On Sunday night, I thought a hot bubble bath would be a great way to end off a good weekend. Toffee was watching his favourite movie (Planet 51, for the hundredth time), Kid was playing his iPad and dad was caught up in watching YouTube videos.
I ran my bath and slipped into the hot water, book at the ready. Marveled at the luxury of having a bubble bath while everyone in the house was awake. Congratulated myself at reaching a point in parenting, where I could leave my kids to their own devices and indulge in a hot bath. Took a deep breath and prepared to do some serious relaxing.
Toffee cruises down the passage and realises that mom’s in the bath, and barges into the bathroom. “Hi mom, want some toys in bah bath?”. (Toffee can’t say ‘the’. He says ‘bah’ instead) I decline his offer of toys, and he can’t understand why mom wouldn’t want ALL THE TOYS in the bath. “But mom, this is a dinosaur. Want bah dinosaur?”. Again, I decline his offer. “No thanks, boy. Mommy doesn’t want a dinosaur in the bath. “But mom, it’s not a real dinosaur, it’s just a toy. Not a serry (scary) dinosaur.” Yeah boy, that’s why mom doesn’t want a dinosaur in the bath. In case it’s a real one. Because real ones are scary. I manage to distract him from dumping all the toys in the bath, by playing a few rounds of peekaboo through the gap in the open bathroom door. Eventually he gets bored of me and wanders off. Awesome, I think. Time to get back to relaxing. I pick up my book.
“MOM, TRAVIS WON’T GIVE ME BACK MY THOR HAMMER.”
“MOOOM. I WANT PLAY WIF TROY’S THOR HAMMBER”.
[SHRIEKING. TEARS. FOOTSTOMPING.]
Dammit. I haven’t even been in the bath for 5 minutes and I’ve been bugged twice. I proceed to negotiate the handover of Troy’s Thor hammer (without getting out of the bath), and somehow manage to get Toffee to stop crying and lure him out of his brother’s room and back to the bathroom. Book now abandoned, I attempt to interest Toffee in doing something else, away from his brother and out of the bathroom. This fails. He’s still whining about ‘Thor’s hammber’. I attempt to interest him in getting into the bath with mommy. He backs out of the bathroom. “I don’t want to bath.”
I’m alone in the bath again. I pick up my book, open it to the right page. Toffee comes flying down the passage on his push car, and slams into the bathroom door. BEEP BEEP, MOMMY. I HAVE A HOOTER. BEEP BEEP ON MY CAR. He’s now bashing his car into the side of the bath.
“Hi, mom. Want some toys?”.
