intolerable injustice she just suffered and finish her hair at the same time. Two done. Quincy sprints from the bathroom and launches herself down the hallway in an impressive cartwheelish rolling feat - completely messing up her hair. "Quincy!!! Your hair!" I tell her. "Woooops." She says guiltily in response. I grab Peyton and begin removing the one million tangles that gather in her hair by morning. She is protesting loudly as Brooklyn toddles off toward her room. From the bathroom I can see she is in her room, drawers open, reassessing her wardrobe options. "Brookie," I begin, while flipping Peyton's hair through a rubberband... "No. More. Clothes." But it's already too late. I see she has her last year's Holiday dress, which I no longer bother to hang up because it gets yanked from her closet (breaking hangers) everyday anyway. She struggles to wrangle it over her head, and I watch her brushed hair and successful hair-do fly out the window. She finally manages to get the dress all the way on - a velvet and chiffon number, over her Mexican summer dress. This seems to be just the touch she was looking for because with a satisified spin on her high heel shoe, she busts a move downstairs. I quickly touch up Quincy's hair, and tell the girls it's time to go.
I realize at this point I haven't even run a brush through my own hair. I get a load of myself in the mirror and without hesitation go directly for a hat.
Mug of cold coffee in one hand, and Brooklyn in the other, I head out the garage door. Peyton has made it to the mothership - the car, and is buckled and good to go. Thank God. One down. I catch Quincy trying to stuff her capri pants into her brown zip up boots and essentially tell her 'Noway in the world' while I get Brooklyn buckled in her carseat. Two. When Quinny realizes she is getting nowhwere with complaining and insisting she simply can.not. get her tennis shoes on, she pops the shoes on and dashes to the car, hops in (Three) and we're off. The girls are brushed, dressed, and ready for the world.
I, on the other hand, have looked better. :)
Quincy was pretty much good to go in a pair of capri jeans and a long-sleeve tee. My "easy" child...
Brooklyn... Sweet little Brooklyn... the most determined and ridiculously dressed of the three came down in: a Mexican summer dress, a bathing suit top (this is a staple of her daily wardrobe) and not one, but two pairs of pants, and yes, they were inside out. For shoes she had on her black Christmas patent leather "high heels" as she calls them. Perfect.
Then there is hair to contend with. Three blonde heads line up at the bathroom sink - small to large. Each child is begging with a passion and zeal you'd have to hear to believe, to be "First" because among the three girls, going first is of utmost importance and significance. I go for the closest head in front of me: Brooklyn's. I work deftly, because any wasted time will result in only a partial brushing. She quickly becomes impatient with hair-dos and often times I find myself trying to pop a pretty on her head while she twists and runs out the bathroom door. I manage to get a rubberband and bow in her delicate little locks and count myself very successful.
Quincy is next. While I begin removing tangles from her hair, she decides to multi-task and starts brushing her teeth. I want to tell her to -wait- until I'm done with her hair, but I'm distracted by Peyton emptying all the clips and rubberbands onto the counter. I tell her to 'knock it off,' which isn't my favorite parenting request- or demand, rather... but it's efficient. Brooklyn decides her teeth need brushing too, so she follows suit standing atop the toilet seat. Peyton is telling me in great detail the kind of hair-do she wants... I'm wrestling with Quincy's hair while she spits toothpaste in the sink. Brooklyn spits her toothpaste too, and it lands directly on Quincy's hand and toothbrush which, I don't think I need to tell you, causes hysterics from Quincy. I manage to calm her from the intolerable injustice she just suffered and finish her hair at the same time. Two done. Quincy sprints from the bathroom and launches herself down the hallway in an impressive cartwheelish rolling feat - completely messing up her hair. "Quincy!!! Your hair!" I tell her. "Woooops." She says guiltily in response. I grab Peyton and begin removing the one million tangles that gather in her hair by morning. She is protesting loudly as Brooklyn toddles off toward her room. From the bathroom I can see she is in her room, drawers open, reassessing her wardrobe options. "Brookie," I begin, while flipping Peyton's hair through a rubberband... "No. More. Clothes." But it's already too late. I see she has her last year's Holiday dress, which I no longer bother to hang up because it gets yanked from her closet (breaking hangers) everyday anyway. She struggles to wrangle it over her head, and I watch her brushed hair and successful hair-do fly out the window. She finally manages to get the dress all the way on - a velvet and chiffon number, over her Mexican summer dress. This seems to be just the touch she was looking for because with a satisified spin on her high heel shoe, she busts a move downstairs. I quickly touch up Quincy's hair, and tell the girls it's time to go.
I realize at this point I haven't even run a brush through my own hair. I get a load of myself in the mirror and without hesitation go directly for a hat.
Mug of cold coffee in one hand, and Brooklyn in the other, I head out the garage door. Peyton has made it to the mothership - the car, and is buckled and good to go. Thank God. One down. I catch Quincy trying to stuff her capri pants into her brown zip up boots and essentially tell her 'Noway in the world' while I get Brooklyn buckled in her carseat. Two. When Quinny realizes she is getting nowhwere with complaining and insisting she simply can.not. get her tennis shoes on, she pops the shoes on and dashes to the car, hops in (Three) and we're off. The girls are brushed, dressed, and ready for the world.
I, on the other hand, have looked better. :)
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