Unleaded Christmas

I saw a blurb the other day that said 25% of American parents are vowing to only give toys made in America as Christmas gifts this year. And to those parents I say GOOD LUCK. No one, of course, wants their kids playing with (or chewing and swallowing, as the case may be) lead-coated toys, but this made in America thing strikes me as an extreme and unrealistic overreaction, since even a casual survey of the bottom of your child's toy collection will reveal that there aren't actually any toys made in America. So, unless your kids have their hearts set on corncob dolls, sock puppets and action figures made out of pipe cleaners, expect some seriously disappointed faces on Christmas morning. That retired grandpa in Tulsa who spends three hours a day making hay corn checker sets out in the woodshed is going to have a banner year as 15 million American parents descend on the shed, having realized too late that he is the only U.S. toymaker in a 900-mile radius.

And what about Santa?? At least there haven't been any recalls (yet!) of toys manufactured at the North Pole. But, having closed his last American manufacturing facility eight years ago (the Rochester, Minnesota plant, following that bitter labor standoff - who can forget those scenes of striking elves chanting "Santa sucks"), how is Santa supposed to honor these parents wishes? I suppose he could start a third list to go with naughty and nice: "Kids with Parents Who Are Ruining Christmas With Their Unrealistic Knee-jerk Reaction." If managing three lists proves too confusing for the old guy, chaos will reign on Christmas Eve as safety-crazed American parents wielding golf clubs and torches chase the confused octogenarian out of their houses. Meanwhile, their children, having woken from all the noise, will scream in horror in the background - the visions of organic American-grown sugarplums dancing in their heads permanently replaced by the vision of Santa cowering in the bushes with his giant bag full of lead paint-infested goodies as the mob slowly closes in. Merry Christmas.

In Hindsight

Mistakes I made this weekend, in no particular order:

Devoting time to watching the Cubs hit into a gazillion double plays on their way to meekly exiting the playoffs;

Absentmindedly shaving a large swath down the middle of Owen's head with a #1 clipper blade (super-short!) as opposed to his usual #2 clipper blade (kind of short), leaving him with a bit of a reverse mohawk look - 4 days before picture day at school;

Telling Deanna that Pamela Anderson seems like a nice person.

There were more, but you get the general idea.

Color-Coded

I have always had sort of a passive admiration for the old hippie value of allowing kids to run around naked. From a practical perspective however, at least for anyone who lives in a house that has anything other than dirt or concrete floors, I feel that running around naked indoors should really be reserved for the potty trained among us or at least those we know aren't going to pee indiscriminately on the couch or take a dump on the carpet.

All that being said, it appears that when you have 16-month olds who are dexterous enough to remove their own diapers, shit is going to happen, if you know what I mean. In the face of the inevitable, the best Deanna and I have been able to do is to develop a code system meant to convey, in as few words as possible, the nature of the problem and need for immediate action.

An excellent example of the utility of such a system came a couple of weeks ago. Deanna was on the first floor, preparing to leave for an early morning work obligation. Upstairs, I picked up Hayden up from where he was playing for his first diaper change of the day and was mildly alarmed to see that his diaper was no longer secured on one side. It wasn't until I laid him prone on the changing table that I saw he had a large piece of poop attached to the entire bottom of his right foot, sort of like one of those sandals that mold to the shape of your foot after a few wearings. As Deanna cheerily yelled goodbye from downstairs as she walked towards the door to catch her train, oblivious to the developing situation I was facing, I began desperately yelling "Code Brown, Code Brown!" Thus, while I dealt with prying the brown sandal off of Hayden's foot, Deanna was able to swoop upstairs and secure the scene in the carpeted room where Hayden had been playing from curious onlookers (Owen) and souvenir seekers (Cooper clearly had designs on a plastic chicken-leg covered in poop that was found at the scene). Once I was done decontaminating Hayden and able to move onto dump site clean-up, Deanna was able to again be on her way and still made her train.

Things aren't always that smooth, and in fact, Code Brown incidents tend towards all-out chaos as we try to contain the problem, but you get the idea.

Code Yellows are off course, more frequent, the most recent coming just last night. Owen had used the toilet and had, of course, left the seat up and neglected to flush. I came upon the scene a minute later to find the twins leaning in and up to their elbows in yellow pee-water, happily cackling and swishing away in their own little toilet water park.

Other recent Code Yellows have featured Hayden suddenly appearing in the dining room sans diaper and peeing on the floor in full view of us with a gleeful look, and us following Hayden up the (thankfully uncarpeted) stairs while he left a small puddle on each stair. In that latter incident, he actually had a diaper on and our working theory at the time was that he merely had some crushed ice in his diaper that was falling out and puddling as he walked (why we may have thought he had crushed ice in his diaper is a fair question and a whole different story). Anyway, it turned out to be pee and that he must have somehow maneuvered his penis outside of the confines of the diaper.

And so the chaos rolls on in our little corner of the world, with shouts of Code _____(insert whatever color you can conjure up from the less-than beautiful rainbow of colors the human body is able to produce) echoing merrily up and down the halls.