I really haven’t decided what is worst, barefoot or in socks. Either way, when your poor unsuspecting foot meets with an unexpected squish, it’s never fun. If you have socks on, you find yourself ripping off the offended sock in a hurried swipe to free it from the ensuing seepage. If you are barefoot, you immediately begin the one-legged hopping dance to the nearest sink. There you acrobatically plunge your saturated tootsies under running water and, likely for the first time, discover what the mess may have possibly been caused by. I know I personally tend to perform the hip-hop version of this scenario since I’m usually barefoot.
Lately, I have been entertaining my family quite a bit with my “gross!-I-stepped-in-something-icky” jig. Between potty training my beloved Princess and the never-ending spitting of my sweet Angel, there never seems to be a day that goes by where I am not jumping around wet obstacles.
All of my babies have been spitters. Angel held back for the first few weeks leading me to believe that I had finally been granted my dream of a non-spitting baby. I tried to think of what I had possibly done differently. Was it the probiotics I was taking this time or the way I was burping her or keeping her upright longer after nursing? I thought I had finally mastered the art of getting a baby not to spit. I am a master, after all, I have five kids. Ha!!! Five kids only means that I have been incredibly humbled out of my self-righteous thinking FIVE times more than people with one kid! So, God in His grace, allowed my new little one to be a spitter, just like her siblings.
On top of the fact that Angel is spitting just as bountifully as my other little humility-producers, she is crawling early. She skipped right over the wonderful stage of sitting up and not going anywhere. I love that stage. You set your baby down on a blanket with some toys scattered around to keep them busy, and then get to walk away for a moment. Nope, not for her. She skipped that part and went straight to creeping and crawling off the blanket…spitting all the way. This means that when occasionally we don’t hear the offenses happen, we are left to unknowingly stumble upon them, socks or no socks.
Now, my little Princess would probably vote for socks, since she recently slipped and fell in some of Angel’s spit that was camouflaged on our cream-colored tile. Once I figured out she wasn’t hurt and what she had actually slipped on, I had to try not to laugh too hard. Is it bad to laugh when your toddler unexpectedly learns what “slippery when wet” means?
With Angel creep-crawling so well now, we’ve had to put a gate up to keep her from getting to the stairs. Yes, the gate is now up. Which means that I shouldn’t walk downstairs in the dark to grab something from the kitchen, like I did last night. That ended badly! It was then, while I was sprawled out on the floor face down, that I thought that maybe we could have waited to put the gate up.
At least I am not still encountering any of the surprises that our sweet Daisy dog would sometimes leave around the house. I miss her, but not her mistakes. Yes, I actually think falling flat on my face last night may have been better than stepping dead center on a piece of doggie-doo in the dark. I remember that before my brain had a chance to determine what the substance was that I had just happened upon, the scent hit my olfactory senses – and I knew! Gross, I know. But life gets messy and gross sometimes when you are a mom.
Yes, there is a lot of squishy stuff that we have to stay on top of as moms. Motherhood is definitely not for the faint of heart. It is dirty, squishy, and hard at times. Exhausting all the time. However, all in all, I wouldn’t change a thing. Okay, so maybe there are a few moments that I’d like to skip. But I love being a mom. I’ve just learned to have lots of extra rags, carpet cleaner and Clorox wipes handy for those unexpected surprises that little ones (and sometimes big ones) leave for me to discover. Kinda like an unwelcome treasure hunt sometimes.
I’ve also learned to keep my knees dirty. I like to think that I’m wearing “spiritual holes” in my jeans as I am earnestly seeking the Lord for extra doses of strength to get through my day and for His love to overflow from my heart to their hearts. I especially need this for moments when I'm physically on my knees cleaning up yet another mess for the tenth time in a day.
Kinda strange to say that my advice for icky, squishy messes is Clorox wipes and prayer, but it is what I’ve found to be the most useful.
So, now for you, socks or no socks? That is the question. 🙂
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