Super soaker

I am grateful that we keep an extra set of clothes in the diaper bag for Kyle. We might need to start packing some for me, too. I could have used them Sunday morning.

We were in church, listening quietly as the priest reflected on the readings of the day. Well, Jennifer and I were listening quietly; Kyle was bobbing up and down, looking around, talking gibberish, grabbing the missals, and shaking hands with the woman behind us... all within the span of a minute. At one point he became agitated about something (maybe he was struggling to fully grasp the concept of the trinity), and he started crying. That's when I picked him up and took him to the shrine.

The shrine is this big, open room to the right of the main church. It's filled with statues of the saints and other religious artifacts. People can go into the shrine to light a candle and spend some time in quiet prayer and meditation. It also makes a great crying room. We have taken Kyle in here from time to time, and usually he calms down right away. Sunday, as I held him in the shrine much like I did in the picture to the right, Kyle remained cranky, twisting himself around in my arms, testing my ability to protect him from the forces of gravity. It didn't take me long to realize why he was so upset.

I felt something wet. And then I saw it: a wet spot, about the size of an orange. But this was not on Kyle. It was on MY shirt! That's right: my son, my first-born child, felt it necessary to relieve himself on me. In church. During the service. I had been christened.

Fortunately, for the sake of the nuns and the rest of the congregation, I had the presence of mind to not verbally express all the expletives that ran through my head at that moment. Instead, I stared at Jennifer, wide-eyed, trying to get her attention, all while trying to contain my squirming kid with the soaked pants. When she looked at me, I pointed to my shirt, and her jaw dropped. She handed me the diaper bag and I darted out the back to the restroom. We moved so fast that Kyle suddenly thought he was on a ride, and he shifted himself in my arms, facing forward to get the full effect. Wheeeee!

Now we often dress Kyle up nicely for church, and this past Sunday was no exception. When the service began, the little guy was wearing a classy green striped shirt and blue dress pants. By the time this whole adventure was over, he was wearing baby sweatpants and a blue shirt with a monkey on it that read "Go Bananas!" Sunday best, indeed.

As for my stain, I just put some bathroom soap and water on it and hoped no one would notice. As a parent, you do a lot of "hoping no one would notice." We had a great number of errands to run after church that day, and I had no other choice but to wear the shirt through all of them. At least one of the stops was at Babies R Us, where my stain fit in with everyone else's food stains, spit-up stains, formula stains, and stains I don't want to know about. Nobody did notice, and by the end of our errands I had completely forgotten about our little adventure. Later that afternoon, as Jennifer and I were at home finally relaxing, she looked at me and asked, "Are you still wearing that shirt with pee on it?"

Ah, the joys of parenthood. Nearly one year in, and still loving it.