Wash Wash Wash

My husband and I were the last in both our families to have kids. Between us, we have nine nieces and nephews ranging from 3 to 11 years. So I thought I had a pretty good idea what to expect from parenting. I knew about the lack of sleep. I knew about the terrible twos. I knew about the diapers. I once had my nephew shoot poop out at an incredible velocity while I was changing him. I thought I'd seen, or at least heard, it all.

But nobody mentioned the laundry. I guess I should have made the connection. I'd heard that you should always bring a spare outfit for your child and for that matter, for yourself. I just didn't think about the fact that you'd then have to wash all those outfits. I didn't think about the mundane, day-after-day, thunk thunk thunk of the dryer running. I didn't think about always having to check for laundry, and that missing a day tossing in a load after breakfast would mean devoting a day to nothing but laundry.

My two-year-old stays relatively clean now, but the almost-one-year-old is just learning how to eat and some days it seems like we trash an outfit per meal. We had watermelon tonight. It was smeared everywhere, embedded in crevices I didn't know she had. Bibs are useless contraptions.

And it is summer, so we go to picnics and to the pool. This means towels. We play with water on the porch. This means another set of outfits. And a towel. We stomp in puddles when it rains. More clothes to wash.

On my personal list of "what would be effective birth control for teenagers" this is very high. The teenage me would not have wanted to do all this laundry. The adult me doesn't want to do all this laundry.