The Helpful Toddler: at Bath time

Every once in a blue moon (usually when it's been long enough to forget all the trouble it was last time) I decide to designate half an hour of Mommy Bath Time. You know, that time when Mommy fills the tub up with water too warm for little bodies, smears on some face cream, closes her eyes and relaxes for half an hour while well-behaved little children stay downstairs and watch some television?

Heh. Yeah.

The first thing to consider is exactly what to do with the bathroom door. Do I lock it? If I lock it and there's an emergency, no one will be able to get to me. Inevitably someone will scream as though the house is on fire (though really it'll be because one heisted the other's snack) and I'll have to spring from the tub, sopping wet and naked, and streak through the house to locate the source of the scream.

Maybe I better not lock the door. Only then I face the inevitable fact that one or the other of the children will ignore the closed door, march right in, and start chattering about whatever might be going on in their happy little lives.

I don't lock the door.

Before I'm even in the tub, standing there wrapped in only a towel and smearing European clay all over my face, there's a little blonde toddler standing on the toilet seat narrating for me (in case I didn't know what I was doing.)

"Mom-mom! Mud! Face! Scaryyyyyyyy."

I enter the tub now and lie back, attempting to ignore the Helpful Toddler that is sharing my sacred Mommy Time.

"Mom-mom! Bath! Wash. Wash boobies?" she offers, holding up a wash cloth. Helpful Toddler, always ready to help wash Mom-mom's boobies for her. "Boobies! More! Two boobies! Looooook! Boobies too!"As she lifts her dress to her chin and informs me that she, in fact, has her own boobies.

Now that's homeschool - a great anatomy lesson.

"Why don't you go watch TV with your sister?"
"Noooooo!!!!!!" she screams cheerfully. "Help. Mom-mom. Bath."

I sigh, close my eyes, and resign myself to pretending I'm back in Mexico lying in a hammock in the sunshine.

It doesn't work.

"Shish. Parkle shish. Preeeetty. Shish parkle more. More shish! Look, Mom-mom! More, more, more shish!"

I realize now that she's reading me her bath book. (10 points to anyone who can guess the book. Really, it should be obvious... if you understand Twoyearoldese.)

The chatter continues until I reach for the razor.

A look of terror spreads itself across her face. "Mom-mom! No touch! Owie!!! No touch!"

I put my leg in the air and lather it up with shaving cream. I bring the razor to my leg and slide it along my skin...

"MOM-MOM!!! NOOOOO!!! Owie! Owie! Owie! No touch!" She runs to the hallway. "Sissy! Mom-mom OWIE!"

Her sister is being the well-behaved child she ought to and is so sucked into Bindi the Jungle Girl that she's completely unaware of her sister's frantic screaming, informing her that Mommy is likely about to kill herself with The-Forbidden-Thing-That-Causes-Owies.

She rushes back into the bathroom to check on me. "Owie?" she asks nervously. "Mom-mom bleed?"

I do my best to reassure her that Mom-mom is just fine and what I'm doing is completely normal. She looks doubtful but finally relaxes when she sees that I'm not bleeding and have apparently survived the self-inflicted attack from The-Forbidden-Thing.

I gave up at about this point, deciding that Mommies are definitely not meant to have long, quiet soaks in the bath.

Maybe I'll try again when she moves out.