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Nature rules!
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Kids In Nature Are Happier

 

So science tells us that kids learn through playing. Playing outside can increase concentration levels and increase motivation AND, bonus, defuses stress! A quick walk outside in nature can focus their attention as well as reduce those pesky symptoms of ADHD.

Kids In Nature Are Happy

Kids In Nature Are Happy

That said, we can’t be the only parents that live in a complex with a small garden that they clearly don’t care much for? What can you do? It is impossible and definitely not financially feasible to go to the zoo every weekend! Going for an outing every weekend is expensive and so I think it’s time we start exploring our cities.

Pretoria has many nature reserves where you can go for a walk outside, gaze at some greenery to sharpen focus and have fun while doing it! The exercise is great for the parents and the kids sleep better!

I also understand that merely leaving the house is a win on some days (most days!) but the end result is totally worth a little (a lot!) frustration.

Here are some of the reserves in Pretoria you can visit:

Nature rules!

Nature rules

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The Shh-Pooh Storm

For the last few mornings my boys have decided that 5am is the best time to have all sorts of bodily functions… That’s right folks, The Shh-Pooh Storm of toddler pooh and toddler vomit!

When It All Started

Last Friday morning DJ C literally HURLED BOWS all over our bed. I suspect that he had drank his milk too fast because he had slept later than usual and was very thirsty. So 5am on a Friday morning i’m taking sheets off the bed, trying to dry a mattress and rinse chunks off kids and clothes.

Day 2

Monday morning at 5am Lil Jams’ hurled all over our bed. This could be partly my fault as he came to tell me he wanted to ‘bommit’ but i told him to go ‘VVVVomit’ in the toilet. He then ‘Bommited’ over DJ C, me and himself. Again, i’m changing sheets, washing chunks. But this morning was different, the lingering smell of meat in hurl stuck with me and i found myself swallowing back a few times.

Day 3

Tuesday morning at 5:15am DJ C walks to our bed and i, unknowingly, pick him up. Realized there’s a lingering smell of shit in the air. Yup. You guessed it. He shat himself epically! So now we have a bed in the kids’ room covered in poo and our bed as well as DJ C and myself… again.

I had had enough of 5am mornings! So i sat the boys down. I told them “NO MORE BODILY FUNCTIONS AT 5am!”.

Ultimately

DJ C complied and this morning at 1:30 Husband carries DJ C into our room in the dark saying he think he had a big poo… what a freaking understatement! Being OCD is a huge disadvantage especially if the words ‘poo’ in muttered, no matter the time! ALL THE LIGHTS ON!

DJ C has left a trail of the route him and Husband walked to the room with drops of shit. I had to switch the lights on to make sure that i cleaned all the poo from DJ C’s bum, legs, hands, arms, feet and between his toes… yes… between his freaking toes! I then had to clean the dog’s feet because he was so excited by the commotion that he slipped in the shit. Literally!

I then had to inspect both beds for remnants of poo and wash the floors. All the activity made Lil Jams wake up and he thought it was time to wake up and was too excited to sleep again because he thought it was concert day…

No one can say that my family is full of shit…

How Does One Handle All This?

You will need the following products:

  • Gloves: No one wants that shit under their nails (admittedly i don’t use them because… well… i’m normally still half asleep and only thinking about how i should get some for these occasions whilst scrubbing poo out from under my nails)
  • Light Reading: To help you remember to keep your shit together and that you can laugh… after the fact
  • Mattress Protectors: Even though we don’t have the waterproof one’s, shit could be a lot worse if we had none at all…

Also, how many times can you flip a mattress in 1 week? Asking for a friend…

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A Plumber Walks Into A Bar

Let me spin you a tale of woe and intrigue.

Our toilet leaks out the flusher handle thingy. So after having wrung out a towel for the umpteenth time I decide to investigate. I open the top and I see the issue… the toilet is over filling. Easy fix, I’m just going to bend the rod thingy with the ball thingy (yeah, I’m no plumber) down a bit so the ball thingy can signal the rod thingy to let the water thingy know to stop.

Easy peasy… except with my new found Viking strength as I bend the rod thingy I break the ball thingy off! Clean off!!! Now we’re fucked. So I MacGyver a fix in the interim with literally only a hair tie! I used an eslastic band meant for hair to fix a toilet! Am I the only one super impressed???

Anyway, fast forward and off I go to purchase a new rod thingy and ball thingy. When I’m at Builders I ask a dude in the bathroom section if my idea of just bending the rod thingy would work? Nope. It needs a new washer in the water thingy, sounds easy enough and armed with all the goods I come back home and decide I’m going to Suzelle DIY the shit out of this toilet. My husband won’t even know and he would be super stoked and proud that I managed to “plumber” the thingies!!!!

Except, I can’t figure out where to turn the water to the toilet off… I search for a tap but can’t find it. So I think to myself, “Okay, so while the toilet is flushing, in essence, the water isn’t running right? So I just need to keep the flusher thingy down!!” Pat on the back and baby in the basin as I start to try unscrew the water contraption where the new washer has to go into… big mistake. Huge. Fucking water everywhere!!!!! It is literally high pressure washing everything!!! Including the baby in the basin who thinks it’s Christmas!!! I had to do it… I had to call Husband. Sigh.

Long story short. I bought the wrong rod thingy, we replaced the washer (baby in the basin is covered in grease) and Husband James-Bonded the rod thingy to the old rod thingy that was the right length.

The toilet flushes again but still leaked out the flusher thingy. Worse now… I think baby in the basin must have thrown, hidden or “hocus pocus-ed” some parts or we failed to put Humpty Dumpty together again…

Time for a nap now… then YouTube!! At least I now know where to turn the water off (what a pa-larva that is!!! All I can say is there is a shaft, screws and baby bird skeletons!!) so once we know what we need to do we can fix that shit!

Note to self: wash towels. Buy more towels.

Update: I wrote this on Sunday afternoon but didn’t get a chance to publish. There has been an update to the story!

On Monday morning Husband and I turned the water off and went to visit my folks and drop off the kids! When we got home Husband wiggled things here and there and tightened and fastened until he could tighten and fasten no more! Then off I went to the dead-bird-cemetery shaft to turn the water back on. Nothing. No water. Did we mess things up even more? Upon further investigation, a main water pipe burst in our suburb and everyone’s water is off… so we don’t know if we fixed it! It is Tuesday morning and still no water!

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Cappuccino’s, Love & Support

Sorry for the long silence! Lil Jams has been keeping us super busy! Last Friday the school called and informed me that Lil Jams had been pushed off the fireman pole on the playground and had landed on his leg. They say that he can still move it but says it’s a little sore. So I decided to go fetch him and take him to the doctor for just in case. I don’t want or need to deal with complications over a weekend!

I am super grateful to the doctor as she said that, since he wasn’t in much pain it was probably just the muscle but insisted we get x-rays just in case!

While we were waiting for the x-ray report Lil Jams started crying in pain and even asked me to leave him alone for 5 minutes because he just needs a break from me. It’s funny now, but at the time it broke my heart a little.

The prognosis? Fractured femur right by the ball joint that goes into his hip. So we had to go to a Ortho Doc that specializes in kids. Then ended up being admitted. Lil Jams was put in traction on Friday afternoon and then Monday morning was operated on to insert a plate and pins.

Lots of spoiling from friends and family helped Lil Jams get through it and we’ve still got 6 weeks of rehab to get through!

I also just want to thank our Doctor, Dr Fourie for insisting on x-rays! Dr Colyn for an amazing operation that went through without a hitch. All the nurses and staff at Life Wilgers Hospital for all the care and attention! Suzanne Coetzer for the help with the physio. All our friends and family for prayers, well wishes and thumb holding! And also the barista at the Weisenhoff Coffee Shop for cheering us up with awesome cappuccino art!