I've been living with some friends for a summer getaway and they have a three year old and a 9 probably 10 month old by now. They are adorable kids. It's been quite awhile since I've been living with little kids. I had enough siblings when I was younger to have an idea of what it's like to live with little ones, but I've been reminded of so many aspects that I'd thought I'd share.
1) Your body is now a jungle gym and/or a toy. The three year old, Caleb, loves to be crawl all over me especially when I'm in the love sac. I've been jumped on, had balls thrown at me, ran into, hugged, and all sorts of other stunts done to me from Caleb. It's been a long time since I've been a jungle gym. Caleb frequently says "I want to come mer" and has pleading hands beckoning me to pick him up and hold him while I do whatever I am doing.
Beckett, the infant is a little different. My hair is a great toy and I'm still amazed at the grasp babies have. His legs kick into my stomach frequently when I'm holding on to him and he even hugged me back once and I've been the recipient of several open mouth kisses--which frankly is so precious even though it's slightly disgusting as slobber gets all over you. I can see why mom's usually go for the short hair...to bad husbands seem to like the long hair.
2) Expect interrogation. This only comes from Caleb as Beckett is really only saying a few words and attempting to communicate at this point. I am frequently asked by Caleb "What are you doing doing doing?" which is honor of the goose from Charlotte's Web and still makes me chuckle every time. There is now a barrage of questions "where are you going?" "is that your car?", "what's that?", "is that yours" and many others. It's humorous what he asks and he cracks me up when he responds to my answer with an emphatic "COOL!" or "Oh" as if he really cared that much about what I said.
3) Watch your mouth cause it'll be repeated. There have been multiple occasions of this where one of the adults will say something and Caleb will so willingly repeat everything we have said. There was one occasion where I had said something at dinner and had said "awkward" which Caleb mimicked to a t and then when I had finished a story about a late night at Denny's with a guy friend and a discussion of liking crunchy bacon and what that meant and the waitress staring at the two of us in disbelief Caleb piped in "Awkward" at just the right moment it sent the entire table in hysterics.
4) Sometime eating in secret is necessary. This is especially true of Caleb as he is allergic to beef, dairy and eggs and thus we eat things he can't. Chocolate is one of those things you have to eat in secret so he doesn't get jealous and if he happens to see you have to explain how he will get sick from it. Popcorn is another. I patiently waited one night when I was craving kettle corn popcorn for him to be put to bed. He can't have butter and thus they have to pop their own popcorn. But it was so close to bedtime I respectfully waited for him to be in bed and then pulled out the popcorn...to which my friends laughed at me for.
Then there are things that you should hid because he's a kid and doesn't know how to monitor his eating yet. Fruit snacks is one of those. I've found that if you can surreptitiously make it over to the pantry and grab the fruit snacks, cross the kitchen to the other side, open the pack and throw away the evidence of a blue fruit snack bag and sneakily put the fruit snacks in your mouth one at a time. But you must be careful that he doesn't catch you putting something in your mouth because then you will be interrogated.
5) Watch out for sneezing. I was feeding Beckett green beans and put a spoonful in his mouth and watched his face turn to a weird face and then suddenly the green beans came flying back out of his mouth as he sneezed. Not a great thing to experience.
6) Laundry is more frequent. I can manage to wear a shirt a few times before it's truly dirty. However I have found that now that I'm a jungle gym and that I'm holding babies that inevitably that I end up getting spit up, or some kind of baby food on my shirts much more frequently thus creating much more laundry than I am used to doing.
7) Crying and excitement. I have been here long enough that both the kids get excited when they see me. Beckett kicks his legs in pure excitement any time I go to get him and Caleb is always excited when I wake up in the morning. It's endearing how excited they get to see me. It makes me feel so loved. I had the flip side of excitement happen the other day. When I went to go somewhere and Caleb wasn't coming with me, he suddenly started crying and was really upset that he couldn't come with me. I felt bad as I walked out the door making sure he didn't somehow follow me, but there was it was nonetheless really touching when a little child cries that you are leaving them and they are not going to come.
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