Ramblings: I Heart Toilets

Get ready--here comes all the junk from the past few days...

Maddie has been giving me SERIOUS guilt trips this whole school year because I haven't been able to come to the school and each lunch with her. So I finally bit the bullet and told her that because I wasn't going to be able to come to her Valentine's Day party (it was during the boys' naptime), that I'd bring her lunch and we'd come eat with her. 

We had to run some errands first and I let the boys help pick out some helium Valentines balloons at the store. Have you ever wondered how hysterical two kids can get as they watch four mylar helium balloons that were chosen ever-so-carefully float out of the car and up, up, up and away into the sky? Pretty freaking hysterical. 

I was tying them in the back of the car when I felt Aidan's cart moving--it had been parked next to me almost against my legs kinda. So I look up and see him rolling down the incline that we parked on and straight towards a shiny new Cadillac with a look of sheer terror on his face. Needless to say, I had to abandon the still untied balloons to race after his runaway cart. FREAKOUT is the only word to describe the next 3 minutes as they watched them go higher and higher until I got them pushed back in the store and let them pick out more balloons. A lady passed us that was checking out at the time of the balloon launch and said, "OH NO! I saw the whole thing and it was like slow motion! Don't worry--I'm sure they'll just give you more and won't make you pay for them." Hey lady, you are dead WRONG. 

Those turned into some pretty pricey balloons after paying the second time. The boys death-gripped them until I got them secured in the back. They still talk about the balloons that went way up in the sky to the clouds and how the birdies are playing with them now. It must have really traumatized them. 

But it didn't take long for them to all end up here: {insert sound of constant freakout for the past five days}

After that we hit the drive thru to get Maddie's requested lunch--Chick-fil-a. Except that Maddie eats so dang early that they were still only serving breakfast at 10:25 when I got there to order. Her lunch is at 10:45 but I still had to drive there, haul everyone and the food in, and sign in at the office. She didn't seem to notice that her nuggets were little biscuit/nugget sandwiches and that I got her fruit instead of the side order of hash browns--which really would've freaked her out when she was expecting waffle fries.

 

The boys were pretty ok--Aidan acted like an old pro and just chatted up all her classmates but Avery was a wandering wiggleworm after about 10 minutes. He kept whispering to me, "I'll be riiiight back," and then he'd try to take off running somewhere, dodging kids that were already having a hard enough time balancing their lunches on their trays. 

That's Aidan with a classmate of Maddie's that also happens to be in her ballet class. He thought he was so cool because he already knew her. Big man on campus. 

Luckily Alex's class comes in right as her class is leaving so I could slip him his food. I think he was a little unsure if it was still cool to have your mom come and eat with you when you're in 2nd grade. 

He was nice enough to at least pose with the boys once before giving me the "this is really mortifying and what are the girls going to think of this?" face. And since the boys were bored with the whole cafetorium scene, we hit the road. Or at least we tried. It took me 15 minutes to get both of them removed from the gym where the open doors were showing rows and rows of basketballs waiting for the next class. I'd get one waiting by the door and then I'd chase down the other one, just to find the first one running back in past me.  We won't be regular lunch visitors, to say the least.

On Valentine's Day, Alex had his final basketball game and the end of season party. Pizza. Playground. another Trophy. Big fun. Hmm...I wonder if the coach picked the team name?? They finished the season UNDEFEATED--even after a very competitive final game where we all thought for a bit that they were about to experience a very tragic loss. Jeremy's head, despite violent attempts at screaming loud and hard enough to blow it completely off of his neck, remained attached throughout the game to witness the victory in the final seconds. I, however, had to leave during the most exciting final five minutes to go pick up a 10 foot high stack of pizzas.  I really should quit my side job as a pizza delivery girl. At least on the weekends. 

Now on to less exciting news. Due to this stupid decorative three inch moss ball, the hall bathroom has been minus a functioning toilet for the last week and a half.

 

We didn't know for sure what was clogging it, but after trying everything to fix it and giving the boys the 3rd degree under bright heat lights, we determined that there was some sort of toy lodged in the curvy part under the toilet bowl. After waiting all day for a plumber to come and tell me he had to charge me almost $300 to get it working again (and that was only if he didn't have to take the toilet off to unclog it), he walked away and I still had a broken toilet. I was so ticked because I had quizzed the person when I made the appointment about a ballpark figure on how much they charge for basic repairs without getting any answers. Luckily he was nice enough to work out some way that I didn't have to pay the $90 service call, which I was supposed to pay whether he did any work or not. He said it'd be cheaper just to get a new, nicer toilet that had a more powerful flush.  We've always had problems with this el cheapo toilet clogging so we opted to get a new one. 

And that's how we ended up toilet shopping on Valentine's Day. Nothing says romance quite like the row of floating toilets at a home improvement warehouse. With four hyper kids along. Throwing tater tots. Running in and out of all the bathroom displays.  Trying to leap from cart to cart. 

But we knew we had found THE one when we saw it labeled with signs that said: "Can flush a whole bucket of golf balls" and "Flushes up to 150 ft of toilet paper." SWEET. Music to my ears. 

Jeremy wanted this one--there was an electronic panel of buttons that raised and lowered the lid, flushed the thing, and heated the seat. I think it probably even wipes you. Whoa. When you need a user manual for your toilet or you can't use it when the power's out, it's probably time to examine what you're spending your money on. 

***And because Jeremy thinks this V Day activity makes him look unromantic and like the poopiest husband ever--I have to add a disclaimer that we DID get to go out the night before for an early V Day dinner and shopping. Without any automatic toilets. Or kids. Or tater tots. Or our cutest little old toilet salesguy ever--who said he only went back to work after retiring when his wife finally decided to retire. He needed a break. HA!***

The installation guys came today to put the new one in and I had to break it to them that there may or may not be something stuck either in the old toilet (hopefully) or in the plumbing line (hopefully not). After they sucked all the water out, they found the culprit wedged really far back in the toilet opening. One guy said that he couldn't get it out because it was wedged in there so tight. I told him don't worry about it--I didn't want it back anyway. But he was freakishly determined to remove it, and he finally brought it to me just to prove how awesome he was. It was that dang little moss ball that had been in a decorative basket in there. How dumb am I to leave something like that so close to an open hole that could be used as a "shoot-it" in times of boredom or desperation. 

So now, poor new toilet, I have to apologize. In the next few months,  you will be exposed to an unnatural and inordinate amount of kid pee flowing all over your shiny porcelain whiteness as I finally attempt to potty train the twins. And you will, at some point, probably have to prove your golf ball and toilet paper flushing abilities.  And I won't blame you--it's not your fault. But please, please, please--if my pretty red cell phone ever ends up in your shiny bowl, resist the urge to choke it down. I will repay you with frequent and thorough scrub downs and lemony-fresh Lysol treatments upon request. Thank you. May the force be with you.