Perfect Children

Yes, go ahead. Laugh. Perfect. That's what I was told. My children are perfect. Well, I do choose to remain positive and always show my children in their best light. I also always want to be an encouragement to others. Typically, I choose to be an encouragement to young mothers by focusing on the many, many blessings of motherhood. There are indeed more blessings of motherhood than I could ever count.

This post will not showcase those blessings of motherhood. No. On the contrary, this post will be one of the very rare "keeping it real" posts. Are you ready?

Sunday morning my Tommy had to get up early for a meeting at work before church. Why they choose to hold monthly meetings on Sunday morning is beyond me. I had a bit of a choppy night's sleep and had gotten to bed very late the night before. I'm sure I offered him a kiss and a mumbled good bye before he left, as I do recall hearing the engine start to the van. Anything other than that and I'm not so sure. At some point the children, my lovable little blessings, woke up. They all came in and piled ontop of me to cuddle for a while.

The cuddling could really only last so long. One by one, I'm pretty certain that Ian was the first, they got up and started playing quietly in my room. I half way came to conciousness when Abigail shut my bedroom door so Katherine wouldn't wander out. I tried really hard to bring myself to at least three quarter conciousness and with extraordinary will power said, "Clothes. Get clothes."

My dear, sweet children just looked at me like I was sprouting a new head. Abigail came over, sat beside me, and rubbed my head. Then she said, "Mom, what clothes do you want us to get?"

My brain tried to function. After a moment of useless wheels turning I said, "It's up to you."

They happily went to hunt down clothes and came back with last year's Christmas dresses for the girls and a matching shirt for Ian. I nodded my approval with my eyes still shut. Abigail said, "Mom, do you want Emily and me to take a shower?"

"Uhuh." came my grunted reply. Then in a split moment of alertedness, I grabbed Katherine and asked her to cuddle so she would stay out of the bathroom. She was happy to oblige. She even read me a book. If you've never had a one year old read you a book, I'll just let you know that it doesn't involve reading, but having said book pounded into your already throbbing head.

Ian came up and cuddled with us for a moment. Then he just couldn't take it any longer. He sat in the middle of my bedroom and gathered all of the toys around him. Why, you ask? So that he was in the perfect position to throw toys through the bathroom door and land right in the bathtub where the girls were showering. Just a side note, I make them shower sitting down. I know. Crazy. But, those tubs are hard. So, the girls not too thrilled with having toys showered upon them got clean as quick as they could and came out to get dressed. When I heard the shower turn off I told Katherine that she could go get her dress and bring it to me.

She must have obeyed, because the next time I woke up the dress was covering my head. I heard mumbling and giggling coming from somewhere. Mumbling is never good. Mumbing combined with giggling is scary. Then I heard Abigail say, "IAN! What are you doing?"

I pried my eyes open enough to see that Ian was crouching just over Katherine. He had something in his hand. Gulp. It was a glue bottle. Gulp. He was pouring it straight onto Katherine's precious blonde head. Then as I was trying to formulate the words to make him stop, he retrieved a CD from his other hand and slapped it right onto the glob of glue on Katherine's head. Yes, indeed. He thought it would be a good idea to glue a CD to his sister's head. He had thought it out so well, that prior to administering the glue to the beautiful head, he peeled the shiny coating off of the CD so the glue could attach to a flat surface. Good thinking.

The words finally escaped my mouth and he put the glue away and tried to clean her up. Yeah, cleaning Elmer's glue off of each tiny strand of hair. Somehow, sleep still pulled me back. This time when I woke up Ian was opening and attaching pads, yeah you know the ones, all over Katherine like he was playing pin the tail on the donkey or something.

I was finally able to reach a state of alertedness that enabled me to remove my body from the bed and stand. I got Katherine as clean as possible and dressed in the dress Abigail had so sweetly chosen for her just in time for Daddy to finally get back home.

I stared at him as he walked in the door with my sweats still on, my hair going in more directions than legally allowed, and the side of my face still red from the pillow. I sweetly pulled him to the couch where I told him as sweetly as possible that from now on, whenever he leaves the house, his male offspring shall join him.

Yes, indeed, my children are perfect.