Why does teething have such weird symptoms? When everything in the world odd starts happening, you know your baby is teething. Pulling on ears, low fevers, listlessness, indescribably rotten diapers, rashes, crying in sleep, or cravings to eat whole chicken legs, bone and all. Ok, maybe not on the chicken thing, but everything else for sure.

We’re teething again at the Callahan household for the first time in several months, and you really forget how much it knocks everything out of sorts. I love spending time with my little girl, but after a full day of teething drama, I am quite ready to retreat to my post-7pm life of eating dinner, watching television, looking at adorable and happy pictures of my baby, and desperately grasping for love and support from Chris and from you, my faithful readers.

My most memorable teething moment was from last time we were teething, about 7 months ago.

We were on our way to Bible Study – me, Ali, and Chris’ Aunt Kitty. We got stuck in a terrible traffic jam, so we were running late. Being anything but early is a pet peeve of both me and Kitty, and maybe Ali too – who knows. We’re sitting in traffic, not moving, and Ali (then 9 months old), is in the back seat clapping and cheering. How sweet!! Kitty looks back at her to ooh and aah over her mad skills, and notices that they aren’t “dry” claps. In fact, they are very brown, splattery claps. Ali’s diaper had leaked – badly – and she had figured out how to scoop up the contents and finger paint with it, then clap with it. She even had a very nice Indian War marking on her nose.

We’re still not moving in traffic.

What to do?

Luckily, we were slowly approaching the Acton Road exit. We pull off and into the McDonald’s parking lot. That McDonalds parking lot will never be the same. I’m not sure why I didn’t think to take her inside to the changing table in the bathroom – oh wait – yes I do – I would have dripped poo all over the floor of Mickey D’s. So I’m trying to change her in the back seat of my then very small car, and trying not to get drippage all over me. Kitty, thank goodness for Kitty – was very helpful – giving me reams of paper towels and boxes of wet wipes. Or at least all of the wet wipes we had, which were far too few to clean up such a nuclear explosion.
For the record, it was on her nose, all over her hands, arms, legs, feet, toes. . .under her fingernails, on her clothes, on the carseat, you get the point. And by the time I finished cleaning up, I felt completely unclean myself.

We didn’t give up on Bible Study that day – we were just late and got to let everyone else laugh about our adventure. While I was taking a full bath in the bathroom (at least trying to), Kitty told them that we had a “blowout”. They thought she was talking about a tire, and were very impressed that we changed it. She explained, they all reminisced of the joys of teething.

After that experience, I officially decided that teething MUST be spiritual warfare! :)

5 thoughts on “the joys of teething

  1. This makes me glad I don’t have a child. :) Is that bad?

    I’m not ready for teething. :) I’ll stick to studying and dealing with my mama drama.

    Have fun with teething. Sounds like it’s a joy. :)

  2. This will be a wonderful story to tell at her wedding rehersal dinner one day! (Sorry Chris, I know that you don’t want to think about that day!)

  3. I clicked on your blog from 5 minutes for mom because of your title. We are going through teething right now.

    That is a crazy story, I’m so impressed you still made it to bible study.

    We are going through teething right now – stop by my blog if you get a chance. I’m a mommy blogger who blogs about saving money.

  4. That is so funny…and so familiar! I think it was just a couple months after you must have written this that I wrote about K and the poop seat. I guess every kid needs a good poop covered car seat story! :)

Leave a Reply to Gina Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *