When we were nominated 1997's Parents of the Year.

The other night Husband and I watched the movie, "Friends with Kids".

Have you seen it?
Cute movie - predictable - it won't ever be on my favorites list, but definitely a solid movie with a fabulous cast and more than a few "huh" moments.

The premise is how having kids changes your relationships - with your friends, of course (especially the ones without kids), but really with your husband, the one person you are supposed to love more than anyone else.....until the baby comes along, and then s/he is the one person you are supposed to love more than anyone else.  Conflicting, for sure.  So maybe what you should do is just have a baby with a friend to take all the confusion out of the equation?

Aannnd "action".

Now, obviously Husband and I are waaay past all the growing pains and drama that pop up in your marriage once you bring a baby into the relationship (and believe me, there's a lot - do not kid yourself), but if you're lucky enough and smart enough and patient enough and kind enough and understanding enough and keep both your sense of humor and enough wine in the house you should make it through the infant years intact. You should.

But watching that movie brought back a lot of memories and got me thinking of not only the tough times, but the hilarious ones too.

So for today's installment of It's OK, I thought I'd confess some parenting gaffes we've made along the way....&/or are still making, 16 and a half years later....because even though there's a lot of bumps along the parenting road, for the most part, it all turns out OK.

It's OK...
...that I cut off the tiny corner tip of Thing 1's thumb the first time I clipped her impossibly tiny fingernails.  She didn't scream for long....and it grew back.  Eventually.

It's OK...
...that when Thing 1 was about 2 years old and had the flu and was sleeping (or not sleeping) between us and by 4 a.m. I was beside myself with fatigue and she was still whining about her pillow being uncomfortable (which had been going on for hours) I might have grabbed her pillow and flung it out from under her head and up in the air with such force that it might have hit the giant wooden antique angel we had hanging over our bed which might have fallen directly onto Thing 1's face.
Yeah...craaaap.
We actually brought the giant wooden antique angel into the doctor's office with us to prove our story (which I might have softened just a bit) so he didn't think we hit her.  He could've cared less.  He just wanted to know where he, too, could get a giant wooden antique angel.

It's OK...
...that when Thing 1 was also about 2 we had what is now referred to in our house as "The Great Lucky Charms Standoff".
She was in her high-chair and wanted a bowl of Lucky Charms.  I told her she could have them as long as she ate the tasteless cat-food bits as well as the fun marshmallows.
Of course she agreed (duh) but of course only ate all the fun marshmallows (duh).  So I decided she was old enough to learn some tough love and refused to enable her and told her she had to sit strapped into that high-chair until she ate every cat-food piece.
She sat strapped into that high-chair for 3 - yes, three - hours.
She'd probably still be there today (14 years later) if we hadn't had to be somewhere.
I learned a lot about her stubbornness that day.
She learned a lot of fancy new words from mama.

It's OK...
...that when Thing 2 was an infant I ran out to throw away a very poopy diaper in the garage trash can and locked myself out of the house.  Oh, and did I mention that I had left her on the changing table? Relax, it was attached over a play-pen so even if she could've rolled off (and she was so teeny she couldn't even lift her head yet) she'd have rolled into the play-pen and her bones were still soft enough they'd have surely bent, not broken....but yeah....still a huge parenting violation.  I had to run around to the back window (which I'd thankfully and uncharacteristically left open), stand on a bucket, pop out the screen and squeeze in.

And if you are wondering why we were nominated for 1997 Parents of the Year (we weren't, but we totally should have been), here's the story (and after combining it with all of the above it makes me thankful that the statute of limitations on you calling CPS has long passed).

The time in which we stopped for fries on the way to Urgent Care (um...with our toddler) -

Okay, before you judge, read the whole story.

When our older daughter was about 2 we were on a hike and Husband and I were swinging her over streams by her hands - which she loved...until she didn't.  At one stream crossing her squeals of delight turned to screams of pain and we realized her little elbow had popped out of socket.
I know. Ew.
So we scooped her up and ran the mile back to the car, got her buckled in her car seat (which is not an easy thing to do when the screaming and squirming child's elbow is popped out of socket), and took off for Urgent Care.  After about 5 minutes of driving we noticed she had quieted down and had actually fallen asleep.

About that time we noticed a Burger King ahead.

Now, in our defense, this was the year that BK introduced it's new fries - fries that were supposed to be better than McDonalds' fries - fries that were supposed to change your life - and we really wanted to try those fries.  So we might have taken a little 3 minute detour through the drive-through and we might have ordered a couple of large fries and a Coke (of course).
Oh, relax - she was fiiiine.  It couldn't have been that painful - hell, she fell asleep.
And we did get her to the UC (where we made sure to wipe the salt off our mouths before entering) and the doctor quickly pulled UP on that arm and other than a blood curdling scream and a pop that I swear I can still hear in my head to this day, it all turned out just fine.
And btw - McDonalds' fries were totally better.

There, now you can judge.

Oh, and in case you're worried, here's proof that the Things turned out OK.

They're smiling because they're scared of me.