It’s amazing how three kids can turn a perfectly neat room into this in less than five minutes. And don’t get me wrong – I don’t consider this mess at all. Some serious paper construction, a Playmobil hospital emergency, a Lego village and an enormous amount of books searched through for just the right one is the best kind of playdate of all. I picked up two extra kids while their dad and E’s helped transport the head of the snake sculpture (remember that from a few posts back?) over to the school for the Spooky Sock Hop tomorrow night. They are going to finish the mosaics at the event and then install it soon in the play yard. The rain was pouring down, so I certainly had the much better end of the deal listening to the sounds of three really creative kids and the lack of sound of one really sleepy baby upstairs for the evening. So that’s the whirlwind, here’s the broken rule:
Bumper pads are sold with almost every bedding set despite the fact that they really aren’t the safest thing to have in a crib. You are supposed to remove them once your kid gets mobile enough to smoosh their face over into it for the duration of the evening. But we did that, and the result was a kid who was mobile enough to promptly get her leg stuck through the slats and scream bloody murder when she tried to extract those plump little thighs by kicking madly at them. So we lay her down in the middle of the bed each night and she looks up at us with this sleepy little smile, turns her head to the side and makes a few jabs at her mouth with her thumb, connecting finally around the fifth or sixth try. Her eyes close, the thumb moves in and out, first with purpose, then at a rhythmic pace, and after about thirty seconds her body relaxes and it plops out on the mattress beside her. Everything in her body language says “I’m spent, and good night”. Not another peep is heard, not a rustle or a grunt over the monitor for the rest of the evening. Tonight the kids screamed, the vacuum ran, the dryer revved up for its loudest spin cycle, and I went in and out of the room half a dozen times with folded laundry or new paper wrapped canisters and each time I entered the room she was absolutely still. But she was also the teeny-tiniest bit closer to the edge. By the last visit she was there – in her spot – with thumb and fist and face pushed up against it, snug as a bug, settled in for the night.