Bath Time

Once a month Matt has an Elder's meeting at church. It starts around 5:30p and goes into the night... which means I'm doing the nighttime wind-down alone. Managing tubby time for three three and under can prove to be a challenge. Tonight things were rather comedic. I was running the bath upstairs and asked Izak, who just strolled up, if Libby was watching Kipper downstairs. He said warily, "Nnnooo." Strange, I thought, so I asked again, and again he said no. He was right. She was downstairs, locked in the bathroom doing a little pre-wash of her own. The toilet paper was all unrolled and wadded up, damp. She was soaked, her hair, her shirt, her blanket. There was very little water in the toilet bowl. As I put Blankie in the washer for a quick disinfecting wash, I decided not to think about what she'd been up to. Izak accidentally dumped a TON of bubble bath in the tub; it was a little like Willie Wonka's Chocolate Factory when they're riding the psychedelic boat and getting belched on by the pipes full of bubbles. Actually, that whole scene used to freak me out, but the imagery was very similar. Rinsing off was tough, bubbles are sticky things, and it required several tries to get the shampoo out of the hair and not have those latent bubbles when the hair looks clean but is really still sudsy... I digress.

Then there's the baby, who I bathed first and let play (read: lay and stare at the ceiling) in the hallway. Generally we go right from the tub to nursing, so Mr. Boobie was quite put out that he was put to bed last.

The end of the day is one of the toughest for me. It's like my strength is waning, my resolve shaking... not.. quite.. sure I'll... make it... . Then, like the still after a storm, comes the most beautiful time of the 24 hour funny-farm -cycle - silence! Ah... the babies are all asleep! Usually Matt and I give one another a high-five and collapse on the couch until one or the other can utter an intelligible sentence... "Want popcorn?" "What's on tonight?" "Do you want the computer?"

Matt is usually at the helm during bath time. I'm eternally thankful for his strength and energy during that time of day. And I'm appreciating it even more as I realize that he does what I did tonight by himself twice every week since I'm working Wednesday and Saturday evenings. I dread the one or two nights a month that I have to do baths alone, and yet he never complains. I think he actually likes that goofy time of day.

Matt's a wonderful husband and dad. At the end of a long day it's not uncommon to hear me say to him, "If you're ever going to leave me, or run away and change your identity, or get really sick and end up hospitalized, could you please try to wait until after bath time?"