Shamrock Pizzas

The Little Women went on a shamrock treasure hunt, following arrows to a special prize:  Finger Puppets!

I finally finished some matching dresses for the little ladies using Simplicity 5695.  I had actually cut out the pieces last May, but due to our move to Switzerland, I just now got around to finishing them.

Here is a dress I made for Annika from Simplicity 3859, also cut out back in May.

I think it’s adorable.  Annika apparently doesn’t.  I cannot get her to even try it on, even though pink is her favorite.  Ditto for the other dress above.  I’ve resolved to only make clothes for the twins going forward, since they’re not opinionated. . . yet.

Yes, I am still *loving* my new sewing machine!  It runs beautifully.  ’Nuf said.

SKIP THIS POST.

You have been warned!

I am raising Poop Factories.  That’s the best way to describe the last several weeks.  I have sat in poop, had poop down my jeans, up my shirt, in my bra.  I’ve scraped it off bedroom floors, wiped it off underwear and the kids’ table, and found it smeared on high chairs and on sheets.  There have been pee puddles on my pants, on bedroom floors, and in the bathroom.  And that is just in two weeks.  I am done.  Done.  Done!  I’m disgusted out!

Nicolyn is the worst of the culprits.  I don’t know how she produces so much of the smelly stuff on a daily basis!  She has about three very large poopy diapers a day.  If she saves up for only one or two diapers worth, it is like a volcano and cannot be contained.  When we drove back from Nuremberg, Nicolyn’s diaper had exceeded its bounds.  Her carseat was covered.  Her pants were covered.  She was a stinky mess.  Clara had also pooped, but hers was contained in her carseat and diaper.  Jonathan had the poopified Nicolyn walk to the elevator and up to our apartment.  I followed with Annika and Clara.  As I started walking, I saw brown globs on the floor trailing all the way to the elevator.  Was it dirt?  Mud?  Of course, you know the answer.  It was the Poop Factory.  Yes, she had THAT much poo that she was prolifically dropping large remnants of the stuff out of her pant legs.  How can one little person produce so much?

Last week I was in another room and overheard Annika saying something about “wiping it off Clara’s foot”.  Those words can’t mean anything good.  I immediately went in and saw Annika trying to wipe poop off Clara’s foot (smear around would describe it better).  Then I saw a big mound of soft poo on the carpet next to Clara.  It was a little hard to find at first because our rug has a myriad of patterns and it kind of blended in.  But it was Nicolyn who was the poopy one.  She had exploded!  Clara had walked in it and Nicolyn had put her hand in it.  I’m proud to say, I calmly cleaned Clara, then also calmly moved on to Nicolyn.  It had exploded halfway up her back.  She had to be completely stripped.  After a while, she was finally cleaned and in a new diaper.  Then I, still calmly, cleaned the rug.  After the poo was cleaned up, I went to get the carpet cleaner (which we bought to clean up another poop incident).  I put the massive, disgusting diaper in its pail and went to wash my hands.  Those of you who wash your hands 20 times a day like me and whose hands are chapped and bleeding even with applying lotion after every wash, try to find ways to minimize yet another washing.  I say that to explain why I took time to use the bathroom myself.  I noticed as I was washing, that my pants felt a little wet, which I attributed to all the wipes I’d used.  Maybe I sat near one and it soaked my pants at little?  I looked in the mirror and saw a small poop blob on my chest.  A little annoyed and with no idea how that got there, I changed my shirt.  Then I got the carpet cleaner.  I walked down the hall back to the living room and saw it.  A poop blob on the ground.  I suddenly knew why my pants were moist feeling.  I saw another poop blob down the hall a bit further.  I turned around.  My backside was covered in poop!  And because I had used the bathroom, it had somehow made it into my pants and on my undergarments.  When I had changed my shirt, my undershirt still had poo on it.  The act of changing my shirt had moved my shirt enough to get poo on my undergarments.  I stripped down.  While taking off my shirt and undershirt – I somehow got it on my bra as well.  After completely changing every piece of clothing and cleaning up, I uncalmly went back into the living room, hoping the kids were not playing in whatever poo piles I hadn’t seen but sat in.  I tackled poo pile number two, checked for any more poo (none) and finally sprayed the cleaning spray, by now very irritated.

The last three days have been nonstop.  Clara has discovered how to take her pants and diaper off, particularly at nap and bedtime.  The first day, I walked in to find a log of poo along with a very large pee puddle on the floor with about six stuffed animals swimming in it.  Clara’s diaper was nearly dry, on the floor.  It had probably been off for several hours.  That was also the day Annika cut herself very slightly on a pear can.  She managed to still bleed several good-sized drops, which made her go ghost white and throw up on the floor right after she had eaten lunch.

The morning of the second day, I found both babies stripped down to their birthday suits, with Nicolyn’s poopy diaper on the floor (Clara was just wet).  They were mighty proud of their new abilities – wanting to show me all they had managed to take off.  I’m sure my reaction was not what they were hoping for.

Later on day two, Annika had “helped” the babies by giving them at least 50 tissues in rapid succession (caught her in the act), which they wiped their noses on and crumpled on the floor.  Add to this that these tissues are from our coveted remaining Costco tissue boxes we brought with us…I was not a happy camper.  While putting Annika in time out, the Poop Factory struck again.  I smelled poo and found Nicolyn and about 15 tissues covered in poo along with their children’s table, little chair, and the floor.  Her diaper was still on, but she had exploded.  Her shirt and pants were covered.

The evening of day two, I taped them into their diapers with packing tape (an idea I snagged from my friend Alie Thompson).  It seemed to work.  But for naptime today, day three, I forgot.  As I walked by their room after they had been in bed for an hour (note – “in bed” does not equal “asleep”), I could smell it.  Poop.  For it to be that strong of a smell, it could only mean one thing.  There was at least one diaperless babe in there.  Clara had done her business on Nicolyn’s bed, diaper free.  Poop was smeared on the sheet.  Nicolyn hadn’t gotten her diaper off, but managed to dig a big chunk out of her diaper to throw on the opposite floor.  They and their rooms are now cleaned, and they are taped into their diapers.  I think by now they may actually be asleep.

The bright side in all this bodily excrement is that Annika is now mostly potty trained!  She has gone a whole week without an accident of any kind (to earn a reward).  She has had her share, though, this past month, of poo and pee in places it shouldn’t be.  It’s kind of felt like a whole month of wading in the stuff with the three of them combined.

Thank you for your time.  I feel a little better.

The bone had made her foot prone to injury and injure it she did with a torn ligament.

In the last two weeks, Jenelle has finally been able to let go of some of the extraneous things in her life, including “The Boot”, but she’s still got to baby her prima donna foot for a while yet – luckily, just in tennis shoes for now.

Jonathan has tried to tell her that in the future, she doesn’t need to go to such extremes for a little extra attention.  He reminded her it was not very effective in garnering the right kind of help in the airport with three kids, 12 checked pieces of luggage, four bike boxes, three car seats, and a questionable number of carry-ons.  There was no ride on the special airport shuttle for late or disabled people out of it.  No one waved us through the lines.  Security even required the boot be taken off to go through the scanner.

He recommended Jenelle find new outlets for her over-achieverness, such as hula hooping or knitting.

So, Jenelle pulled out her sewing skills and made costumes for Annika, Jonathan and herself.

Annika’s costume was Jenelle’s crowning achievement this year.  Fortunately, she eventually agreed to put it on.

After a photo session, the family set off for a ’round-the-cul-de-sac trick-or-treat walk.  Annika declined to say “trick-or-treat” at any house, but maybe she can do that next year.

After returning home, Annika sat down on the living room floor to sample each piece of her modest-sized loot.  They next morning, she asked her parents where her “snacks” were — but by that time, they had mysteriously disappeared.

Jenelle’s sewing projects were particularly impressive this year due to repeated problems with her Swedish sewing machine, which she inherited from her grandmother (the machine, not the problems).  (The machine’s name is unprintable here because it contains too many consecutive consonants.)  After repeated trips to the repair shop failed to remedy the problems, Jenelle bought a pdf of the machine’s manual on eBay and then fixed the machine herself.  Since then, MIT has offered to confer an honorary doctorate on her, but Jenelle is too tired and too busy to bother with such fluff.

More Halloween pictures are here.