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Friday, August 3, 2012

Kiddie Groomers

A friend recently posted this on FB: 


"I wish there was a place you could drop off your kids to have them bathed, then pick them up clean in an hour or so.... You know, like a dog groomer for small filthy humans."


Oh yes I thought!  This is what I need!  Absofrickenlutely! 


I'm imagining that I can throw the kids in the car in their skivvies and drop them off, get a nice cup of coffee, and come back to find them smelling sweet with their hair all done up pretty.  Or even better, you could drop them off at night, filthy from the day's play, catch a bite with your spouse, and pick them up in their jammies.  They would then fall peacefully to sleep on the car ride home, at which point you could put them into bed without waking them.  It's a nice fantasy.  


I'm lucky in that my kids love baths, but my house does not.  The bathroom floor is by far the cleanest place in my house as I mop it every time they take a bath.  I tend to avoid bathing them in the second floor bathroom for the sake of the ceilings.  


They also love to brush their teeth, but they have do do it themselves.  I guess they are doing okay because we had zero cavities for 60 teeth at their last dental appointment.  Flossing is another story, one that ends in someone being tied up with floss, usually the dog.  


Hair on the other hand is a disaster.  All 3 of my kids were blessed (or cursed) with my curly hair.  There is no getting a hair brush through this mess.  If left unattended, it can dread, as in like a dread lock.  I gave up on long hair for the girls and instead did short bobs this summer (not like the child abuse mullet my mother subjected me to as a child).  


Fingernails are another dreaded project.  I have to wrestle them to the ground and practically sit on them to cut their nails.  And their toe nails - yuck.  I can generally bribe the girls with nail polish, which leads to my son wanting also nail polish.  It's hard to come up with a good reason why he shouldn't have his done like his sisters, so you go ahead and give in.  What color does he want?  No not the nude pink that you try to pawn off on him hoping no one will notice.  He wants every color of the rainbow, and proudly shows it to everyone he comes into contact with.  You haven't lived until you son's pre-K teacher comments on your son's rainbow nail polish.  


In general, trying to get out of the house to go anywhere is a project with three small children.  I have to get myself ready to go first, but by the end I'm a sweaty mess.  I've tried doing it the opposite way, and dressing the children first then getting dressed right before I go out the door, but then I come to find the children in various states of undress.  And those 6 socks that I managed to find and get on little feet are now 3 socks.  The dryer has nothing on my children when it comes to losing socks.   And gloves, gloves are way worse than socks.  I tried sewing them to their sleeves.  The little stinkers ripped them off.  This year I may have to make use of the staple gun. I'd also like to know when clothing manufacturers stopped making mittens in favor of gloves?  Mittens actually keep your hands warmer, and you only have to worry about getting the thumb in the right place.  I have to do 30 fingers each morning. I pity the poor pre-K teachers who have to do 100+.  Unfortunately that is not a task can't be farmed out to the Kiddy Spa.  I'll just have to suffer through the next few winters.  If my kids end up with frost bite, please don't judge me too harshly.