Not Me Monday

Let me begin this little blog with a short story.

A few months ago, shortly after all three of the boys moved in with us, my dear husband gave me a Saturday morning to myself. Of course I chose to go shopping. And of course, aside from purchasing a few items for myself, I also bought things for the boys. For the 11 year old, D, I had no idea what to get. So I bought him one of those metal water canteen things to keep water in. He was pretty excited about it, which made me happy seeing as how I was totally stabbing in the dark on this gift.

Shortly after I purchased it, D went through a smoothie-making phase. This was after his summer program was over so he was home all. day. long. And, naturally, bored. So he experimented with various types of smoothies. Some of you can already see where this is going...

Last night, he approached me and told me he was failing math. After we talked about that a little bit he apparently got brave, because he said "I need your help cleaning something up. Something happened and I don't know how to clean it." He proceeded to open up one of his dresser drawers, and pull out the canteen. Goo was oozing out of the lid. I asked tentatively "What IS that?" and he responded "Do you remember that strawberry banana smoothie I made...?" He revealed the interior of the drawer, which had said goo all over it, as well as all over the contents of the drawer.

So for my first "Not me!" moment, I did NOT at this time abruptly sputter "I am NOT TOUCHING THAT. That is ALL you." Turns out the thing had fermented after sitting there for who knows how long (longer than a month, I'm confident) and exploded during the night. Horrified does not even begin to describe my feelings about the whole situation at this time.

Now on with the rest of the show -

I did NOT refuse to clean D's fake snakeskin vest that someone in his family gave to him. When I found it in the laundry and read the care label and it said "Wipe with a damp cloth. Do not wash. Do not dry clean." I did not promptly give it back to him and declare it his duty to wipe down said vest. After all, what are foster mothers for besides wiping down funky (ugly!) vests?

I did not give myself pink eye. When the little boys had it I was extremely careful to wash my hands after every time I touched them, especially after bath time and after putting their eye drops in their eye. One tiny little moment of eye-rubbing indiscretion did not result in painfully awkward week of seeing out of one eye for me!

I am not reading my THIRD non-fiction book in a row this week, entitled "Negotiating with children." I also did not read an entire book on caring for a newborn and a book on "bringing up boys" in the past few weeks. I know everything there is to know about parenting, obviously, and I would never need so much help!

When I went to pick up D from his class at church yesterday, I did not walk within 6 feet of him, and start waving my arms and shouting his name, while he continued to be oblivious to my presence. When he finally did see me, he did not say "OH! I thought you were just another middle school girl standing around bored!" Very nice to be told you look like you are approximately 12 years old. Mmmmhmmmm.

I think that's enough embarrassing moments for the week. If any of these things had happened to me, of course! ;)