I’m still teaching until the end of June, so life is a bit crazy with grading and report card comments and, well, life. This is a post from my archives…April 2010 to be precise. Enjoy.
I’ve blogged before about people googling weird terms. I’ve blogged before about my twins’ wild antics. I’ve blogged before about my cleaning problems. Combine all three of these and you get cleaning queries I’ve googled since having twins.
Cleaning Query 1: How to remove permanent marker from a wooden table
Problem: Last year, one of my twins coloured with permanent marker that ran through to the table
Complication: This was not any table; it was the table we got made with wedding money my parents gave us. It’s maple, and it’s supposed to be symbolic of good family times (as opposed to lax parenting)
Solution: Toothpaste. It worked and didn’t remove the table’s finish. Good thing, too, or we may not have remained a family of four
Cleaning Query 2: How to remove diaper cream from carpet
Problem: When our twins were two years old, they took the diaper cream that I left on their dresser and smeared it everywhere: on the carpet, on their blankets, and on themselves
Complication: The cream is water insoluble
Solution: Give the kids the world’s longest bath and rub the cream into the carpet’s fibers
Cleaning Query 3: How to remove permanent marker from face
Problem: My son, age 2, decided his face was a canvas. His medium was marker, the permanent kind
Complication: His focal point was his eye
Solution: Eye make-up remover…and time
Cleaning Query 4: How to remove foundation from carpet
Problem: I wear foundation twice a year: on my work’s photo day and at the Christmas party. My twins found it in my makeup bag, and squeezed the entire tube onto the carpet
Complication: The Christmas party was that night
Solution: Rub it into the carpet’s fibers (yup, I learned from the diaper cream experience). Then have an extra drink at the party.
Cleaning Query 5: How to repair walls with chipped paint
Problem: While I napped, the kids pulled their nightlight out of the socket and used the electrical prongs to chip away the paint
Complication: Fixing this involves tools, which doubles the chances I’ll injure myself
Solution: Ignore it for a year or two and the wall starts to look normal
Your turn: what weird things have you had to google?
Also, if you haven’t checked out StuffKidsWrite.com recently, we’ve put up more hilarious writing from kids (plus, many of our pics have been featured on BuzzFeed and Huffington Post). Check it out, and feel free to send funny stuff that kids write to stuffkidswrite(at)gmail(dot)com.
I use your solution to query 5 for a lot of household cleaning problems. Works quite well. 🙂
Yes, the ostrich theory. I get that.
Love it. Especially rubbing said stuff into the carpet fibers. Works every time. LOL!!
I don’t even want to know what’s in the fibers (like under my couch cushions…)
My wife uses stain sticks to cover mars in wood. Makes the wood look almost like new.
Brilliant.
Ha! If I ever do have kids, you are going to be my go-to woman!
I just found out my cousin (by marriage) sat behind Leonardo DiCaprio at a Broadway show last night, so I started stalking via Google different variations of “DiCaprio last night Broadway Once sighting.” I need proof! I’m kind of glad it wasn’t me though. I couldn’t have handled two hours behind my favorite actor without blowing up his spot!
Seriously? Was he “Near…Far…Wherever you are?” (Sorry. I don’t even like Celine Dion’s music)
Just last week I googled “How to organize millions of Legos.” Our Lego situation has reached the catastrophe point.. My kid is a Lego fiend. I am an indulgent parent, who has spent way, WAY too much on the dozens of Lego sets he has wanted, since he turned 4. We have generous family, who have given him dozens more. He also inherited from older friends gigantic bins of loose Legos (literally many thousands of pieces). Since he’s 8, he doesn’t maintain the sets. He instead breaks down the models and makes new things, which is great for his creativity. But I cannot take having another minuscule Lego brick jammed into the tender flesh of my heel when I inadvertently step on it. The organizing tips I gleaned from my Google search were pretty disheartening. It would end my writing life for months if I followed the advice of separating the huge jumble into a nice system. I fantasize about throwing them all out. But that would cause severe psychological damage. I am settling right now with just shutting the door on his overflowing room.
–Rebecca
I hear you. My husband buy Rubbermaid Totes filles with Lego pieces. We use the vacuum as a threat. “Mommy is going to vacuum. Pick them all up.” They are disorganized. When Vivian and William get a brand new set, they tend to make it once, then add it to the totes. I find they’re more creative when they make ten boats out of random pieces (what William did tonight).
But…here’s another idea… http://pinterest.com/pin/33425222203880578/
My goodness, Shirtsleeves! I didn’t know you back then. We met one month later. At Clay’s. Wow. We old friends now. 😉 Hurry up and finish teaching now! 😉
That was BR: Before Renzay!
Oh my, your kids have been busy over the years. Great that you’ve found solutions to remove all the messes.
My kids have drawn on our walls but thankfully with pencils so eraser works. Most permanent damage has been to the wallpapers. But thankfully they were all the ones I disliked 😀 Now my husband is finally agreeing to replace them. I could kiss the little artists.
Oh, that’s clever. Maybe I should get my kids to destroy what I dislike. Hmm…
FYI, Baby Oil will take sharpie off a kid’s face:)
I googled “raw courgettes” after my husband tried to put them in my pasta and convince me it’s absolutely normal to eat them prior to cooking.
They were disgusting. We still argue about that.
Another cooking hint: don’t put red onions in a crock pot with chowder. Everything turns black.
And this reminds me; don’t heat up cream in a small pot + lid, or the lid shall never be separated from the pot ever again.
(That actually make a very good home-made glue)
I’m pretty sure I’m on some criminal watch list for some of the things I’ve researched for novel work (seriously ;))… Must get it from my mom, as on a recent road trip, I read female serial killer “trivia” to her from my iPhone for entertainment.
I’d love to see your search history, August, or to take a road trip with you and your mom!
Like August, I am probably on some criminal watch lists for research questions I have googled. Gah!
On a different note, I have cleaned all of the things you mentioned above, and many more. :Sigh. Diaper cream is a ghastly thing. Giggle.
I think Diaper Cream is its own element on the periodical table.
I googled, “Is it okay to vacuum baby powder?” after my then 2 year old son made it “snow on da choo choo!” (Entire bottle of econo-sized baby powder.) Google thought it should probably be alright. Google was wrong. Vacuum DOA.
LOL, after the first permanent marker incident, there wouldn’t have been any more markers. Sort of like spinning wheels in the Sleeping Beauty story. But, hey, there’s always some old witch that would reintroduce them, right? Thanks for the tip about toothpaste!