Boogers on the Wall

I’m pretty sure I’m the only mother on Earth who doesn’t pay her children an allowance. Just ask my kids – they’ll verify it. Because according to them EVERYONE is getting paid.

Paid for what? For being a decent human being? For contributing to the daily work flow of the house? For learning enough in school to earn top grades?

I’m not paying them for that.

I’ve slowly started adding a few jobs for my oldest two boys to do and you would think I’m robbing them. Robbing them of their time, robbing them of some fun and robbing them by not paying them.

My boys have had it easy. They are almost 6 and 8 years old and up until two months ago I still made their beds. (Granted they had bunk beds that were a little difficult to make, but still.)

I’ve started making them make their own beds – without pay. I know the outrage! This has led to grumbling and crying on some mornings, but I don’t care. They are old enough to tuck in some sheets.

This has also led to them sleeping on top of their covers – luckily it’s summer. They are trying and learning and improving. (I made the mistake one day of getting after my 5-year-old because he hadn’t made his bed yet. Apparently he had – Oops.)

But even if they get so good that I don’t even have to remind them seven times, I’m not going to pay them to make their own bed.

Secondly, I’ve started having them collect one of our garbage cans and dump out its contents every week before garbage day. Yet another chore they thought they should earn some dough doing. No. I’m sorry.

Have you seen the amount of garbage my two boys can produce? They should be helping me pay our monthly utility bill. They can fill a trashcan in minutes. You better believe I’m going to have them help take out the trash – without pay.

Finally, I’ve decided to have them help me fold laundry. Now this is a fun one. I got sick of sitting by myself sorting through and laying out clothes while they got to veg out on the couch watching TV. If I have to fold laundry, they have to fold laundry.

And if you thought the amount of garbage those two produced is impressive, you should check out the amount of laundry they go through. And they aren’t even teenagers.

Folding laundry stinks. I have to tell my sons repeatedly that I hate it too. It’s not like I WANT to fold laundry. But if we didn’t fold it, we’d all have to go naked.

So once again, they are asked to do a regular reoccurring chore without pay. The agony!

About a month ago I caved. I had been sick throwing up all day and couldn’t get off the couch. The living room was a mess and it was driving me crazy. I told them if they could clean up all of their toys in five minutes, they could each earn 25 cents. My youngest was thrilled, my oldest wanted 50 cents.

He argued with me for 10 minutes about how he needed more money while his little brother cleaned up the toys.

So my oldest walked away with nothing.

He cried and cried because his brother got paid and he didn’t.

This clinched it for me. I have been anti-allowance my entire parenting life, but this proved to me that my boys have way too much. They always beg for more. Nothing I offer or do is good enough for them.

And so they can continue doing slave labor.

Maybe I’ll change my mind someday, I doubt it, but maybe.

For now they are getting a pretty good allowance. I ALLOW them to sleep under my roof. I ALLOW them to eat three home cooked meals a day. I ALLOW them to get new school clothes, shoes, underwear, etc. I ALLOW them to watch Netflix, play the Wii, Ipad and Kindle.

The list could go on and on. You get the point. As far as I’m concerned, they get plenty of ALLOWance.

This is what happens when we try to do yard work. One of my boys ends up getting into some serious mischief. I swear they are attracted to mud piles.

When I’m older I’m going to start a yard-tending business. Well maybe it won’t be a business, I might actually do it for free.

I’m not talking about tending yards I’m talking about tending so people can work in their own yards. Children. I’ll tend people’s children while they work in their yard.

Maybe I’ll even start tending before I’m older. Maybe I can kick it into gear when my own yard is in shape.

Because if anyone has ever tried doing heavy yard work with three young boys they will know it’s nearly impossible.

One of my boys is either beating someone up, flicking mud on his brother or falling out of a tree. It’s wild, it’s crazy and it’s really hard to get anything done.

I love to work in the yard. It relieves my stress and makes me happy. Unfortunately I’m afraid my boys are deathly allergic to yard work. At least they think they are.

This summer has been a killer. We bought a house a couple of months ago that has a yard that has been neglected. I’m talking about vine/weed/shrub overload. It took us one whole month to find all of our sprinkler valves – valves that probably haven’t been used once in the past decade.

But my husband and I knew what we were getting into. Like I said earlier, I love yard work. We knew we’d have plenty of it and we were OK with that. We just didn’t know how much fun it would be to work beside our children.

At the first of summer I had to threaten my boys to stay outside with me. I gave us a working-in-the-yard time limit and they couldn’t go inside until that time was over. Oh how they hated it. They whined, they cried. You would have thought they were going to melt or shrivel up in the sun – and we always went out before 10 a.m.

It was disastrous. I couldn’t pull one weed between complaints.

I seriously wondered what was wrong with them. Why didn’t they want to be outside? I told them they didn’t even have to help me work, they just needed to be out there getting some fresh air.

They still hated it. I was ruining their lives.

One day I got so sick of it I let them cut out early. I told them to go in and put a show on while I wrapped things up. I told the oldest two to take care of their brother and come and get me if he started crying like a maniac.

Not two minutes later I thought I heard a child crying. I shrugged it off thinking it was probably a neighbor kid. But it didn’t go away.

I put down my tools and ran to the kitchen sliding door only to find my almost two-year-old screaming at the top of his lungs. What did his brothers say about that? They didn’t think he was screaming like a maniac – yet. Apparently we have different definitions of maniac screaming. I’ll have to be more specific next time.

My youngest is actually the most helpful of the three. He loves to dig in the dirt. I can put a shovel in his hand and sit him down by me for at least 15 minutes. (At that point he wants to go run after his brothers.) But those 15 minutes are golden. Sometimes if I give him an Otter Pop he’ll last 30 minutes. That’s even better.

The older two just get into mischief while we work. They are definitely not helpful.

We had to make a no-playing-in-the-house rule while we are outside doing yard work after I came inside a few times to find that a tornado had struck our home. There’s nothing like coming inside dirty and tired only to find you have a giant mess welcoming you – seriously not helpful.

The night we finally hooked up the sprinkler control box to all of our valves we turned the water on and had two giant fountains in the front yard right by the curb. They were spewing water all over into the street and mixing the nearby dirt into thick, solid mud. What did my boys do? They turned it into a messy street race, racing their scooters back and forth in the river of muddy water – once again, not helpful.

Last night my husband and I were in the back yard ripping out some more bushes and vines when my 5-year-old volunteered to push his younger brother around the cul-de-sac on our miniature tricycle. We were thrilled. That would keep both of the busy and out of our way. My husband had the sudden urge to check on them and luckily he did. The older brother had unstrapped my baby and convinced him to ride in the rickety tipping bucket on the back of the trike then he buckled himself behind the wheel. Like I said – not helpful.

I got more work done in my yard the day my friend came over to help and brought with her her kids than I have the whole time we have lived here. Her kids played with my boys for hours while we weeded my jungle. They kept each other occupied so we could keep going. It was amazing.

That’s when I got the idea for my yard-tending service. I’m going to help other people out who don’t have the child-free time they need to get their work done. I’ll watch their kids while they weed. My boys and I will entertain their children while they mow their lawn. And we’ll bring Otter Pops.

Because heaven knows I would LOVE it if someone would do that for me. But then again considering the state of my yard, I’d need them to do it for me all summer long.

What is it like to be pregnant again after a baby has already died in your womb? It’s terrifying. Some days it’s almost crippling.

I know what some of you are thinking – Get over it! I can’t. My pregnancy consumes me. It worries me both day and night.

I have a handful of amazing friends who can relate. Who have dared to bear another child after losing one while pregnant. But for the rest of you I thought I’d give you a glimpse into what it’s like for me these days.

I’m about 24 weeks along now and each day is a stressful waiting, watching game.

Most of you probably already know that my third son, Luca, was born stillborn at 37 weeks. I noticed he stopped moving around as frequently and one day couldn’t feel him move. I had been getting really bad side aches for a while and the day he died I felt achy and sick all over.

He had a true knot in his extra long umbilical cord. Something that is extremely rare. And he couldn’t live with it. It closed off too tight – something that is even more rare.

But no matter how rare, it still happened to my baby. I don’t care how uncommon, it happened to our family.

The odds of something like that happening a second time are microscopic. But I can’t get my mind to realize that. Besides, I have had friends who have lost more than one child.

And so I walk around stressed out each and every day these days while playing a constant movement waiting game. That’s really the only way I can tell if my baby – a little girl – is alive and well.

I wake up in the morning and wait. I think she’s probably a lot like me and likes to sleep in because many mornings I have to wait a long time before I first feel her move. Some days I’d like to lie and wait in my bed all day. But obviously I cant.

I wait while I cook my boys breakfast. I wait while I get them dressed. I wait while we’re watching TV or reading a book. I wait while I’m getting ready and I wait while we’re playing a game. I’m always waiting and watching the clock. Trying to feel her move and note what time it was when I last noticed.

It’s exhausting. Some days it’s nearly paralyzing. But I can’t stop.

There will be days when I’m really busy running errands or working in my yard. Hours will go by and I don’t realize it. Some days I’d like to stay busy and distracted all day but then I pay for it later. When I finally stop and sit down I am terrified. Did I feel her move while at the grocery store? Did she kick me while I was weeding the flowerbed?

If I’m ever feeling sick I get really worried. Is it because something is going wrong? Does my side ache because there’s a problem?

Sometimes I sit and wonder why I put myself through this – again! Sometimes I could scream.

My husband and I have been blessed with four boys – this will be our first girl. I know I should be getting ready for pink and purple to enter our home, but I just can’t. Not yet. I just can’t wrap my mind around bringing her home until I actually do.

People ask me all the time if I’m excited for this baby. Excited? That’s not the word I would choose. They look at me funny when I just shrug my shoulders. It’s hard to get excited about something I’m unsure about. If I knew without a doubt that my little baby girl was going to come home and sleep in her crib, that she’d wear the clothes and suck on the binkies I buy for her, that she’d snuggle up to me while wrapped in her new pink blankets, then yes! I’d be excited! But as the mom of an angel baby I know that doesn’t always happen.

So right now I’m just taking it one day at a time. One hour at a time.

At my last doctor’s appointment my doctor told me to make sure I felt her move at least once a day. Ha! I kind of chuckled at him and told him that I make sure she moves a lot more than that – if he only knew.

I have 16 weeks left. How am I going to make it? Why did I do this?

Probably because I love my kids and I knew I wanted one more. I’ve been blessed with the cutest little 2-year-old who was born two years after we lost Luca. Every time I think that I’m not going to make it through the day, when I’m stressed out beyond belief, I think of my toddler. He is the cutest, happiest, sweetest little thing you will ever meet. He brings me love and peace. Hopefully his little sister will too.