Up the front buttercup...

My brother-in-law, George, has anointed the rear end explosion of his two daughters as an "Up the Back Crap Attack." (It is always important to source other people's work). Today, I typed away at my desk, Preston ("P") swinging at my side in homely, domestic bliss when he begins to fuss and hiccup. I found yesterday that "me carrying him around" was a perfect cure for his diaphragm so I got him out of the swing and put him over my shoulder expecting immediate results knowing deep down I just like to carry him and hold him close.

We proceeded to walk out to the back deck to enjoy the beautiful day, blue skies, and a stiff breeze when my "Spidey Sense" began to tingle. Actually, it was a seismic shift of my right hand firmly ensconced under his buttocks, shaking and trembling in a manner similar to our earthquake here in Virginia a few months ago. P rattles often as infants do in some sort of emittance, whether front or back, but these rumblings from the "dark side" insisted on investigation.

Upon placement on our fine changing table (thx Craigslist) fit only for a prince, our worst fears were realized. Just as George had warned us, P had managed to defy gravity in a broad pattern of effluence which mingled not only on his backside, but down his leg and around the front to areas I never would have imagined. The physics of this event had changed what we know about the universe, at least in our little corner of the world. Kristina ("KP") and I are proud to announce our first experience with such a thing. I am about to use a phrase that parents know but we didn't until now - I to myself as much as anyone else:

"When you have kids, everything changes." I know poop will be a part of my life for a while, but we are confident our son has a bright future in the manners of release. We laughed, smiled, and expressed language we never dreamed would come true for us - "OMG, look at where this...Wow! I didn't think this was possible...look, he got it under there...let's try to limit it to three towels, we only have so many...etc. and so forth." To the bathtub, Batman!

We have joined in the union of the first bath. He was slippery, he wrestled, but his disposition never really changed. He is calm and peaceful, "chill" as the kids used to say. We turned him front side to back side, attacking the hip and down the leg to the feet - first between the two master bath sinks (too cold), then the bathtub in the bath chair (hard to use because you can't flip him on his tummy, which was horribly necessary in this instance). We are fortunate because there were two of us and I am proud to say we survived, though we did take casualties (under the fingernails, elbow of one fleece, four towels, a onesie, and the smell of death in the air). I am beginning to surmise practice will be in order for me to master this skill before KP returns to work in June.

The work was completed, egos intact, and the strategizing began for shopping for even more materials to sustain our force (hazardous waste laundry basket with step-on feature...perhaps more plastic bags to protect the dirty laundry from the REALLY dirty laundry...maybe we take out the closet doors and use all this space instead of all this crap that we haven't touched in five years...what is that on my hand? Ewww!). This experience is a glorious process of firsts. We are tracking all the things that happen first (trip home, pediatric appointment, Mia's visit) on our calendar and many of you have already been through them.

We humbly submit for peer approval what I have christened the "Round the Front Buttercup" in honor of George and his daughters, explorers and adventurers on the forefront of this new frontier. I must also honor my sister-in-law, Rebecca, who deserves an enormous amount of credit for holding the front line against the thousands of "Up the Back Crap Attacks"our two nieces fashioned through the years. After careful review, we believe the theory of "Up the Front Buttercup" will hold up under the scrutiny of our contemporaries. Just don't get too close to the a...

"My name is Preston and I have a hard time keeping it in my pants."