FiveManns.net

Three little Vietnamese triplets stand out in Marin County which, in spite of it’s socially counterculture history,  hosts a largely homogeneous, ethnically white-bread population.  “Wow!  Are those triplets?!?!”.  Indeed they are.  Inevitably the next comments is, “They must be a handful!”.  I don’t mind hearing that same comment over and over.  Not only is it true, but I feel the empathy.  They, those who are parents, know this truth.  “I only had one and he was difficult, but triplets!”   “I can’t even imagine!”  “I had three, but not at the same time!”  Our pain is obvious and walks on six legs.  We are seen.  The truth is out there.

What is less obvious are those domains where raising triplets is easier.  For example, mealtime.

At first mealtime was a nightmare … spoon-grabbing, in-chair-standing, gulp-and-running, food-spitting, water-swishing, picky-eating, chaos that took forever and precluded Mommy & Daddy from savoring anything save for a few gulps of survival rations.  Those were the darkest days, where wine and grilled chicken seemed a distant memory.  And now?  Cadets in West Point cafeteria eat with less precision and order than our boys.

When the dinner bell rings they run for their chairs, climb in, open their arms to booster chair straps and their little necks to plastic bibs.  Mommy brings the bowl of food, the little spoon, the cloth wipey, and the little plate for food whoopsies.  All attention turns to the bowl.  There is silence pregnant with anticipation, perhaps a gleeful squeak slipping through.  Mommy lifts the bowl.  Picks up a spoonful of yummy.  “Nhan, are you ready?”, Mommy asks.

At those magic words, any remnant of fidgeting, feet kicking and games of hold-the-bib-over-my-face halt instantly, little face turns to Mommy, and mouth opens wide.  “Yuuummmmm”, says Mommy as she inserts the spoonful of food, food which can be and is anything.  Oatmeal, strawberries, chicken, broccoli, blueberries, quinoa, bananas, stew, salmon, pasta, rice, beans, peas, yogurt, carrots, crackers, cheese, zucchini … you name it, they eat it. They eat it quickly.  They eat it happily.  The chew it completely … with their mouths mostly closed.  Should something dribble on their face, “Grunt!  Grunt!”, they ask for the wipey and wipe off their face.  A kernel of rice hits the table?  “Grunt!  Grunt!”, point the triplets until the offending mess is cleaned up and placed onto the whooopsie plate.

“Last one”, announces Mommy as the last spoonful comes around.  They know.  They understand.  When the last spoonful is complete, there is a round of spontaneous applause by all.  Toddlers remove their bibs.  Mommy & Daddy undo the buckles.  All is well.

How could this be?  You’ve read enough Daddy Reports by now to know these are not enlightened, angelic beings come into the world fully-formed and preternaturally polite.  They are two year old boys.  What created this paragon of dining pleasure?  In my opinion, it was two things:  East European determination and the possibility of immediate feedback.

Mommy is from the Czech Republic.  The Czech Republic, right after it was freed from the Nazis, was occupied by the Soviets.  You don’t grow up under the Soviets and grow up soft.  You learn to push through obstacle … even three of them.

But perhaps more importantly, dinner time with triplets provides an excellent opportunity for what my child raising book calls “logical consequence”.

It started in Vietnam with the bibs.  Mommy requires bibs.  She likes clothes without spots.  She would put a bib on Daddy if they came in adult sizes.  She put the bibs on the boys.  Two stayed on.  Tam took his off.  He threw it to the floor.  I put it back on.  Tam took it off.  Mommy tells Tam, “you have to wear a bib”.  I put the bib back on.  Mommy continues, “if you don’t wear the bib, you don’t eat.”  I’m thinking that’s metaphorical reasoning.  Tam thinks so, too, and throws the bib to the floor.  “Tam!”, exhorts Mommy , “put your bib on or no dinner.”  I put the bib back on.  I still think Mommy’s just trying to make her point stronger.  I don’t take her literally.  Neither does Tam.  He throws the bib to the floor.

Neither Tam nor Daddy grew up in Eastern Europe.  We both failed to appreciate the extent to which they do not mess around over there.  It’s old school.  At this point Mommy gets ups, grabs Tam, picks him up, and sets  him on the floor.  “No food for you!”

This is the place where triplets are handy.  If you have one child, at this point you have simply stopped feeding your child.  Although the situation has changed, there’s nothing to immediately compare it to.  After enough days of no feeding, the child will eventually get really, really hungry.  But by the time hunger sets in, the connection to tossed bibs is pretty much lost, and the whole educational feedback loop is gone.  You’ve just got a hungry kid who still throws bibs on the  floor.  Not so with triplets.

Mommy proceeds to feed the brothers, Tai and Nhan.  “Yuuuuuummmmm”, goes in the food.  Neither Tai nor Nhan are stupid.  They’ve been watching this whole thing and like wolves in a pack, they are more than willing to eat all of Tam’s food and let him starve.  If Tam starves, that’s his problem.  In that sense, Tai and Nhan are pretty much thinking like Mommy.

Tam starts to cry.  This is predictable and does not impact the flow of food to Tai and Nhan.  “Yuuuuummmm”, goes in the food.  Tam starts to screech.  Daddy softens and starts to intervene.  Mommy scowls at Daddy.  Daddy withdraws and puts in earplugs.  It’s a battle of wills, in a way, but all the will is on Tam’s side.  He has taken an untenable position, a fight with no enemy, for Mommy is not fighting.  Mommy is simply feeding the two children who are working their way toward Darwinian domination and survival in the Mann family by eating their dinner … bibs on.  “Yuuuuummmmm”, goes in the food.  All the power is in Tam’s hand, the rest is “logical consequence” … no bib, no food, Tam’s choice.  There’s no yelling.  There’s no upset (other than Tam’s).  All is flowing smoothly.

But even Tam, no dummy himself, is starting to notice his predicament.  Presumably a scientist at heart, he decides to test his hypothesis.  He points at the food and grunts.  “You have to wear your bib”, says Mommy.  “Let’s give him a chance”, says Daddy.  Daddy puts Tam back at the table.  Bib goes on.  Quickly, Mommy feeds Tam a bite for positive reinforcement.  “Yuuuummmmm”, goes in the food.  Tam rips off his bib.  He throws it to the floor.  Mommy goes into action.  Tam is on the floor.  Nhan and Tai proceed to eat Tam’s portion, threatening his survival.

Finally, after a few more experiments, Tam makes a correct assessment of the situation:  Mommy is from Eastern Europe and you don’t mess around with Mommy.  To his credit, he figured it out a lot faster than Daddy.

That was just step one of many.  Today … we don’t tear at the tablecloth.  We open our mouths when Mommy asks, “Are you ready?”.  We sit while eating.  We eat what is served.  We chew with our mouths closed.  We keep our fingers out of our mouths.  To survive in the Mann family, this is how you eat.  So this is how we eat.

To be fair … the kernel-of-rice, neat-freak thing … that was orphanage training.  I don’t think they tolerated spilling food in the orphanage.  The caretakers came from Vietnam, not Eastern Europe, but I don’t think you mess with them, either.

Triplets … I ask myself, how did this become my life?

I think a lot of fathers ask themselves their version of that question.  The answer depends a lot on the context of the asking.

For example, I asked it of myself this morning about half way through the half-hour screaming and fighting fit taking place over any one of three identical and readily available toy cars.  How did this become my life?  This is the more rhetorical form of the question, a moment of self pity, to which there is no helpful reply other than to suck it up and have a little compassion all around.

The other form is more matter of fact:  how did the triplets come into our life?

First, Daddy-to-be met Mommy-to-be.  They got married.  Then they tried to make babies in the time honored way of their ancestors.  A close friend and exceptional seer even told Mommy-to-be and Daddy-to-be, “I see the three spirits of your children hanging around you.  You’re going to have three children.”  This was very exciting news.  Daddy-to-be and Mommy-to-be tried again and again in the time honored way of their ancestors to make babies.  As fun as all that was, no babies came.  This was a great disappointment.

So Mommy-to-be and Daddy-to-be decide to use in vitro fertilization, or IVF.  IVF involves giving Mommy-to-be vast quantities of tests, pills and shots for weeks on end so that she will produce large numbers of eggs like a chicken.  Daddy-to-be has to go into a small room and watch videos.  But no babies came.

Mommy-to-be and Daddy-to-be decide to try again.  Mommy-to-be endures another round of rump-bruising  shots and pills.  Daddy-to-be watches the video again.  This time Mommy-to-be produces three lovely eggs.  Wonderful, it would seem, those must be our three children!  But still no babies came.

At this point Mommy-to-be has a very intense dream.  She dreams of three people telling her they have to leave.  This is a very disturbing dream, for Mommy-to-be sees it as the three children leaving before they make it to our family.

The third and final round of IVF is again not successful.  No babies.  No hope.  This was the end of the line.  There is much sadness and grief.

A few months later Mommy-to-be and Daddy-to-be meet with their friends Tom and Betty.  Tom and Betty tell us their story.   They tried to make a second baby in the time honored way of their ancestors.  No baby came and there was much sadness and grief.  They decided to adopt a baby from China.  But even as they moved forward with this adoption, it was difficult to completely let go of their desire for a biological child.  Like most people going through international adoption, Tom and Betty waited a long time for a match, and all that time, there was the aftertaste of regret.

Until the ladybugs came.

The symbol used by the Chinese partners of their adoption agency was the ladybug.  All the documents and communications had ladybug images on them.  One day their yard was overtaken by ladybugs, thousands of them.  They had never seen ladybugs in their yard before, and now it was a ladybug festival.  One week later they got a match with  a beautiful little Chinese girl.  Their take on the ladybugs? … it was meant to be.  In their eyes, this was the universe’s way of saying, “This child was meant to be with you.”  That ended the regret.  They were at peace with their new blessing of a daughter.  And Mommy-to-be and Daddy-to-be were inspired.

So Mommy-to-be and Daddy-to-be decide to adopt.  They do a little ceremony to tell the three little spirits, “Hey, if you want to come live with us, you better get over to Vietnam and find some bodies to be born into.  We’re going to adopt!”  But the three little spirits were already on it.  They were born to a birth mother in Vietnam one week after Eva had her dream.

Mommy-to-be and Daddy-to-be start working on the application.  The deadline is approaching because Daddy-to-be turns 50 on January 9 and becomes inelligible because of age.  Mommy-to-be is crazy with urgency.  There’s a huge winter storm and power is out on the mountain for a week.  Mommy-to-be and Daddy-to-be check into a hotel that still has power, bringing computers, routers, networks and printers with them to work on the application.  The day before Daddy-to-be’s birthday, the application goes in.

After the application comes the dossier.  The dossier is a story unto itself.  It involves more bureaucratic mess than a reasonable person could imagine.  Even if you set out to create a difficult process, you probably would not think to create all the stuff required in a dossier.  Get your doctor to write a letter on his or her letterhead using the exact wording specified by the Vietnamese bureaucrat.  Schedule an appointment.  Schedule a mobile notary to meet you and the doctor at that appointment.  Receptionist prints letter.  Doctor signs letter.  Notary notarizes letter.  Take letter and notary page to the county in which the notary lives.  County adds a piece of paper saying, yes, this is a notary.  Take those three pieces of paper to Sacramento where they add a fourth piece of paper saying, yes, this is a county.  Do this for a thousand different documents.  For some of them do it a second time because, well, don’t ask, just do it.  It’s a full time job.  We did it.

The application has a little checkbox.  Would you accept twins?  Sure, that would be great.  But forget about it, the agency tells us.  They don’t use fertility drugs in Vietnam.  You don’t see twins come up for adoption.  It doesn’t happen.

Besides, there are bigger problems.  The memorandum of understanding for adoption between the United States and Vietnam is expiring on Sept 1.  Any couple who is not matched by Sept 1 is going to be out of luck.  A match normally takes 1 – 2 years after submitting the dossier.  For Mommy-to-be and Daddy-to-be, that Sept 1 deadline is a scant 6 months out.  Furthermore, Daddy-to-be is now ineligible to apply again because of age.  If it doesn’t work out this time, that’s it.  It looks bad for Mommy & Daddy to-be.

On June 12, 2008, 3 days before father’s day, 3 months after submitting the dossier, 3 months prior to the termination of US/Vietnam adoption, and more than a year earlier than would be expected, Mommy & Daddy to-be get a phone call.

“How about triplets?”, inquires the social worker.

Mommy asks, “Can you send pictures?”.  Daddy asks, “What about 2 out of 3?”.  Mommy scowls.  Daddy thinks about the cost of college.  Mommy takes one look at the pictures and says, “Yes!”.  Daddy thinks about the cost of nursery school, food, clothes, cars, braces, insurance and airline tickets.  “How can you say no to these cute faces?”, asks Mommy.  He couldn’t, really.  The bases were loaded.  The deck was stacked.  It was all or nothing and nothing seemed like a bad choice.  But knowing that you can’t say no is a long way from actually saying yes.  Mommy tells the agency yes.  Daddy catches up about a week later, and has been playing catch-up ever since.

So, if you ask us, these are our children.  That they incarnated into the beautiful young bodies of Vietnamese triplets is dwarfed by the miraculous journey of three spirits from the seeing eye of our friend to the screaming, fighting little bundles that vex me today.

That’s how this became my life.

This morning I changed two back-to-back Class 5 Diapers.

A Class 0 Diaper is new.  You would never change a Class 0 Diaper, unless of course, you taught your toddler the baby sign for “change diaper”, he learned it, he used it, and you got all excited that your otherwise wordless, grunting  toddler was actually communicating a clear and specific desire to you, and rushed the boy downstairs to the changing area to discover a nicely dry, Class 0 Diaper.  You’ve been had.  Your toddler has learned that by rubbing his little fists back and forth (i.e., “change diaper”), he will received immediate attention and, even better, without invoking Stern Daddy Voice.

I try putting the diaper back on.  Instant crying … he won’t have it.  I told him that whenever he wanted a diaper change to make the sign.  He made the sign.  He wants his change.  Damn.  I’ve been had.  How much do these things cost?  It adds up.  I consider using Stern Daddy Voice, but I’m laughing too hard to find it.  I could just make diaper changing a less desirable experience.  But, somehow, even lacking Eva’s good intuition, I’m sensing this is not a good call.  I fall back on the  hope for potty training.  This, too, shall pass.

A Class 1 Diaper is wet.  It still looks and feels like a diaper, but it’s wet.  The wetness is restricted to the diaper itself.  These are the best.  Quick.  Easy.  Minimal mess.  Minimal use of baby wipes, whose cost also adds up.

A Class 2 Diaper is soaked and weighs a ton.  The kid’s been walking around with a bloated, sagging pee balloon between his legs.  It’s amazing how much liquid those things can hold, but by this time, the diaper doesn’t hold all of it.  His pants are wet.  One has to marvel at the percentage of body weight that a toddler can convert to pee over the course of an evening.  As a comparison, imagine if you as an adult filled a bucket … that would be impressive.

With Class 3 Diapers we’re moving into solid waste management of the poopy diaper.  A Class 3 Poopy Diaper contains your classic, well defined, identifiable unit of a turd.  These are almost as easy as Class 1 and 2.  Wiping is pretty targeted.  Minimal mess.  All is well.

A Class 4 Diaper is more challenging.  The poo spreads out.  There’s a lot more wiping.  There’s a lot more odor.  There’s a lot more hazard.  I learned from watching the caretakers in Vietnam.  You’ve got to hoist the feet hog-tie style, get the diaper off and into the can, grab a baby wipe and start wiping without ever letting poo hit the changing mat.   Foot-activated diaper cans are helpful.  Ambidexterity is essential.  But it’s a learnable skill that even a guy can master.

When I was taking a mountaineering class in Wyoming many years ago, we did two exercises to help us learn how to survive difficult conditions.  One was to purposefully run out of food 5 days and 50 miles from the end of the trip.  The other was to spend all night on the icy summit of a mountain with just the clothes on our back.  The former was much easier than I expected.  After a day or so, I wasn’t really hungry, just weak and tired, but the 5 days went by without incident or any particular suffering.  I learned that going for days without food is nothing to be concerned about.  The latter was far more miserable than I expected, as the icy hours dragged on and my shivering abated only when huddled in a piece of spare plastic.  The plastic allowed me to warm up enough to fall asleep, but at the expense of trapping my sweat.  I’d fall asleep, the wind would blow the plastic away, and I’d wake up soaking wet and shivering, only to repeat that process all night.  I never want to go through that again.

Diaper changing has been like both of those.  Although it was the thing I absolutely feared most about adopting children, it has been the thing that has bothered me the least.  There is a sort of sensitive intimacy between father and little boy, whose flexibility allows him to lie on his back, present his butt upwards, and watch you with a smile, all at the same time.  Although conceptually revolting, it’s true what they say.  Just as we are not repulsed by our own biological processes, I experience dealing with the triplets as I would myself.

Right up until Class 5.

A Class 5 Diaper is a thing to behold.  Spread out in a thick, sticky smear from mid-back to testicles, poop covers everything with a fermented stink that could burn away plastic.  My nose burns.  My eyes water.  I cry out in agony, which only inspires the happy toddler to get his hands down there and figure out what all the excitement is about.  NO!  DON’T TOUCH THAT!  Too late.  Now there’s a problem.  Do you let go of his feet to wipe his hands and mess the mat, or keep working on the back?  There’s no choice … gotta go for the hands.  Now there’s poo everywhere.  Focus.  Wipe.  Dispose of the wipey.  Focus.  Wipe.  Dispose of the wipey.  One step at a time.  I block his hands with my legs.  I fake a smile.  Wipe.  And his little private parts … all those wrinkles … how do you get all that poop out of those wrinkles?  I try as carefully as I can.  This takes a lot of wipes.  He starts laughing hysterically.  Now THIS is fun!  Great.  Is this even legal?  No wonder they start making the “change diaper” sign.  I’ve become a poop wiping gigolo.

I give up.  It’s off to the shower for Class 5 Diapers.

This morning I was rushing to get ready for my 9am client.  No problem, honey, I’ll change the diapers before I see the client.  Usually in the mornings I’m dealing with Class 2 Diapers.  Quick change.  Quick wipes.  Off we go.  But this morning was different.  This morning was  back-to-back Class 5’s.  Oh god … there’s nothing worse than dealing with Class 5 changes while you are in a rush.  Patience … patience … focus … wipe … dispose of the wipey.

I borrowed from the rating scale for whitewater boating to create my diaper scale.  Back in the 80’s when I did a lot of whitewater canoeing on the east coast, a class VI (i.e., 6) river was considered unrunnable, certain death.  These days top boating experts run class VI rivers all the time.  I have never seen a Class 6 Diaper.  I hope I never do.

It’s been three weeks since we arrived home. It feels like ages ago … The memory of Hanoi with its serviced apartment, convenient restaurant and room service, and boys’ many hours of sleep seems far, far away. Instead we’ve had the reality of very jet-lagged boys who never seem to want to sleep, and 2 zombie parents who almost forgot what sleep feels like. After few days, Wallace had to go to Utah to fulfill a prior commitment, and Eva stayed with the boys alone – with the help of a few last-minute-found nannies, and many wonderful friends. It’s been quite a wild ride …

Despite the lack of sleep, we have had some great experiences – from the many wonderful friends who have generously devoted their time and energy to help, to the great progress that we see and the amount of joy that is starting to appear in our boys’ eyes when they discover something new – which is often.

Fran and Jan gave us a warm, van-&-balloon welcome home at the airport; we learned about all things sand with Megan who took us for a fun trip to Stinson Beach; we went for a lovely park visit with Betty and Pat; and we had wonderful visits with Mark and Innesa. The boys experienced a profound release and change after two osteopathic treatments that they received… the difference from one day to another was quite amazing. Thank you, guys! We have also had many exciting new explorations with Christina – among other things, she introduced us to the Discovery Museum, which became the favorite destination of our half-day outings.

During this time we learned that our boys were afraid of not only dogs but also pigeons; that the house was nowhere nearly childproof for 3 enterprising toddlers – both from the child and house safety point of view; and that the boys love driving in a car and run for it squealing with joy the minute they are let out. More recently, they even started pointing at their shoes and the diaper bag once their breakfast was done – they can’t wait to go!

The boys also learned to master many new physical skills – from simple ones like running up and down our steep stairs and walking on steep playground “hills” to sliding on a big curved slides, and climbing big kids play structures like pros. Where 4-yr olds hesitated, our boys didn’t even slow down and were swiftly up. We visited Little Gym and although our boys had no appreciation for sitting in a circle, they outdid all the other kids on the rings and during various climbing exercises. We also introduced strollers, finally. Before taking them for an outing, we let the boys play with them leisurely on our deck, which made them think the strollers were a new cool version of a ride-on.

Did I mention the boys’ passion for ride-ons? Whereever we go, they keep an eye for any type of a ride-on that they could get their hands on. We got a little Plasma car for them as an experiment, and it was an instant hit. We might have to buy two more of those!

I thought, in my naivete, that childproofing a house protected the child from the house.  One locked the medicine cabinet to keep the meds away from the kid.  They sell foam strips to put around stone and tile … surely in a meeting of head and tile, it’s the head that we are worried about, not the tile.  But a simple linguistic analysis of waterproof watch should have made it clear:  the aim is to protect the watch from the water, not the other way around.  A toddlerproof house is a house impermeable to toddlers.

A toddlerproof house does not exist.  Take a waterproof watch deep enough and water will eventually work it’s way through the seal and destroy the watch.  Give a toddler enough unsupervised time and he will eventually work his way through the drywall and destroy the house.  What we’re talking about here is toddler resistance.  You’ve got your 10 meter resistant watches, your 30 meter watches and your 50 meters watches.  You’ve got your solo-girl-toddler resistant house, your boy-resistant house, and then you’ve got your triplet two-year-old boy resistant house.  I’m not sure if those houses can have furniture or windows.

My friend Tom came over to help with our house.  His assessment was simple:  “If they can reach it, it will be destroyed.  You’re not ready.”  And Tom only has 2 girls.

I (sort of) finished my toddler-proofing prior to going to Vietnam.  Since returning we have moved a dozen plants, locked 2 toilets, added a dozen cabinet locks, boxed all of our CD’s, moved the CD shelf to the basement, boxed 30 shelf-feet of books, stripped Toddler Territory of hanging artwork, added a second gate, put shields around the stove, added useless refrigerator locks to the fridge, emptied the fireplace shelf, shifted the sofa away from the scary banister, moved the small cabinet to the opposite side of the room, moved the kitchen light switch from one side of the wall to the other, installed a door, moved a shelf unit to the basement, added doorknob toddler-stoppers everywhere, stored all wooden toys and instituted a gate and door policy most closely approximated by a jail.

Moving a light switch might seem excessive, but if you’ve been reading the blog, you know our boys love switches and they love to hang out by the gate and watch mommy cook.  Switch on.  Switch off.  Switch on.  Switch off.  It’s was like cooking in a disco and mommy didn’t like that.

How’s it all working?  All three boys are still alive.  Check.  The house still stands.  Check.  But like medication, toddler-proofing has a few side effects.

For example, how do we get three boy toddlers from the carport to the bedroom?  I’ll give you a hint.  Opening all the gates and doors  and saying, “OK, boys, let’s go take a nap” doesn’t do it.  Secure kitchen gate.  Secure all level 2 doors.  Open kitchen door.  Three boys run into kitchen.  Secure kitchen door.  Secure stairway gate.  At this point one would be tempted to open the kitchen gate.  That won’t work … they’ll just run back and forth.  Lift each boy over kitchen gate into living room one at a time.  Secure all level 1 doors.  Open stairway gate. Open bedroom door.   Heard boys down stairs, lured by a game of down-the-stairs-up-the-stairs.  Secure stairway gate.  Heard boys into bedroom.

At this point it gets tricky … you can’t close the bedroom door or they’ll scream, so we play lay-in-bed-get-up-from-bed for a while until everyone is napping.  At night we play lay-in-bed-get-up-from-bed most of the night or until Daddy loses his patience and finds Stern-Daddy-Voice, after which we play sit-up-in-bed-lay-down-in-bed until Mommy comes to the rescue and gets them to sleep.  I don’t know how Mommies do this.

Toddler Territory is bare.  It looks like we moved into the house last week and our boxes have yet to arrive.  Everywhere else  is jammed.  Mommy and Daddy Land looks like Ikea uses our house to store their unsold stuff in.  There’s no floor, per se, but rather a path for navigating to key points in the room.

Now the worst part comes … the utter collapse of efficiency.  Let’s say you are standing in the living room (Toddler Territory) and pick up a piece of lint.  You’d like to throw this piece of lint away.  By now, the triplets have noticed the lint and are interested in it.  Thus … walk to kitchen, open gate, close gate immediately or suffer the consequence, grab magnetic lock, unlock cabinet, throw lint in trash, close cabinet, replace lock in hanger, open gate, close gate behind you … and return to the living room to be greeted by the smiling and helpful toddler who has his delicate little hand held up to you with a second piece of lint.  Do I throw it away?  Or roll model the efficiency of irresponsibility by stuffing it behind the couch?  Off to the kitchen, open the gate … and so on.

I just installed toilet seat locks in the bathrooms, even though we keep the bathrooms locked.  Just in case.  About 10 minutes later Eva comes out and asks, “How do I get the toilet seat up?”, underscoring how Dr. Evil’s House of Horrors is evolving.  After weeks of toddler-proofing, the house is safe from the kids and the kids are safe from the house.  Now it’s our turn … Dr. Evil’s House of Mommy & Daddy Horrors.  Locked up, stripped down, stuffed to the max and minimally efficient, we’ve created our 21st century testament to the intersection of toddlers and technology.

I’m going to write a book on Toddler-Proofing for Triplets.  It’s one paragraph long and goes like this.  Step 1:  Lease out  your home to a pair of tidy, middle-aged women.  Step 2:  Rent yourself an unfurnished apartment and put in a few mattrasses.  Step 3:  Raise your kids.  Step 4:  Return home when  safe.   I think this will save time and money.