Airport Adventures

I am going to Ohio 1 week from today.  I am flying there.  On a plane.

In January I took both of the babies to Ohio by myself!  It was a disaster.  Poor Peyton.  An airport must seem like the ultimate amusement park to her.  Things to climb on, lots of attractions, and a seemingly endless supply of elevators, escalators and those weird moving conveyor belt things.

Poor Loralie was grumpy because she was so hungry.  Every time I tried to nurse her, Peyton would seize the opportunity and take off.  I had one of those monkey leashes but after a while she figured out how to unsnap it.  Before she figured that out, though, she escaped and when I caught up to her she threw herself on the ground.  She screamed on the ground as I pulled her through the airport.  She made a great mop.  I got many bad looks.  What else could I have done?  My hands were full of luggage and Loralie.

At one point I was changing Loralie's very poopy diaper and Peyton took off (for the thousandth time).  I was trying to speed wipe Juju but I kept seeing Peyton get further and further.  I had to stop what I was doing and chase her down.  I was running while holding Juju away from me because she still had poop on her.  People stared.  When they saw my running, screaming toddler, they connected the dots and gave me a sympathetic nod.  I found her on the conveyor belt thing licking the glass siding as it moved her further away from me.  I ran along side it frantically saying things like, "Peyton Jane, don't lick that glass anymore.  We have to go back to our seats."  "If you don't go back to your seats, somebody might steal your fruit snacks." "Peyton, please.  Juju is going to pee on me and I am getting poop everywhere."  "Fine, Peyton!  Go ahead.  Loralie and I are going to make good decisions and sit in our seats." (For the record, Peyton was unbothered by that.)  I think I finally got her to come with, "All right.  See ya later!  I'm going to see Meemaw and Papi and Aunt Sarah without you!" Yes.  I'm aware that that might be less-than-ideal parenting.

It progressively got worse.  It got so bad that they let me board the plane 25 minutes before anybody else, including other families.  Things were much better after we boarded.  Both girls were angelic.  It helped that Peyton was strapped into her car seat. Wouldn't you know that as the other passengers began to board the plane, Peyton pooped.  It was so stinky.  The whole plane smelled like her poop.  I couldn't get off the plane and change her so I had to do it in the bathroom on the plane.  Have you ever been in one of those?  I can't begin to tell you about the acrobatics involved in changing a poopy kid in that tiny space while trying to get them not to touch anything.  All the while I could hear Loralie screaming.  I had to leave her with one of the flight attendants.  When I was finally done and able to retrieve Loralie, the flight attendant looked frazzled.  I told her that Loralie was coming into the stranger awareness phase.  The older woman nearby corrected me and informed me that Loralie was just afraid of the black flight attendant (eye roll).

All of this, in addition to my fear of flying caused me to cry in our seats while Peyton said, "Aww...Mom.  We're gonna blast off! Pat pat pat!" Kudos to those of you who get the Little Einsteins reference.

I swore that I would never do it again.

I was mostly right.

This time I am only taking Loralie.  I have to tell you, I am so heartbroken about it!  I won't get to see my Peyton Pie for 2 weeks.  I worry about her ability to handle it.  Two weeks without either parent is going to be hard, even when in the care of her very capable grandmother.  I am also a little worried about how Loralie will survive 2 weeks without her sister.  And no, my last experience is not the reason I'm leaving her in Utah with the grandparents.  It would just cost an extra 500 doll hairs for her to come.  This is an emergency trip for an emergency situation at home and there is no emergency money left for my Popeye.  I keep telling myself that we won't be poor college kids forever.

I guess I'm done now.  This post didn't really have a direction.  I started it with a purpose but I have since lost it.  Now I'm going to spoil Peyton before I leave.  With cake and cartoons and cuddling.

Stitches Follow-up

Loving Peyton is so easy.  Being her mother is hard, though.

I tried to take Peyton to get her stitches removed yesterday, but as we neared the hospital she freaked out a little.  For the rest of the day we talked about how it would be so cool to get her stitches out.  We talked about how if she got them out she could get a treat.

The treat was all the motivation she needed.  I caught her 2 times yesterday (and Aunt Emily caught her once) with tweezers (and nail clippers) trying to take her own stitches out.  When asked what she was doing she replied, "I want a treat!"

She seemed eager to go back to the hospital today to have them removed.  We all know, though, that nothing with Peyton can just be simple and routine.  Peyton picked so much at her stitches that she picked off the little strings that would have made them easy to remove.  The first nurse could not get them.  She called a second nurse to help.  Between the 2 of them they still could not remove these 2 little stitches.  A third nurse was called, all the while getting Peyton more and more upset.  They still had trouble and decided to get a doctor.  By this time they had Peyton strapped to the bed so that she couldn't move her arms or legs.  She was crying and screaming, "Save me, Mom!  Save me!  Please!  I be good!"  It broke my heart.  I was holding Juju and rubbing Peyton's forehead and Juju was screaming and crying and reaching for Peyton.  I suppose P broke Juju's heart, too, because she thought she was up for the job of saving her big sister.

The no-nonsense doctor showed up and seemed a little irritated at the nurses.  He was at the desk giving me sympathetic nods earlier.  He was able to get them out but even he had difficulty.  I didn't expect there to be that much blood from getting stitches removed.  I mean, there wasn't a ton, but I didn't expect bleeding at all.

Anyway, the nurses felt so terrible for Peyton that they sent her on her way with 5 packs of Smarties.  Peyton was happy when we got home and told me that she needed a nap.  I think I need a nap.  I would bet that those poor nurses could use a nap, too.

Sister Love and Paper Cutting

Yesterday while I was doing dishes (or dusting or some other cleaning that my house desperately needed) I heard Juju crying.  I went to the girls' room to check on things and I found Peyton on the floor with her arms and legs wrapped tightly around Juju.  Poor Juju was screaming and trying to escape with no success.  Peyton seemed not to even notice her sister's attempts to get free.  This was our conversation as Juju screamed in the background.

Me: Peyton, what are you doing!?

P: Hugging Juju.  I love her too much.

Me: She doesn't like it!  Let her go!

(Peyton pauses and reluctantly lets her sister go.  Juju crawls to me very quickly, obviously traumatized.  She stood up and walked to me with outstretched arms)

Me:  See Peyton?  When you squeeze her like that it makes her sad.

Peyton: She's sad!?  Then I give her a hug!

Hugs and crying ensued.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

One of Peyton's favorite things to do is to use her scissors to cut up paper into really small pieces.  Yesterday she just wanted to watch cartoons.  That conversation went like this:

P: I want TV, Mom.

Me: No, Pops.  We're not watching TV today.

P: Pree Pweeez!

Me: No.  I'm sorry.

P: (Looks down, disheartened, then suddenly looks up like she was struck by an idea) Okay!  It scissors time! 

She said is with all the authority and intensity of a Power Ranger and a goofy fist pumping motion.  She cut paper for a long time and loved it.  Not sure it was more educational than TV, but at least I didn't have to hear weird/annoying cartoon voices.

Kids and Ketamine

I have a beautiful new niece named Lynnlee.  Peyton and I went to the hospital yesterday to visit her.  While we were there Peyton got a little too excited and ran into Emily's bed frame.  She fell back and freaked out.  I ran to pick her up and I was holding her and heading for the hallway (I didn't want the crying to bother Lynnlee) and on my way out somebody pointed out the blood.  I took her to a nurse who mopped it up (for a while the blood seemed to be never ending, which is weird because this all went down pretty quickly) and wasted no time telling me I had to take her to the ER.  She escorted me and, sadly, one of the ER receptionists recognized me.  By the time the doctor made it in to see Peyton she was not bleeding anymore.  He took a quick look and confirmed she would need stitches.  Peyton said, "Sixes!?  I want sixes!  I want blue sixes and pink sixes.  I want sixes on my butt!"

The doctor also decided that he wanted to give her drugs so that she wasn't bouncing all over the place.  Since the cut was by her eye he was afraid she'd move and it'd be too risky to do it without.  He decided to give her Ketamine.  I said, "Whoa.  You want to give my baby a horse tranquilizer!?"  He insisted it wasn't a horse tranquilizer.  He was wrong.  When the nurse went to give P the shot Peyton screamed, "I be sowy!  I all bettah!  I be good!  Don't hurt Popeye!"  Broke.  My.  Heart.

I don't know if you've ever had the misfortune of seeing somebody on Ketamine, but it was absolutely horrific to see my baby like that.  She was sort of in a trance.  Her eyes were open but she couldn't move at all.  She produced a lot of spit and she started choking on it because she couldn't swallow (she couldn't really choke either, it is difficult to describe) so we had to suction it out.  They said she would come out of it in 10-30 minutes.  It took her over an hour and a half and I cried almost the entire time.  I remember taking a drug class and learning that people coming off Ketamine often scream and cry because it causes a weird type of nightmare.  I put her hand on my cheek and  starting singing her favorite songs.  As she came out of her trance-like state I could see her trying so hard to mouth the words but she still couldn't move.  The second I stopped singing, she screamed this pitiful scream because she still couldn't move much yet, not even her lips, so I would start the song all over.  After an hour and a half she was able to sit up enough so I could hold her but she still couldn't hold her head up.  Toward the end she was saying some pretty hilarious things but I couldn't even appreciate it because I was so heartbroken over the whole ordeal.

Around midnight I called Chris to come over because I was so spent.  He found somebody to chill out in our house with Juju and he came to the emergency room.  Poor Popeye peed all over her clothes and the bed.  It took the staff over half an hour to take care of it because they were so busy.  So she was this poor, stoned, naked girl in a cold room By the time we took P home she still couldn't walk by herself and when she sat up she would say, "Whoa! WhooooOOOOooa!  Whoa!"

Anyway, all that for 2 little stitches.  The Ketamine was much worse than the stitches.  She is perfectly fine now.  OH!  The hospital is footing the bill because it happened there.  Even though it wasn't their fault.  Nice, eh?

"My mom be so mad!"

This happened a few weeks ago.  I wanted to blog about it then but I felt like I couldn't accurately describe the ridiculousness of it all.  I'm going to try now, anyway.

A few times a week I have the opportunity to watch a cute baby who is about 7 months old.  Peyton and Loralie absolutely adore this baby.  Her dad drops her off around 8:45 in the morning, which is about the time the girls wake up.  He brings her whole stroller into the house (the baby's mom and I always laugh about that).  The second the baby's dad left, she became upset, so I held her.  Peyton immediately dumped out the contents of her diaper bag to see if she could find  a cool toy to make the baby happy.  Loralie proceeded to hide behind the stroller and pull all of the DVDs out of our entertainment center.  Baby still cried.  Not long after, Loralie started to cry (she loves the baby but hates when I give her attention).  I put both babies on the floor and tried to play with them.  Still screaming.  At this time Peyton gives the phone to Loralie because she knows that that is Loralie's favorite toy.  I hardly notice because I am still trying to console the other baby.  This goes on for sometime.  Much crying.

In all of this, I catch Peyton trying to hide behind the couch.  That means she's trying to poop.  I tell her in my "serious mom voice" that she needs to go sit on the potty.  She disappeared.  Yes.  I did it.  The girls are still crying.

Out of the corner of my eye I saw an image in my window.  A police car zoomed right up and two officers ran (really, they ran) to our apartment.  I'm an apartment manager and this was not the first time the police have paid a visit to one of our tenants.  I wondered who did what this time.  Then, they opened my door.  The conversation went something like this...

Police: We are responding to a 9-1-1 call.  What is the problem?
Me: (stunned) Are you sure it is from here?  We don't have a problem.
Police: The call is still in progress.
Me: (Scan room.  Peyton is gone.  So is the phone.)  I'm so sorry.  My daughter is somewhere playing with the phone.
Police:  Is it okay if we come in and check things out, anyway?
Me: Sure.

I'm going to paint a picture for those of you who may have forgotten the scene.  Two screaming babies, one is half dressed with breakfast all over her face.  My small living room has a stroller in the middle of it with the contents of a large diaper bag scattered everywhere.  Our DVD collection was pulled from shelves and was now in a spread out pile on the floor.  I was still in my pajamas.  My house still smelled like dinner from the night before because I hadn't done the dishes.  And it was a very garlic themed meal.

The officers walked around and the babies still screamed.  They checked all the rooms except mine and asked if anyone else was in the house.  I told them that my toddler was here.  I heard noise coming from my room.  I tried to open the door but Peyton had locked it.  I picked the lock in front of the officers and opened the door.  The smell of poop hit me like a punch in the face.  And it looked like my room had been ransacked.  The clothes baskets were dumped out (because Peyton likes to use the baskets as ladder-type things) and my dresser had tipped over (likely from Peyton trying to climb it).  The blankets and pillows had been thrown from my bed in a pile on the ground.  I shouted for Peyton and heard nothing.  Then I saw the blankets shift.  I lifted the blankets and found Peyton half naked talking on the phone.  The police officers asked Peyton if she had called them.  She said, "yes!"  They asked her why and do you know what she said?  Do you?

"I poop my pants my mom be SO MAD!"  Oh, I was mad, all right.

The police explained to her that 9-1-1 was only for emergencies.  I apologized profusely and sort of wanted the earth to swallow me.

Peyton emerged from the blankets in all of her stinky glory and as the police were leaving she asked if she was going to get a "big pow-pow."

Over the next week I waited for CPS to show up.  They never did.  While I'm grateful they didn't, I can't help but feel like somebody probably dropped the ball.