One of those days

Jesse is in Arizona for a week doing pre-deployment stuff. The day started out well enough. We were planning to go to the zoo today. I made the kids waffles for breakfast and turned them on a movie while I made some phone calls about move stuff. When I was finished I went to the kitchen to do the dishes. I notice that Savannah's fish is laying at the bottom of it's bowl. I flick the bowl a few time. Yep, its definitely dead. Then I notice there is soap in the fish bowl! I call Savannah in, and we talk about why you don't put things in the fish bowl, and she said that she wanted to help me "send Alice-arella to fish heaven" i.e. flush it down the toilet. So we do that, and as soon and the fish disappears Savannah starts to bawl. She doesn't want to go to the zoo anymore, she wants to get a new fish. It took me a few minutes to get her calmed down, then I went back to the kitchen.

I walk in the door to find Lincoln standing on the edge of the counter, toes over the edge, holding a steak knife in one hand and a butcher knife in the other! It gets worse, not only is he about to fall off the counter holding extremely sharp knives, he's sticking them in the toaster, which is plugged in! Once my heart started beating again I told the kids to get their shoes so we could go to the zoo.

Savannah is too tired, she needs a rest. So she lays on the couch for about 10 minutes, then starts playing again. I decided at this point it was best to wait until after lunch to go to the zoo. Of course, after lunch Lincoln needed a nap, and when he finally woke up it was 2 PM, and the zoo was closing in 2 hours. New fish it was then. I also had a few other errands to run. So we ran the errands, with Lincoln crying most of the time, Savannah meowing as loud as she could (she was "crying about her fish"), and both kids trying to climb out of the cart. As we were leaving Target I decided to buy the kids Icee's since it was so hot. Ya, Lincoln dumped his entire Icee on the floor of my new car. We finally made it home with a new file box and files, a few groceries, and the fish.

I turned a movie on for the kids in the playroom, and went back to the dishes. A few minutes later Lincoln comes running in the kitchen screaming and rubbing his eyes. He's covered head to toe in some sort of blue goo. I have no idea what it is, but I'm pretty sure it should be all over his face so I run him to the bathroom and hold his face under running water in the tub. He's screaming, thrashing, and trying to get away. As soon as his face was clean, I ran to find Savannah and see what we were dealing with here. The door from the playroom to outside is wide open. There is an empty bottle of car wash soap laying next to a big puddle on the porch. Savannah claims that Lincoln did it all by himself. Ya right. An 18 month old unlocked the door, opened it, opened the garage door, reached the soap that was on the dryer, took it outside, opened it, and lifted the gallon bottle above his head and poured the entire thing over his head. Sounds a bit fishy to me. So I look for warning labels on the bottle; avoid contact with skin, if in eyes flush with large amounts of water and seek medical attention if irritation continues, call poison control if ingested, do not inhale... I'm freaking out! He seems fine, but what if he swallowed some, what if he's going to be blind, what if it burned his skin... I start calling everyone who might be able to tell me what to do. I call Jesse, my mom, 2 of my sisters, Jesse again, no one is answering. I'm debating whether my dad might have some insight when Jesse calls back. He calms me down and assures me that if Lincoln isn't crying and is acting completely normal he is fine. I'm not.

Its now 7 PM, and we haven't eaten dinner, we've had 2 almost trips to the emergency room, a dead fish, and plenty of whining. I decide its time for a trip to the McDonald's play place. I tell the kids to get their shoes on and I walk into the bathroom. Wonderful, someone has dumped an entire box of cereal in the sink, then run the water so it is now a gooey sticky mess. I decided not to deal with it right then. We went to McDonald's and I let the kids play for an hour until it was late enough to come home and put them straight to bed. As I was putting them to bed Savannah started crying that her throat hurts. Lets all hope that this was just a ploy to delay bedtime, and that she isn't getting sick.

Its now 9 and my house is a disaster, I still haven't gotten the dishes done, and Patricia is coming over in the morning. But, this is why it is all worth it: