A marvelous time for all

After Captain Adventure’s birthday party last weekend, we had histrionics from our niece, who wanted to stay the night. Well, that won’t work this weekend, we said; other plans and so forth. How about next weekend, we said.

So this weekend, over she came and with us she stayed. As did her baby brother! Which was not planned, but the husband and I are fast talkers and my poor sister-in-law really never stood a chance.

I grabbed The Nephew out of her arms faster than you can say “baby hog”, coolly informed her that we had blankies, outgrown clothes that would fit him, baby cereal, baby shampoo, diapers, wipes, and in fact every other thing a child of his tender months could possibly need; and also, a supermarket where anything we might not have that would be required for 48 hours of infant survival could be purchased. HA HA! Argue with that logic!!

Combined with the suggestion that it would be So Cool if she and my brother could go do their thing on their own…imagine! Going to the art festival without strollers, diaper bags, fussiness from children, the constant fear that you’re giving them skin cancer by taking them outside…being able to stop and say, “Hey, this looks like a nice place, why don’t we have lunch here?” without having to go through the Kids Are With Us checklist for food type v. service speed v. family appropriateness…a whole solid 30 someodd hours of not worrying about who wants juice and who needs a diaper change and who is getting tired…

Yes. My juju was too powerful. I got to keep The Nephew overnight. SQUEAL! {singing} I got to keep the baaaaaaby…I got to keep the baaaaaabyyyyyy… {/singing}

It was his First Overnight Stay Away From Home Ever™ and he took it like a champion. I think he was too busy playing with cousins and new toys all day, and by the time he got tired he was so tired he simply passed out and didn’t mind that he was sleeping in a porta-crib in our bedroom with a borrowed blankie. He’s one of the chubbiest, happiest little guys I’ve ever known. As long as you’ve got food, he’s fine.

Captain Adventure had a few moments. He had to make it absolutely clear that I am his woman. His. Not yours. So don’t get any ideas, bub. Don’t get comfortable. Don’t start thinking, you know, that you’ve got any kind of rights around here. That lap? Mine. The boobies? Definitely mine. That snuggly back-rubbing thing? On loan, pal.

Because…the woman is mine. So are the toys. All of them. And the food. All of it. Except the rice cereal, because it’s yucky. But the other food? Mine. This turkey right here? MINE. And the mashed potatoes? Also mine – and I will prove it by rubbing it in my hair! Ha ha! HA!

Cousin M, the elder girl-child, is a triple handful of energy. She’s a hoot. And naturally, because she isn’t completely sure that I’m kidding when I say I’ll sell her on eBay if she doesn’t behave, she is very good for us.

Hopefully, their parents got a relaxing weekend of grown-up togetherness. And we had a blast with their kids. It really is amazing how the Den can simply absorb an ‘extra’ two, three people without it being…noticeable. Sure, I used the visitors as an excuse to finally roast up the twelve pound turkey that has been languishing in my freezer since that really great post-Thanksgiving sale, but other than that – it really didn’t feel like we had three extra humans in the house (oh yeah – we also had an old high school buddy of the husband’s staying with us this weekend) (you begin to see why it is The Den of Chaos…).

It’s weird having a baby in the house again, though. The Nephew is just at the mobile stage – fireman crawling around like crazy, pulling himself up on furniture to cruise. I thought I had clean floors, I really did. Then, as I plucked everything from ancient hot dogs to plastic straw wrappers out of his mouth (don’t you dare tell his mother!), I realized that, uh, clean? Is apparently pretty relative.

My Den is clean compared to, say, a bus stop.

But it is not ‘and now we’ll drop an eight month old baby into it and let him roam’ clean.

Not even close to that kind of clean.

There were tears and bickering and laughing and running and shouting and asking the same question fourteen times in a row without pausing for either breath or answer. The baby got cuddled and Captain Adventure was reassured and bottles were consumed, Captain Adventure tried to shove his baby cousin over and was reprimanded, more tears, more shrieking, more cuddling and reassuring, and somehow or other the three that weren’t ours got safely on their way.

My Den…is even more Den-like than usual right now. And also, I feel rather tired. Rather in a ‘I’m so not doing those dishes tonight’ kind of mood. Looking forward to work, because it is so peaceful.

But a marvelous time was had by all.