2012...full of disgusting stuff?

This is the first blog of a new year, 2012. The social networking sites were full of joyous pronouncements of a better year to come. Everyone wishing each other happiness, joy, and an amazing year. I, too, have hopes that 2012 will be a year to remember, but then I realized each and every year is one to remember. Unlike some people, I seem to remember the years based on some kind of disaster my kids made: 2008: Emmett chases Ethan into the wall causing six stitches to his head;  2009: Emmett broke the 40" flat screen with a Wii remote two days after Christmas;  2010: the kids used my giant bathroom floor for an indoor slip and slide; 2011: Ellis pulled the TV on his head while vacationing in Florida, resulting is another emergency room trip. I could go on and on, but as New Year's Eve was upon us, we settled in to a quiet evening of celebration with the kids and hopes of ending 2011 with little mishaps.

Of course, I was wrong. This blog seems to end up always being about bodily functions, and for that, I now apologize.

So, Ellis starts puking at about 6:30pm. He proceeds to puke about every 10 minutes for the next four hours. At some point, of course, there was nothing left for him to throw up, so the poor guy was just dry heaving.

When you have children, the last thing most people think about it all of the bodily fluids you will have to handle and clean up. No one looks at their new sweet bundle of joy and says, boy I can't wait to clean up any thing this kid's body can produce at 3am. With three boys, the amount of "stuff" we have to assist and clean-up on a regular basis has made me blissfully unaware of how disgusting it is - at least usually - because of a certain amount of desensitization. Perhaps, because it was New Year's Eve and I was feeling a sense of optimism that the new year would be somehow different, I was unprepared.

Those idealistic views were shattered. It was disgusting. It lasted all night. Now, here we are in day three - diarrhea - it, literally runs out of the diaper onto the floor. Two places to clean up. Joy. At least the puking is done - pause - jinxed myself because as I was writing this he just puked. *sigh* do you see why I know 2012 will be more of the same. If a sick and puking kid isn't a reality check of just what 2012 will bring, I don't know what is.

So I bathe, clean, and wash more towels, bedding, and puke-filled laundry. I Lysol everything in the mad hope (however unrealistic) that no one else in the family catches this stomach bug. I mop the floor with bleach, and I change more clothes, diapers, and give more baths. I comfort the whining baby, rub his belly, and snuggle with him - still hoping I don't catch this bug. I do what every mother (and father, Kevin pulled night duty - thank you baby!) has to do, not because the aroma of these bodily fluids makes me happy, but because there is no one else to do it. I knew after the first child what I was getting myself into, and I agreed to two more kids and more odds of cleaning up disgusting stuff. So here I am, pausing between bouts of sickness to whine to you about it.

This would all be horribly depressing foreshadowing of the year to come if I wasn't such an optimist at heart. So here is what I hope (and plan) for our family in this new year:

Start our farm: build new garden beds and finally plant some food to grow; build a chicken coop and goat shelter (plus fencing) so we can get chickens and goats (anyone sense the irony of more disgusting stuff to clean up?); finish the house we are living in, and develop some of our surrounding property. Perhaps squeezing in a family vacation, and a couple of day trips to the surrounding lake this summer. Good, simple, stuff.

In order for these things to happen we need: less puking, no major accidents, some good luck, and a whole lot of hard work. I say the odds aren't good, but I am an optimist - or at least that is what I tell myself when I wake up every morning looking forward to a new, even puke-filled, adventure.

There is one thing I know for sure, regardless of how 2012 turns out, Ellis getting the stomach flu for new years 2012 will be one to remember, probably because of this blog.