Prune Juice and Bodily Fluids

The day began innocently enough (Don't they all?). Dad brought almost-2 yr.-old Jr. to day care along with a sippy cup of prune juice.
"Jr.'s stopped up. Needs lots of fluids. No milk"
No problem (so I thought....).

The kids sat around the table for breakfast. Jr., not happy with the prune juice or dad divulging his secrets about his privates, hurled the prune juice-filled sippy cup across the kitchen and onto the floor where it exploded like a volcano. Prune juice dripped and ran down cabinet fronts and cabinet doors, chair legs and kids' legs. The kitchen floor was awash in fluid. Fortunately, the runner rug was there to absorb the rest of the juice....

Biting my lips and crossing my arms with my clenched hands under my armpits (and with four-letter word combinations you'd never imagine going through my mind), I stormed to the locked upper (clean) cabinet and got the cleaning supplies. And began wiping, scrubbing, and cleaning the lower 4 ft. of my kitchen.

After I'd thrown the rug in the washer and was scrubbing the floor again, Carter informed me that the baby in the high chair had thrown up. I glanced up from the floor and could see a bit of white formula on her chin. Upon standing, I realized she was puking up formula, fruit, and rice cereal the equivilent of Mt. St. Helens eruption in 1980! After the major eruption and the small lava flows that followed, I lifted her lovingly in my outstretched arms and carried her dripping torso to the bathtub. I peeled her clothes off over her head ( Trust me, if I'd had scissors or a pocketknife on me, I would have cut them off. I've done it before .... with an encounter with a different bodily fluid that shouldn't have been fluid...) and cleaned her from head to toe.

All the while I'm doing this, the kids are still sitting at the table eating their breakfast. They seem to eat more when there's a show included with their meal.

Baby then went into a playpen while I took the cushioned seat cover off the high chair, hosed it off outside, scrubbed it in the sink, laid it on the porch rail to dry, and scrubbed the rest of the high chair.

I then refilled Jr.'s sippy cup, with oj this time. Guess he didn't want oj either. After rescrubbing the lower 4 ft. of my kitchen, I cleared the table and the breakfast mess.

Carter and Aidan began running through the house from one end to the other knocking down anyone or anything in their paths. No amount of asking, pleading, demanding, or bribing could get them to stop running. So, I sent them outside and told them to run all they wanted.

As I began bundling up all the littler ones to go outside, I began to suspect that the prune juice was working its magic. After Jr. was unbundled, cleaned and changed, and rebundled, I realized the prune juice had caused a chain reaction in all the little ones.

Between diaper changes, I looked out to check on Carter and Aidan, they were just standing on the porch. Not running. I told them they were supposed to be running like they had been in the house. They began walking down the steps, so I headed back to the bathroom and more diaper changes.

While diapers, wipes, changing pads, poopy butts, and germs were flowing in a strange, and smelly, assembly line in the bathroom, Baby decided that was an excellent time to puke again. So, the bathroom rug joined the kitchen rug in the washer.

Eventually, 8 diapers were changed (2 for each Diaperbutt... Apparently, prune juice works just by coming in contact with someone who's drank it, or thrown it). Everyone was rebundled and we headed outside to find Carter and Aidan, sitting on the swings. Not swinging. Just sitting.

Just as I turned them all loose to play outside, my mom pulled into the driveway. She lives across town - about 10 blocks in our modern Mayberry. She got out of her van carrying a day-old birthday cake - thick with frosting and brightly colored sprinkles. She wanted to share it with us. How nice.

I was anxious to see how the second hour of my workday was going to go.