How kids lowered my standards

I've had a series of ridiculous events happen lately  Nothing bad, just stuff that happens and you sit back and ask 'did that just happen.'  Then you answer yourself with, why yes it did. I wasn't phased by these events at all.  It was barely a blip on my radar, but on a normal person's radar, it would have been a big deal.

Here are a few examples of what I'm talking about.

Last Saturday, I was walking into the kitchen after changing Cassidy's diaper.  I see Sawyer licking something off his hand.  I grab the kitchen towel and head over to clean him up.  I stop about 2 feet from him when I realize exactly what he was licking off his hand.  Poop.  My son was licking his own poop off his hand.  He had pooped in his diaper, stuck his hand down it, and in the process smeared it all over the back of his hand.  And you know the rest.  I grab his hand and call for Andrew saying he needs to change Sawyer's diaper.  All the while I'm thinking, that's really gross.  When Andrew walks around the corner, all I said was, "Your son is licking his own feces off his hand.  He needs a diaper change."  I handed him over and walked away.

When Andrew was finishing up changing him, I walked in to hand him Sawyer's pants.  I kept sniffing them trying to decide whether he actually got poop on them in the events leading up to the now infamous poop lick.  After about the third sniff, Andrew looks at me and says, "Emily, if you're sniffing it that much, I'll get him a new pair of pants."  I shrugged and said ok while dumping his pants in the laundry.

When Jackson wasn't quite 2 years old, I caught him eating dirt out of a potted plant on the back porch.  I grabbed my camera and took a picture then gave him some milk to rinse out his mouth.

I caught not one but two of my children eating out of the trashcan about a month ago.  They decided they were still hungry, so they wanted to finish their lunch from 3 hours ago.  Never mind, I had given them a snack they finished 5 minutes prior.

And don't get me started on the fighting, punching, and general wrestling, I put up with everyday.  My house can turn into a WWE wrestling ring .01 seconds flat.

I've just come to accept the fact stuff happens I have absolutely no control over.

I'm sure normal people would freak out and be completely grossed out by their child eating their own poop.  The fact is it barely phased me.  It was just a little blip on my radar.  And that is what made me realize, kids have lowered my standards for pretty much everything.

I would love to have a clean house all the time with no clutter.  In reality, I step on Legos, Matchbox car, and other random toys on a daily basis.

I would love for my bathrooms to stay clean and smell fresh, but I have two potty trained boys.  And boys are disgusting.

I'm weird about keeping clutter off the kitchen counters.  In my mind, stuff on the counters should be put away in their own place and not cluttering up the counter.  In reality, I can completely clear the counters off and in a matter of 2 hours, a pile of crap has landed back on them.  It annoys the holy hell out of me!  I just don't understand why people (big and small) cannot put their own stuff away!

So my already low standards have been lowered even more with children.  For now, I just go with the flow.  The kids will get older.  I'll stop stepping on Legos and cars, then wonder why my babies had to grow up so quickly.

Embrace the mess is what I say!