vaseline, diaper rash cream, lansinoh, and parental education

And when I say, "parental education," I mean those things which you're taught by being a parent that no other course or program can really teach.  For instance, when you learn to be understanding of other children's untempered aggression after you see your very own, *gentle and loving,* toddler plowing another child to the floor as if it was the the final game of the super bowl.  That's the kind of education you get when you're a parent.  Recently, my son has been trying desperately to teach me organization and responsibility.  Sadly, I have been a very poor student to date.  As the consequences of my failure to learn have been severe, I have great motivation to change my ways.  Let's hope I am starting to learn from my mistakes.

It was probably two months ago that Elijah started to fight his naps.  He had taken to pulling all the clothes out of his dresser and throwing them all over the floor.  When that became too boring, he moved on to do the same in his closet.  At one point, I took all the clothes out of his dresser, and had organized the closet in such a way that I was sure he would be unable to make a mess of it.  Of course, I was wrong.  I came in that day to see a four foot tall avalanche of clothes and boxes (I truly have no idea how he did it) tumbling out of his closet. (Also, let me note here that when he makes these messes with clothes, he loves to take out his favorite ones--those with pictures of either trains or Bob the Builder--and scream loudly of his joy at owning such an amazing wardrobe.)

One day after hearing Elijah's bubbling excitement from downstairs, I ran up to his room fully expecting to see clothes once again strewn across his room.  Instead, I found him jumping on his bed with vaseline all over his body.  It was on his shirt, on his shorts, on his hands and face, and in his hair.  He had found the 12 ounce container (almost full) in one of the drawers he didn't usually search when tearing apart the room (it only had boring socks in it otherwise).  When drawing my eyes away from just his own person to the entire room, I had the opportunity to see not only vaseline on the walls, bed, floor, toys and books surrounding him, but also a  small trail of poop close to the wipes container on the other side of the room.  I suppose he had decided that he would take it upon himself to change his poopy diaper and was attempting to do so--though, found it difficult to open the container with vaseline covered hands.

If you didn't already know this, vaseline is extremely difficult to get out of clothing, sheets, and hair.  About five detergent and oxy clean-filled loads later, his clothes still had oil residues on them.  His wall, also, has a discolored patch just above his bed.

Of course, I would like to say I learned from my mistakes, but, as I said before, I have not been learning well what Elijah has been trying to teach me about organization and responsibility.  So, a week or so later, he found the diaper rash cream in that same drawer  and repeated his adventure for a second time.  Now, let me just take a second to lay out my own excuse which is this: as it is summertime and sandal weather, I do not generally open the sock drawer.  So, I at least would like it noted that I did not consciously  leave it there for the taking.  I was merely foolish enough not to remember it was there and take it out...

At this point, you would think I would scour his room and closet for all things oil based and move them to a secure location.  But, you are smart readers and have already noticed the subject line of the message mentions "lansinoh," so, as you suspected, I did not do what a wise mother would do.  Instead, I merely spent the next week, again, cleaning what I could with oxy clean and dish soap--wishing my son didn't have such an interest in oily textures.

Now, since my second was born five months ago, I have been wondering where my lansinoh was.  I had bought one of the largest tubes they sell when Elijah was born but had probably used less than 1/4 of it.  I didn't want to buy more when Abby (my second) was born, since I knew I already had some.  Yet, I looked in all the places I thought it would be and couldn't find it.  And at this point, I had given up my search since there wasn't much need for it anymore.  Turns out, it was in Elijah's room.  In that other drawer, you know, the only one left that he hadn't emptied out.  Lucky for me Elijah's good at finding things.....

So, for the third time, I found my son and his things covered in grease.  I must say that of the three products, lansinoh is by far the most difficult to get off of things.  If you've ever touched it, you've realized why it's such a good nursing product.  It "protects" like nothing else.  The problem is when it's "protecting" the carpet, the dresser, the wall, the sheets and the clothes.  Not only was lansinoh more difficult to clean, Elijah had also decided to make this third adventure a more exciting one by covering even more of his room.  We now have a bag hanging on the inside of his closet that is filled with toys that are covered with either vaseline, diaper rash cream or lansinoh.  Not to mention, the carpet at this point is more like a canvas than anything else.  As we walk from one soiled area to the next, we draw new lines of lansinoh where there were none before.

My husband has often pointed out that I am quick to appoint blame.  In this case, I would love to point out that Elijah has obviously been a lousy teacher since I made the mistake three times....  But of course, I can't really blame an almost 3 year old for my folly.  Oh how I wish I could!  For all the hours of cleaning I did, it just doesn't seem right that it was all my own fault.  Let's just hope I don't need a fourth lesson to get the point....