Those Kids. A little after Thanksgiving chuckle for everyone.

You know - "Those Kids". The ones that enter conversations like this. "Did you see those kids at the party?" "No, which kids?" "Oh, YOU know, - those kids." "Oooohhhh - yeah. Can you believe those kids?"

Last Friday, my children were "those kids". Grandparent warning: I'm about to talk bad about "Those Who Do No Wrong", so look away! ::wink::

We had a Fall Festival party with the CHEC group on Friday. Let me tell you what, the mom who put this shindig on really goes above and beyond. Umpteen stations/games - crafts, balloon darts, bingo, candy walk, go fish, bobbing for apples, and on and on. Pizza, fruit, munchies, cookies, cupcakes, drinks - it was all fantastic. The other moms all pitched in a little bit, but this was primarily organized and executed by the mom whose house we went to. KUDOS Amy!!!
(Rabbit chasing moment - it reminded me of a birthday party my mom did for me MANY years ago, where she organized a treasure hunt all over the yard and woods behind the house. The preparation involved in the Fall Festival reminded me of that party).

So, anyway, we get there Friday morning. Go into the back yard where everyone was playing. Tooter makes a beeline for the slide, and Poodle is quickly behind him. He slides, she slides, they repeat several times, every one is having a blast. I put my stuff down inside the house, and come back outside. Say hello to a few moms and then Tooter walks in front of a swing-in-use. WHAM! He gets clocked on his head and nose. SPLAT. Down he goes.

I go get him, and a couple of minutes later, blood starts coming from his nose. He's hurting, and I keep trying to wipe the blood, because he's starting to get it everywhere, including his eyelashes. Of course, the wiping doesn't make him feel fabulous, and forGET about putting ice on his nose. Not having that. He then proceeds to cry loudly and with authority for the next 20 minutes. (yeah..... I know he has a bloody nose. But the last 10 minutes of the crying was pretty forced on his part. Drama. Both kids).

Then, Poodle gets a bit confused during the group pictures (not sure what was going on, and Mommy was dealing with Toot), and gets a little pouty. Then, gets pouty again just before lunch. Because I didn't know she wanted me to help her get out of the tire swing. (ugh). We get through the rest of the party (which, may I say again was very well planned), and at this point the kids are both tired, Tooter is way past his nap, and Poodle is wired for sound from all the playing.

Folks are starting to leave, so I grab the 3 coats (it was cold when we left the house, warm when we left the party), my huge "mommy bag" (i.e. a large bag that does double duty as a purse and diaper bag), two of the gift bags and Toot's goody bag. Poodle is carrying her goody bag. Tooter, who has decided he is WAY too old to be carried around is wriggling to get out of my arms that are otherwise overloaded with stuff.

But first! Poodle must go say "bye" to two of the girls still there. Twice. Then she gets distracted by toys in one of the bedrooms, because I got distracted saying goodbye to one mommy. Tooter then proceeds to head into the bathroom to "play".

I get Poodle extracted from the bedroom, and open the door to the bathroom to get Toot, and he's stuffing toilet paper into the toilet. Horrors.
So, I throw down the things that I'm carrying at the moment, drop my keys on the bathroom counter, and rescue the poor toilet from the clogged fate that Tooter intends it to suffer. (Amy, if you read this blog - I apologize for the softball sized soggy mess that I left in your wastebasket!)

I grab Tooter, tell Poodle to follow me NOW, and we start trudging towards the car with my arms full of wiggly Toot and the aformentioned stuff, and an unhappy Poodle whining behind me because I'm making her leave. Mm-hmm. Their behavior was just SO exemplary that day.

We struggle all the way to the van, and I put Toot down to get my keys. Off he runs. A friend is putting her two boys into her car at the same, and I notice the striking difference in the sets of kids. It's hard not to. They are quietly and politely saying good bye to my children and quietly and politely getting into their car without their mother having to even raise an eyebrow. My little ones closely resemble the lemurs from Madascagar. Caffeinated lemurs. (Oy Vey everybody!)

Meanwhile, I'm tearing thru my mommy bag and sweating buckets from the stress with the frantic look of a crazy woman in my eyes. Oh - yeah - back to my escapees. They're all over the yards adjacent to the cars and I can NOT find my keys. My internal language has now reached new lows, and I dump everything on the ground next to the van, kneel down and tell Poodle that if she doesn't follow me quietly and without arguing that..... well - I'm sure I promised some terrible and ominous punishment. Then I go racing to rescue Tooter from his exploring, and we go BACK into the house while I try to find my keys.

Ahhhh. Right. Bathroom. Okay. Wait for little one currently in said bathroom to finish. Go in, get keys, trudge back to the car with a squirmy, whining Tooter still in my arms, and an unhappy (actually just very tired - but she LOOKED unhappy) Poodle following me obediently for the first time that day.

We get into the van, and Tooter is asleep literally 3 1/2 minutes after we leave the house. We only have 8 minutes of a drive home. I think I intermittently fussed at them and fumed the whole way home.

Yep - my kids were THOSE KIDS that day.

But, then, we had an absolutely lovely visit with a couple on Sunday afternoon who brought their brood of four (ages 6,5,3,1.... I think) - and even though mine were sans nap, they played so nicely and were well behaved with children that they had never met before that afternoon.
So, the monkeys redeemed themselves, but I still had to get Friday on record. Commiseration is a good thing. Sort of like chocolate at the end of a long day!