Tuesday, April 7, 2009

Broken Glass & Birth Order

My whole life I've heard people refer to birth order and it's importance, "...She's such a first born...Typical for a youngest...Only child syndrome..." I never really understood all of it, but what I did understand, I completely agreed with. This morning I discovered the difference between a 6-year old, first-born girl and a 5-year old, second-born boy!

Tuesdays are Bible Study days. Shane brings Zoe to school so I can get everyone dressed, out of the house and to bible study on time. Today started out no different. I came downstairs with the triplets outfits - ready to let Ty know his outfit was waiting for him, too. When I came into the playroom, Ava handed me something small and shiny and said, "uh oh!" What was it? GLASS! A tiny piece of broken glass.

After calmly and quickly taking it from the peanut, I frantically scanned the room. Cole was sitting quietly watching Blue's Clues. Ty was sitting on the couch fiddling with something. Eli was standing next to Ty on the couch. What's broken? Is there more glass? Where'd Ava get this?
"Ty...where'd Ava get this glass?"
"Eli did it!"
"Eli did what?"
"He broke the picture!"

Apparently, SOMEbody threw a ball ("a hard one") in the family room....and hit one of the pictures over the couch...and broke the glass....and somebody ELSE didn't feel the need to come upstairs to tell his mother. Seriously? My 5-year old didn't feel that broken glass was important enough to stop watching Blue's Clues and come get me. Zoe would have run upstairs the minute the ball flew...regardless of whether or not it hit something!


That's when something glimmered in Ty's hand and caught my attention. He was playing with a piece of glass too! Hello????? Isn't he 5????? What on earth was he thinking????? (FYI: See on the picture of the broken glass there's a piece that looks like a moon? That's what Ty was playing with!) I scooped up the babies and brought them downstairs to play. I grabbed the glass from Ty and ordered him downstairs to play with the babies while I cleaned.

Everyone's fine. The glass is cleaned up (I found a few "lost toys" and my nephew's pacifier in the process). But as I was finishing, the phone rang. About 5 minutes into the conversation, I heard someone coming up the stairs...COLE...followed by Ty!
"Ty, did you forget to shut the gate?"
"I wanted to answer the phone."
"Are all the babies out?"
"...I guess...?"

Ty opened the gate and let them out! HELLO????? Isn't he 5????? What on earth...????

By the time I got them rounded up and put them back into the "Gated Community" (a.k.a. The Family Room), they'd created a mess with Shane's CDs (which brought back SERIOUS memories of Zoe and those blasted CDs) as well as emptied the majority of the board games from the kids' game cabinet.

Ava's damage this morning
Zoe's mess circa June 2003 (with a little help from cousin Sammy)

When all was said and done, 45 minutes had past...the kids were still in their PJs...my coffee was cold...my "To Do" list had grown...and Bible Study had started...without us...

Hope your Tuesday went a little more "as planned"!

10 comments:

beth said...

i absolutely, 100% feel your pain. and, not to rain on your parade or anthing, but you could have been describing my nine year old boy. do you think it is birth order as much as boys vs. girls? my boys are super helpless and my girls are halfway effeicient, which is pretty scary since the girls are 2. hope tomorrow is better!

Dorinda said...

I guess all I can say is that I'm glad you've survived the day! Sounds like a crazy one. I'm glad no one cut themselves on the glass.

Looks like fun at Wolf Lodge. We've always wanted to go and just haven't gotten down there. Maybe someday we'll meet up with you guys! I'm just not brave enough to take the triplets yet either...

Amy said...

i'm glad the craziness ended without any serious injuries :) i think it's #2 ~ mine is the same way ~ completelyl oblivious :)

gotta go work on my kegels! hahaha!

Kelly Deneen Raymond said...

Oh NO! LOL. I am glad everyone was safe with the glass and that the triplets didn't cause too much damage. heh.

Thanks for stopping by my blog this morning!

Helen said...

I'm seriously biting my lower lip right now trying to not laugh at the unfortunate start to your day yesterday.... Ok, I can't hold it in anymore! LOL!

Unknown said...

sounds like you have a busy house!! Triplets - I can't imagine!
Leavin some love from SITS!!

Alexa said...

I seriously thought that that was a picture of Michah and Cole for a minute there. Uncanny resemblence!

Anonymous said...

Hey - we are friends of your parents from Valley (we lived in CT for 3 yrs, but are now in MD) and your mom shared your site with me. My triplets are about to be 10 in July (& we have a 4 y.o.) so she thought I'd be interested. It is one of the highlights of my dad -- checking your blog!!
thanks for the encouragement and the window into life with a bunch of little ones. You won't believe it, but the days are long but the years are short and before you know it they'll be 10!!! Debbie

Tamara Mitchell said...

I am LOL! That sounds like many of my days! I am glad Ty didn't get hurt.

Your kids are adorable.

Saying Hi from SITS!

Momma Gesswein said...

hasn't shane moved all his music to mp3/mp4 yet (I know it's mp3 b.c of the sony-ness...but have to pitch ipod language just the same) if he had moved it to digital, this mess downstairs wouldn't have happened...so see, it's really shane's issue ;-) hah. as for the birth order...it's right... no clue why, but it's right...but for maybe the fact that GOD knows and plans each step of our lives.. ;-)