Monday, February 7, 2011

You Never Come Over Anymore...

It's a frequent complaint of our childless friends.  I'm sure every parent has heard it at some point.  Beyond the usual tired excuse of it being a big hassle to pack kids up and get them out to someone else's house, there is another reason.  A good one.

Destruction.

There's only so much of it that you can curtail.  I don't care how good a parent you are, kids are kids.  Especially when you consider that there are many different types of destruction.  My kids hit them all at the Superbowl party we went to.

Destruction of Peace

  • Terrible twos=terrible tantrums.  I was actually considering taking my son home early on in the visit. Five minutes in the door he started crying like someone kicked his favorite Wonder Pet.  He missed nap time though, and I thought that once he slept for a little while, he'd be just fine.  He did okay until he emptied out a 64-count box of crayons onto the floor and we took them away.  He was hitting his head on the floor (carpeted, doesn't have the same effect as it does at home, where our floors are made of laminate material), kicking everyone that tried to touch him and screaming bloody murder the whole time.  He did this in the middle of the game.

Destruction of Person

  • One fat lip for a little girl, courtesy of my son's rock head.
  • He got as good as he gave though, as an elbow ended up meeting his face at some point.
  • One of our friends is about the right height that, when my son comes barreling around a corner, his rock head catches the friend right in the...rocks.

Destruction of Property
  • An unknown quantity of Disney Princess accessories disappeared yesterday.  I know my son ate one princess shoe and attempted to also swallow a ring.  I saved it, but it's mangled now.  Beyond those, I don't have a clue until he passes it all.  I'm sure that we'll have some explaining to do if he poops at school tomorrow.
  • A personal journal.  Hope they liked my daughter's pictures of Purple Kangaroo.  On every page.  She did it in pencil, so it was easily erased, but she's a heavy-fisted artist, so you can still see the impressions.
  • A pool table.  Remember just a sentence ago, when I said that my girl got ahold of a pencil?  Yeah.  Our friend's pool table has light tan felt covering it.  Now it has some lovely artwork covering it as well.  We worked with our friend to clean it as thoroughly as possible, but the cleaners he had there couldn't get it out.  We took our walk of shame out the door the second the game ended.
Next year, we already have plans to stay home.  I'm sure we won't be invited back anyway, so it shouldn't be an issue.

    4 comments:

    Launa said...

    Oh gosh, that's... um... a bummer? life with kids? I'm sorry but I hope you got to enjoy a few minutes of the game. I ended up outside with my kids and missed a huge portion of it... heehe! The INSANITY!!

    Anonymous said...

    LOL! I cringed the entire time and literally gasped out loud at the pool table part!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Oh my!

    My son, when he was six months old, threw up all over my friend at the time's THREE THOUSAND DOLLAR PERSIAN RUG. I know it was three thousand dollars because after he threw up on it she said HE THREW UP ON MY THREE THOUSAND DOLLAR RUG!

    That was when I knew I was changed forever from my previous high maintenance I buy designer self because my first thought was Why the HELL would you pay three thousand dollars for something you step on?

    Awesomeness said...

    Ugh. Thanks guys.

    It was just a major bummer because I feel like the kids were out of control despite everyone's efforts to keep a good eye on them. (There were 3 other parents with 4 other kids there and we all rotated in to check on them every 2-5 minutes.) It's amazing how much can happen in a very short period of time.

    Everyone there was very understanding about the whole thing and I'm sure I'm just blowing it out of proportion, but it felt like my kids did everything but light the place on fire.

    Anonymous said...

    Well, at least they didn't light the place on fire! LOL