Nathan's 2nd birthday

We celebrated Nathan's 2nd birthday with family and close friends.

Other than celebrating the amazing life of our little boy and how thankful we are for him, nothing was terribly interesting during the birthday party. But before the birthday party, I will elaborate on.

I have for months now, put up a baby gate across Nathan's room and will put him and Katherine in there while I take my shower. I have the monitor in the bathroom with me and I can hear everything that goes on. It's been rather fool proof, except for a little spat every now and then. No one has ever gotten hurt, escaped, nor has anything been destroyed in the room.

This morning, after painstakingly cleaning up the house for about 25 visitors, I put the kiddos in "roomtime" and hopped in the shower. Jim had to make a run to Publix so I had to fall back on my fail-safe. I took my time to massage my scalp while washing my hair, because the monitor picked up chatter here and there, but remarkably happy and well-behaved children. I thanked God for the opportunity to have a minute to unwind a little before our company arrived and for blessing me with two beautiful children. I also thought to myself, "I need to make sure to mention the baby gate to Jim so when he's watching them, if he happens to need 5-10 minutes of alone time, he can use this technique. It's better than the TV all the time." My usually very quick shower turned into a little longer one because of how well-behaved they were being.

My low blood pressure, calm spirit, clean body, clean house and continued great behavior from both kids gave me even more time to blow dry my hair and put on my make-up. I got dressed and turned the corner to walk down the hall, ready to dole out praises. But much to my surprise, I saw a pale cloud billowing out of Nathan's doorway and it had started to fill the hallway. With only seconds worth to process it all, I felt a slight panic overcome me. I peaked around the doorway to find two children very proud of the cloud of powder they had created ALL throughout the room.

There was powder in the bed, on the changing table, in the diaper stacker, on the window sill, smeared on the windows, in the creases of the rocking chair, on the lamp shade, in the CD player, on top of the books, all over baby Octopus' private parts, in the crevices of truck tires and all over two children dressed in their party clothes.

The facts:

• There are 25 people showing up in approximately 5 minutes and I have the Hiroshima of powder bombs to clean up.
• I just vacuumed and cleaned this room an hour ago.
  
• Two kids are rather proud of the powder cloud they've created in a matter of 20 minutes or so and are smiling from ear to ear.

Decision tree time. I have the choice to respond a couple of different ways:

• I can do what I feel swelling up inside of me, which is be angry with them.

or

• I can take pictures of the occasion, laugh it off as best as I can and chalk it up to, "well at least the room smells good and they were having a good time."

Remarkably, I chose to do the latter. Please note the progression of both of their attitudes.

Katherine: Here's the bottle we used and see, I can look pretty while covered in powder also. Isn't that just amazing?
Nathan: Oh crap, mom found out!

K: Look mom, it was this easy. All I had to do was twist the top and it was soooo easy to spread everywhere.
N: Mom, please don't be mad. She made me do it!


K: What? He'll do anything I tell him to do! That's not my fault.
N: I promise I'll never do it again. Ever! Please don't hurt me.

K: But all I have to do is say it nicely and he does it. What's wrong with that?
N: I'M GONNA DIE!


K: (muttering) It's not my fault he's gullible.
N: I hear there's a children's home down in Lakeland I can move to.


K: He'll figure it out eventually. I've only got a limited amount of time for brainwashing...
N: I hate to leave all these trucks and my favorite movie, Cars, behind.


K: You mean we're not in trouble? Sweet! Another one bites the dust!
N:What? You want me to pose and smile pretty? That's it?

I normally don't take pictures of my kids crying but this was too funny. It was so amusing because not once did I raise my voice or even act mad. All the drama with Nathan was out of pure conviction.

Another reason why I've nicknamed them, Big Bossy and Little Pawn.

So here's some pics from the party that happened minutes later.