Poo Shoe

I had to stop myself from doing the death-check twice this morning. It's become not uncommon for the kids to wake up around 7:45. In their short histories, this is actually quite late. Heath was a 5:30 riser for a year or so. But today when 8:15 rolled around, then 8:30 hit and still no word from either child, I thought, Oh no! They're dead.

They weren't dead. They were just sleeping in until 8:35. And it's actually no surprise when I remembered that they had a late night and didn't get to bed until 9.

Yesterday afternoon Aunt Debbie, Mark's sister, gave us a call and said that she and Goma (Mark's mom) would watch the kids for us if we wanted to go out. It's always a fabulous offer. We take them over to their house and they eat dinner and have their bath, then we pick them up, take them home and put them to bed. And Heath and Stella get to see some cousins and Sophie the dog and watch a little Nick Jr.

Our date was a Target/dinner combo. Target. Not very romantic, but being able to pick out some clothes for the kids without having to listen to complaints and screechings and beggings for another race car is sanity-saving. Some of Heath's shirts have become almost cropped tops and three-quarter sleeves, so it had to be done.

Dinner was luxurious as well. No kids. No ringing phones. Just sushi and miso soup and tofu and basil. So, so good.

We picked the kids up and headed on home. Very soon after we settled in the car, I noticed a funny smell. Certainly with two small children funny smells aren't unheard of, but when you spend a lot of time dealing with the same children and their funny smells, you kind of "recognize" them. Sort of a signature scent, if you will.

So when Mark said, Did someone poop?

I, without the hesitation, answered, No, no. No one pooped.

I didn't poop, Heath piped up from the back.

But the smell just kept coming and Mark, who has the worst allergies known to man and doesn't have the greatest sniffer, was no help in identifying the source. Well, what is it? Where is it coming from? he demanded. I think my search was starting to annoy him.

I don't know, but it's like something has d-i-e-d. Like an animal or something. The smell is definitely in the behiney family.

Behiney family? Heath inquired. What's the animal in the behiney family?

We concluded that it was something coming from outside and I tried to stop sniffing around. When we arrived home, we gathered the kids and our bags, including our Target bag of goodies, out of the car and into the house.

I walked into the back door, into the light of the kitchen, and that's when I saw it. A mud-type something all over the Target bag. Earlier in the day Heath had been very busy making mud and painting with mud, so I thought maybe I had rubbed the bag against our fence or part of our deck and picked some of it up. I leaned in for a closer look.

That's when I located the source of the smell.

It's poop! There's poop on the bag! Without thinking, I tossed the bag to Mark. I never actually touched the poop, but seeing it caused some sort of instinct to kick in and I had to clean my hands. I put Stella on the floor and raced across the room to the kitchen sink

Mark said, Check your shoes, you've stepped in dog poop. He shook his head with what appeared to be a bemused annoyance. That's something my dad would've done. As if there are certain people who step in dog poop, and then there are those who do not step in dog poop.

Not only have I stepped in the dog poop, I've managed to pretty much track the poop across the floor, and I am feeling somewhat defensive about what happened. I didn't want to step in the poop. And I really didn't want to spend the evening cleaning up the car (because apparently I smeared my shoes all about the passenger side) and the kitchen that is now smothered with stinky dog doo. But there we were. Cleaning dog crap. Trying to keep Stella from walking or scooting in it. Heath saying, Where's the dog poop? Where'd you get that dog poop? You got dog poop?

We didn't get everything cleaned, though. This morning as I headed out the door to a playdate with the kids, Heath spotted my doodie slathered hiking shoe sitting suspiciously by itself on the back stoop.

That shoe got pooped on, he said, stopping to check the bottoms of his frog boots. My shoes didn't get pooped on.