Getting Older

When I was younger, my Mom always made a big deal out of birthdays. Big party, cute cake, lots of presents and balloons. Naturally, I tend to do the same thing with my kids. I've never had the desire to throw myself a party or bake myself a cake, but I do little things to spoil myself. I always take off work for my birthday, I refuse to do laundry and I eat a big piece of cake without feeling guilty. This year I stayed in my pajamas until noon, I went to lunch with some friends (and my boys of course!) and I let Ammon eat a whole can of chunk pineapple for breakfast (because it was my birthday and I wasn't in the mood to fight him). It was shaping up to be a pretty nice day when both of my kids fell asleep on the way home from the mall and stayed asleep when I carried them in the house. I was just getting settled and started reading my book when the doorbell rang. It was friend bringing her kids over who I had agreed to babysit (which I did remember, but conveniently forgot amid my excitement over having some quiet time.) Not five minutes later, I heard Ammon crying upstairs. I put the baby in the bouncy seat and went upstairs to get Ammon (this is when letting him eat a whole can of pineapple for breakfast totally backfired on me). He was standing at the toilet (still half asleep) and had poo running down his legs, in his pants, on his socks and shoes, on the bathroom floor (miraculously missing the rug) and somehow on the toilet itself. This was one of those moments for me when I was looking around for help and it dawned on me, "Oh yeah, I'm the mom, this is my job. I threw Ammon in the bathtub and starting cleaning up. Somewhere between rinsing diarrhea out of multiple articles of clothing, listening to Karlee screaming from the bouncy seat, Ammon screaming from the bathtub and Lysoling my bathroom I thought to myself, "Birthdays just aren't what they used to be." and then I got really homesick. Not because I thought my day would have gone any differently, and not even because of the card my Mom sent me that made me cry earlier in the day. I don't really know why, I just was.
For those of you wondering, I actually had a great day. Colby came home and rescued me. I finally got a candy thermometer (after I opened it Colby said, "I don't know why you don't have one of these, you have been asking for it for the past four years and they really aren't very expensive.") Now Ammon keeps asking me when I am going to make candy. Later in the evening, Colby and I went out to dinner at my new place of employment (which turned out to be even better because my manager told us it was "on the house"), and the kids were in bed when we got home. I would like to say to Emily (who is days away from delivering her first child) that, as is obvious from this post, once you have kids your life is never the same. But they are worth it.