Blue's clues

Husband outside mowing the grass, baby girl quietly sitting in her bouncy seat (best money ever spent on her), 3 y.o. son upstairs w/ our dog playing happily, momma finally gets a few moments to stretch out on the couch and watch TV (a rare luxury these days). Aaaahhhhh.....the sweet sound of silence. I can literally feel my blood pressure and stress levels coming down.......

And then it hits me: Silence is not a good thing when you live with a three-year-old! "Benjamin! What are you doing?" "WHAT, MOMMA?!!!" "What are you doing?" (run, run, run...footsteps overhead.....Benjamin appears at the top of the stairs with a smudge on his shirt) "What's that on your shirt Benjamin?" "TOOTHPASTE" "Benjamin, have you been playing with your toothpaste?" (big toothy grin....nodding) (Momma rolls eyes....thinking 'I bet it's all over the bathroom')


WRONG!!! I spent the next hour cleaning blue toothpaste off his bed, his mattress, his comforter, his bedside table, his wall, his ceiling (HOW???), and his light-colored carpet (at least 2 dozen large spots). Fortunately, the toothpaste came off everything, except the carpet. He'll probably have blue spotted carpet until he's a teenager when I get around to replacing it. I desperately wanted to take a picture, but he would totally think it was cool that mommy was taking a picture of his masterpiece. After cleaning it all up, I finally got him to bed, leaned over to kiss him goodnight, and that's when I noticed he had it in his hair too. Oh well, no bath that night. He went to school the next day with toothpaste in his hair.

Lesson learned: 15 minutes of silence=1.5 hours of clean-up=15 years of blue carpet