All you can do is smile.

 Let's begin by stating that my kids are late sleepers. Which is great for everydayness  <------- side note-that word, 'everydayness' was not corrected by the spell check. Seriously? Is that a real word? 

Moving on. 

So, typically, late sleepers = happy mom, except when we have places to be early in the morning. Cuz toddlers who wake up on their own are happy toddlers. Toddlers who are awoken by anyone else...not so happy. So I dreaded the fact that we had an 8:45 appointment, which, in my backward planning, meant that I would need to be dropping Ethan and Hunter at my mom's at 8:00, which means we'd need to be driving by 7:45, which means we'd need to be loading into the Burb no later than 7:40, which means they'd need to be changed, fed and dressed by 7:35 which means I'd need to wake them by 7:20, which means I'd need to be ready myself, which essentially means I'd need to be awake by 6:30 so that I'd be ready and showered and geared up for the above chaos.  

The key is that right about 7:15, I start turning on all the lights upstairs, open their door, crack their blinds, turn up the volume on Special Agent Oso downstairs and generally make as my friend Nicole might describe it- 'a crap-ton' of noise to make my kids *think* they had woken up on their own. Oh the guilt I feel looking in at their warm little bodies nestled all snugly beneath their comforters, fighting the bright lights knocking on their eyelids....

But alas, we made it to Grammy's just a couple minutes behind schedule, I delivered E and H and then Colton and I headed for the Children's Clinic for our 'one year palate surgery follow up'. Which I realized is really a just a year since the last 'year follow up' Surgery was almost 2 years ago!! Crazy!

Because we typically wait for an hour or so before seeing the Doc for just a few minutes, we came armed with our favorite toys. Most important of which is "MyQueen" as Colton puts it.

 Dude don't go anywhere without McQueen. (The one with the chipped paint. And don't try and fool him. He KNOWS.)

 Crazy the subtle reminders that my babies are growing up.....Colton got to stand on the 'big kid' scale and not the newborn/baby scale. Sniff sniff. He sure was pleased to stand on those big old feet though.

Then I said, "Hop off, Bubba, and come let's see how tall you are." To which he did. Hop. Off the scale, that is. I forget how literal they are at this age.  :)

 After his vitals were taken, we went BACK to the waiting room to play for a little longer. Toy du jour? Mr. POTATO HEAD! Or "Tato Head" as Colton calls him.

 There was even a little coloring goin on, once he realized it was Alex and Marty from Madagascar!

He played his little heart out while we waited...

 Then we saw Dr. Hurst, said hello good-bye, how's it goin, etc. And just like that, we were high-fivin', fist-bumpin' our way to the door. "See you in another year Dr. Hurst!"

 Would YOU want to leave this place? They got walls that change color when you touch the fish and the flowers...

And Fish Tanks with you know who....

 Nemo!!!

 Dory!

And they've got a darling little walls of mosaics which make for great little backdrops!

And dude got even MORE excited when he saw this.

 

 Mr. Mickey, that is.  

 So happy, he could just hop away....

"I'm hoppeen mummy." I'm hoppeen!"

ONE APPOINTMENT DOWN. 

ONE TO GO.

We headed back to my mom's house to kill a few hours before the kids' dentist appointments. 

And the first thing I see is this.  

My little girl...

With seriously stained, pink fingers, 

lips, chin,

tongue, 

and teeth. 

Are you freaking kidding me? 

To which I say, "Hunter? What did you get into that's pink?"
And the girl says, "I was just doin sparkles, mommy."
And the mom (me) says to the grammy, "Mom, what did Hunter get into that's pink?"
And the gramma says, "Oh, I was just letting her eat some cupcake sprinkles."
And I say, "SERIOUSLY??   On the day I'm taking her to the DENTIST???"
And she says, "Oh right...I didn't really think about that.."

She's lucky she's a gramma and therefore generally allowed to break most rules and get away with it, since Grammy's jobs are to pretty much spoil the grandkids and let them eat cupcake sprinkles. But I did tell her that I was blaming it on her AND that this might make a blog.  :)

But, I was none too pleased that I would be the one explaining to the dentist that, "no, my kids don't typically eat much candy or sugar. No really. I swear they don't. I mean sure, they had some cupcake sprinkles today, but I promise that's so rare. (Can't you just see the notes they're jotting down in my kids' dental records?--


"MOM IS A COMPULSIVE LIAR. FEEDS HER KIDS SPRINKLES, RED DYE, ETC. PROBABLY LETS THEM SNACK ON SUGAR CUBES TOO. BLAMES IT ON THE GRAMMA. INCREASE KIDS' VISITS TO EVERY 2 MONTHS INSTEAD OF 6. DON'T BELIEVE A WORD MOM SAYS."

Somebody's not happy she got busted....

Anyhoo, we said goodbye to cousin Brinley and headed for the dentist. 

"Hello everybody!" Ethan says! "I got my water!" 

(super excited to show his sippy cup for some reason.)

They sure do love this waiting room.

And then it was our turn. Much to my surprise and delight, Hunter and Colton went right in and sat on their chairs. Another subtle reminder of their big kid-ness.  (In all their other visits, I still held them on my lap.)

Hey there, Princess Sparkles! 

Colton, thrilled beyond belief that his hygienist found him a McQueen toothbrush! 

And Princesses for my princess. 

Ethan did not get right up onto his chair like I had hoped. I was quickly informed by him, that he had pooped. And that had put him in a funk.  So I left H and C for a minute while I went to change Ethan. And when I came back, this is what I saw! My big kids all by themselves getting their teeth cleaned by their very own hygienists! Without me!

The fact that they give them sunglasses to wear to shield them from the light above is brilliant. 

(They'd be even more brilliant if my kid actually wore them, you know, OVER his eyes.) 

And much to my dismay, even with a clean diaper, Ethan still refused to have his teeth cleaned. And I mean confidently, adamantly refusing. He kept insisting that "he was done and that he was going to the car now."  (Hilarious.)

We were all trying our best to coax him, all to no avail.
He was happy to watch the others, but he was NOT going to let anyone into his mouth.

No how. No way. 

Cuz he's done. 

And going to the car. 

Apparently. 

Can this kid pout or can this kid pout? 

So sad...so forlorn. 

"No mommy. I'm all done."

Hunter's hygienist suggested that she go say to Ethan, "Look at my clean teeth." And that's exactly what she's saying in this photo. And still, nothing.

Colton, just chillin, waiting to see the dentist next. 

We were pleasantly treated today by Dr. Marshall (who is Dr. Bunch's wife). The kids enjoyed her care very much. 

She counted their teeth, told me which ones I was still waiting on, checked for over and underbites, checked for cavities and painted on a fluoride treatment. 

Thrilled with his goody bag of toothbrushes, toothpaste, flossers AND his treasure coin! 

Which they each got to redeem in the machine for a trinket. (not candy)  :)

And because in this family, we've adopted the belief that dull moments are, well, just that-dull, we REALLY try hard to keep things interesting. Take our arrival home for instance. (And apologies again to my friend Anabelle who had to suffer through this whole ordeal with us, via the cell phone).

After an already exhausting day, I pull into the driveway, open the the garage door, unbuckle 3 kids, wait a whole 9 minutes before they all actually get OUT of the car and then unload a 'crap ton' of stuff (thx again, Nicole) from the front seat. Like mama and baby ducks we head for the door leading into the laundry room.

And wouldn't you know it? It's flippin' locked.

ARE YOU FREAKING KIDDING ME?

(I know what you're thinking, what's the big deal? Get your key and unlock it. But you see, I have keys to everyone ELSE's house and not my own. Why? I don't know. I only think of it on times we get locked out....)

So after muttering a few choice words under my breath (because I knew for certain that it was one of the 3 little people behind me who had locked the door) we headed for the side gate which I was praying  was not padlocked.

It was. And I'm too short to be able to read the combination from the front side of the gate.

This meant two things- Me-climbing the wall. 3 kids-standing in the front yard while I attempt said feat.

"Don't run out in the street, kids" I say. "Mommy will just be gone for a second." (So many things wrong with that sentence.)

Long story short, I climbed the wall, (again, still on the phone with Anabelle), unlocked the gate, let the littles in the backyard with me, and then proceeded to bribe the kids, starting with Hunter, to crawl through the dog door and unlock the sliding door.

Now, Hunter is incredibly bright. I really mean it, she is scary intelligent for her age. (I know this, because I have my own study right here in my little family and she is much more 'aware' and expressive than her brothers.)

But she was so freaked out that I was actually asking her to go INTO the dog door that she totally freaked. (She did crawl in once and then right back out, crying. I even offered ice cream cones if she could do it.)

Colton tried as well. He went in and came right back out.

And so, after what felt like an hour, I shimmied my self through that door and eventually saved the day.

And yes, Hunter immediately asked if they would be having ice cream cones. :)


So our day finally proceeded as normal, tired kids who had missed the nap window...playing in the playroom. Ethan came out and asked if I would hold him.

He and I were snuggled on the couch for about 15 minutes when Hunter finally appeared stating, "He's making powder! He's making powder!"

"Come again?" I say.

Knowing all too well that this wasn't gonna end well, I got up off the couch and uttered the phrase, again,

"ARE YOU FREAKING KIDDING ME?" 

Oh he'd made powder all right. All through the hallway, the bathroom, and the living room. He had emptied an entire large bottle of baby powder. 

AWESOME!! 

I seriously wanted to cry, but knew full well I'd be better off just laughing. Laughing as my children slid through the powder, tracking it EV-ER-Y-WHERE. And so, my relaxing moments on the couch had ended. We had some cleaning to do.

And I wasn't about to do it alone. Oh no, they made the mess, they were gonna help clean it. (Yes, Colton is naked, FYI. Not even sure why.)

(They're like firefighters in training aren't they?)

At some point, I banished them to the play room so that I could actually clean and not just spread the mess all over creation. So there I was, vacuuming away, down the hall, past the playroom, where I glanced in at my cherubs, and stopped dead in my tracks as I watched  Colton autograph himself, the chairs and the table with (thankfully) a crayola marker he'd found somewhere.

You know the saying by now....Go ahead, say it with me. 

"ARE YOU FREAKING KIDDING ME??"

Anyhoo, I was exhausted and extremely grateful that my dad was coming over to play with the kids at any moment because it gave me a few minutes of quiet, uninterrupted time to make dinner and finishing cleaning up.

As you can see, Hunter was also eagerly awaiting Ponka's arrival. She first placed her chair about 12 feet from the door to  wait, but then became impatient (she gets that from me) and decided to pull her chair right up to the window to wait.

All in a day's work, right?