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.
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.
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