Every morning I need to put sunscreen on both kids before school. This morning, Peyton was giving me problems, and I thought it was because she woke up on the wrong side of the bed. She was so grouchy, right from the moment she woke up. She was sleeping so soundly even past my alarm, and I went to get Brandon at 7am. He was already up, but just slowly moving out of the bed. I hurried him to get ready, then went out to check on Peyton who was whining and looking for me in my room. I was behind her, and when she saw me, she stretched out her arms. She calmed down when I picked her up. During breakfast, I was trying to put sunscreen on her face. She said, “I no want scun skeen.” I finally convinced her that we needed to, she just didn’t want it in her eyes. Brandon didn’t give me any problems even after I did get it in his eyes. Good thing it’s tear free.
Later today, when I picked Peyton up from school, the teacher said she had a bit of a tough morning. They figured she was just used to playing with her brother, but now these kids at school were her friends. She did better than I thought with the potty, given she had been in diapers all of our trip. She only had one poop and one pee accident, but it was all in her swim clothes, so she was in her regular clothes that I had out for her after water play. She helped me with the laundry when we got home. She gets her body halfway in the laundry; just her legs are on the ground, and she pulls out all the wet to go to the dryer. She stood up too quickly and hit her head on the washer and said, “Oh, I hurt my head.” Later, when eating the Chinese broccoli Dave made, she said, “This not good for me.” I tried to convince her it was good and if she ate it, she’d grow taller and be able to ride more rides. She wasn’t buying it. She just repeated, “This not good for me.” She chose to eat her frozen veggies instead. Dave was on the phone with the internet people, so I was finishing up dinner with the kids. Peyton was having a tantrum since I took away her princess cup since she wasn’t drinking it like a big girl. I poured the milk into a sippy cup and gave that to her. She spilled some of the milk on purpose on the floor through the tiny sippy cup holes, so I took that away from her. I wiped up the milk with a towel, and left a little water on the ground. Peyton was walking away from me since I had taken her milk away, but she slipped on the wet spot. She howled even longer while I did my best to suppress my laughter at the sight of her totally laid out on her back, looking up at the ceiling. I told her if she wanted to read books, she had to drink her milk. She came back to her milk, and then I set the dreaded timer. She cried even harder, telling me she didn’t want the timer. “Turn it off, Mommy. Turn off the timer.” I refused, and told her she had 5 minutes to finish her milk. Actually, I set it for 10 minutes, but really, she only took 3 minutes. There was only a half cup in there. She had calmed down, but still had clear snot dripping down from her nose. I took her upstairs to brush her teeth, and cleaned her up a bit. Her eyes were still teary, and her nose had residual drip. I held her closely to me, and she looked up at me, smiled and said, “Snuggle, snuggle?” When we “snuggle snuggle”, we rub noses. I took one look at her nose, and had to strategically snuggle with my nose above her drippy nose. The things we do for love.
Again, whenever one kid is in trouble, the other becomes an angel. I had asked Brandon to take a bath, while I finished up with Peyton. He went up, did his thing, then came back down. While I was brushing Peyton’s teeth, he said, “I think someone’s trying to call me downstairs.” I asked him, “Who’s trying to call you?” I asked him if my phone was ringing. He said it was, and that someone was trying to call him. Weird. Later, I realized he was right – my mom had tried to call, but I hadn’t even heard it. Dave had left his work badge at home. I called him this morning to let him know. When Brandon saw it, he asked Dave which door he’d be leaving out of tomorrow morning. Dave asked him what for. Brandon said, “So I can put the badge down in front of the door when you leave, so you don’t forget it.” Such a sweet boy. (The teachers said he had a good day today, except that he tried to smuggle a lego minifigure into school, and then blamed it on Peyton and/or me for putting it in his pocket)