Why, Yes, I am a Member

of the THAT family's "Family Tree Society - Where not every branch forks" It's funny that I am, because up until last night, I didn't think I qualified. You hear that rumbling noise as you read this? That's God laughing. You know He laughs when we tell Him our plans, right?
Last night, DH was at work and I had to get BB ready for bed by myself. I had managed to get BB to eat some dinner (he's in a picky phase right now), and I was getting ready to get him into PJs and off to bed. BB was picking up his toys when he let out a BURP. A burp that was so loud I dropped what I was holding. A burp that would have made any adolescent male proud. A burp that unfortunately, caused BB to barf up his dinner. Onto the living room carpet.
As I'm watching BB barf, I don't have enough sense to grab a bowl or a trashcan for him to barf in. I stand there like a dummy and think "Wow, what a mess." BB stops barfing, takes 2 steps and barfs again. He is now standing in barf puddle #1 and creating barf puddle #2. Again, mommy is standing there like an idiot, watching and not acting. I only think to spring into action as he walks into puddle #2 and behaves as though puddle #3 is coming. I whisk him into the kitchen where puddle #3 is created on the floor. At least this puddle is on easy to clean linoleum.
When I think that he is done barfing, I begin to get him out of his barf clothes. As I tug his shirt off over his head, BB takes a step forward and slips in his barf. He falls directly into the puddle and rolls in the barf as he tries to get up.
With BB's now covered in barf, I wipe him off as best as I can before trying to clean up the worst of the barf. I figure it's more important that I avoid any further slipping accidents than to go ahead and bathe BB. While I'm wiping up the kitchen barf, I look behind me to see BB rolling his car through barf puddle #1 in the living room. I tell him no, scoop him up, and decide that perhaps we should bathe first.
I take him into the bathroom and get the bath water running. As the tub is filling up, I turn to get a towel and washcloth from under the sink for BB. I turn back around in time to see BB dump a bucket of water onto the bathroom floor. I grab some towels and throw them onto the puddle, only to have BB pick up the towels as they land and throw them into the bathtub. Realizing that this could quickly turn into a losing game, I pick up BB and place him in the tub where he can't reach any more towels. I take off his diaper as he is standing in the tub and discover that his diaper contains massive poo. Not the type that is easily cleaned up, either.
The second his diaper is off, BB tries to sit down in the water. I try to keep him from sitting in the water so that I can wipe him off first. BB rejects this attempt and grabs me around my neck and hoists himself out of the tub, smearing a trail as he goes.
I manage to wipe BB off and get him back into the tub, clean up myself, mop up the bathroom floor, and bathe BB. I get BB into clean PJs and settled in his room before I go back to finish cleaning up barf. When I go to clean the barf, I make the discovery that this barf is not coming up. It is mucus barf, which is pretty much straight slime. I wipe, spray, blot - nothing is budging this stuff. The situation is probably not helped by the fact that whenever BB barfs, he always barfs in the same 2'x3' area of the living room. He has always barfed in this once spot ever since he was a baby. He can be in another room, and he will come to this spot in the living room to barf. This spot of carpet has been much cleaned and abused the past 2 years.
DH and I have plans to remove the carpet and put down laminate flooring next month because the carpet in our living room is so bad. With that in mind, my solution to the barf dilemma is not as crazy as it may look: Yes, that is blue carpet padding that you are looking at. I wish I had done this long ago, and I'm not the least bit sorry. But for aesthetic reasons, here is what the floor will normally look like until next month: See? Nice rug. In retrospect, we should have simply bought a bunch of rugs and put them down on top of the carpet the moment we brought BB home. But by the time we realized that, the carpet was already ruined. Now, don't you feel better about your own life?