Cry, baby, cry (let your mother laugh)

Alrighty, since my last post garnered way more sympathy texts than laughs, I thought I should disclose that:

1) I am OK, we are OK and 

2) I am trying to be funny. PLEASE LAUGH (even if you also want to cry). And if you do cry, please lie to me and tell me you laughed!

I also want to reiterate that the story about everyone puking was from a few months ago.  We had been healthy for at least a week by the time I wrote that.  As luck would have it, the day after posting it, Charlie started throwing up all night long (knocking on wood never works).  Then a few days later (Valentine's Day to be exact), Trevor started puking, and the next day Phoebe started puking... It just so happens that puking and not sleeping seem to be the only "funny" things going on over here!

It is gross, it is tiring, but it is still pretty funny. However, if you do not laugh, it is not funny. SO PLEASE LAUGH!

I was going back through some of my notes to find other things that were funny-but-not-funny that I had been meaning to write about.  One note said, "she's in the garbage sucking on someone's dirty q-tip." But with no other context clues, I have no recollection of what that was about...

Another funny-but-not-funny story came from a one of the first nights home from the hospital as a family of 4.  Here is ow that particularly "fun" evening went: 

8:30pm: changing infant diaper in the bathroom while toddler takes a dump on the potty.

8:31pm: infant is screaming and crying as I struggle to get the diaper and jammies on.

8:32pm: toddler complains that the toilet water splashed in her face while she pooped.

8:32pm and 2 seconds: call in hubby; I need back-up ASAP.

8:33pm: hubby wipes toddler's bottom, washes her poop-water-splashed face, brushes her teeth.

9:30pm: finally get the loud and cranky infant to sleep while hubby reads books to the toddler. 

9:45pm: relieve hubby of book-reading duties so he can go back to finishing grading papers for work. 

10:30pm: finally get overactive toddler to sleep.

11:00pm: clean up kitchen and shove a peanut butter and Nutella sandwich and a couple cookies in my mouth.

11:30pm: brush my teeth and go to sleep. 

1:45am: toddler comes into our bed.

2:15am: infant gets up to nurse.

2:20am: restless toddler keeps rolling around and knocking into nursing infant.

2:21am: gently (yet forcefully) shove toddler across the bed and away from nursing infant and realize toddler is soaking wet and has congested breathing. 

2:21am: worry that toddler is sick and sweating thru her clothes? Feverish? She doesn’t feel hot...

2:22am: realize that toddler probably got the germs from that damn booger-faced kid that I saw at daycare pick-up.  Hopefully it’s just a cold and not goddamn COVID. Also realize she definitely pissed her jammies. 

2:30am: finish nursing infant who fell back a sleep, put infant down in the bassinet.... asleep.

2:31am: infant has explosive shit.

2:32am: pick infant back up and bring to bathroom to change disgusting diaper.

2:34am: open up diaper and infant had another explosive shit mid-change. 

2:40am: infant is now all cleaned up with a fresh diaper, new jammies are on, and he is re-swaddled and ready for bed. 

2:41am: infant is now wide awake. 

2:42am: nurse infant again.

3:00am: put sleepy infant back in bassinet.

3:02am: go check toddler's bed.

3:03am: confirm toddler bed is soaked with urine.

3:05am: find clean bed sheets and change toddler bed.

3:15am: find new toddler underwear and jammies.

3:16am: remove soggy clothes from comatose toddler who wakes up upset looking for Gregory (the goat who eats trash - a character from the last book she read). 

3:18am: proceed to only get underpants on the confused toddler before she starts to lose it. 

3:19am: give up on the jammies and usher toddler back to her own, now clean and dry bed.

3:30am: toddler is back to sleep.

3:31am: go back to my room and strip my wet bed sheets.

3:33am: find clean sheets and start to change the bed.

3:35am: dazed and confused naked toddler returns to my room see what I am doing.

3:45am: dazed and confused naked toddler is ushered back to sleep in her own bed.

3:55am: finish making my king-size bed but could only find a twin-size comforter. Leave an extra fleece blanket on hubby’s side of the bed in case he ever makes it up to bed.

4:05am: lay in bed wide awake not tired; wondering what’s next: nursing infant or more confused toddler?  Stressing about how to keep this booger-faced toddler away from this immunodeficient infant? Decide to write this all down.

4:15am: infant rips a nasty wet fart....

4:16am: consider whether or not to check infant's diaper weighing the risk of waking him up and pissing him off and taking at least another 30 min to get him back to sleep vs letting him sleep in a shitty diaper (that may or may not actually be shitty).

4:17am: decide he will let me know if he needs changing and stay in bed....

4:18am: start looking at mindless social media to bore my brain and tire me out.

4:20am: dazed and confused booger-faced toddler comes in and wants me to lay down with her in her bed.

4:26am: laying in toddler bed I hear a weird screaming noise.  Toddler is sound asleep. I get up and check infant - he seems fine. Assume it must be a fox? Or did I dream it? Or am I actually losing my mind?

4:45am: toddler keeps sneezing and is wide awake again.

4:46am: sneak downstairs to grab a face mask and come back up.

4:47am: toddler cries for me to take the mask off. Tell her in the politest way to shut up, mind your own business, and go the hell to sleep.

5:00am: infant starts stirring. 

5:02am: text hubby if he is awake, no response. 

5:30am: infant starts chirping.

5:40am: infant is full-on screaming.

5:44am: nursing infant in my room.

5:45am: toddler comes in my room crying for me to come back in her room. Tell her to go back to bed.

5:50am: toddler comes back out of her room; tell her to go back to bed. She says she has to use the potty. Fine. Go!

5:52am: toddler comes out of bathroom (no toilet flush or sink sounds but she goes back to bed on her own, so I keep my mouth shut). 

6:15am: infant is back to sleep. Toddler hasn’t moved in 20 minutes. Maybe she’s asleep? Should I even try to go back to sleep? Or make the biggest cup of the strongest coffee and “enjoy” a few minutes of quiet time by myself?

6:20am:  Well, I procrastinated too long. EVERYONE IS UP FOR THE DAY!! 

Lesson of the day: Control what you can control. Forget sleep. Always make the coffee!

Audience check-in: Are you laughing?

Yes?  Perfect!  Thank you.

No?  Reminder:  keep your crying to yourself and tell me you laughed.