Homefront

July 29, 2007

By Tiffany Horvath

A longtime family friend invited myself and several family members to his house for dinner this past weekend. His mother was in town visiting and he wanted to grill some salmon and introduce her to some of his Alaskan friends.

I was somewhat weary of accepting the invitation at first, mainly because he stressed my children were certainly welcome.

This nice gentleman had not had a toddler in his house in almost three decades. His children were all out of college, scattered in various jobs throughout the Lower 48. I wondered aloud to him, and with some degree of trepidation, if his house was baby-proof.

He laughed and said it wasn't, but he doubted my children could do too much harm, and then he winked at my 3-year old and told him to bring his swimsuit.

I knew then that if his house weren't baby proofed when we got there, it certainly would be by the time we left. I tried to tell him that.

He laughed again, and I envied his innocence. Then, I eagerly accepted the invitation.

It was a moment of weakness, I'll admit.

I was desperate for an adult dinner party, with drinks served in glasses that didn't have cartoon characters. I wanted to eat food someone else cooked that didn't come with the instruction &#8220remove frozen french fries before microwaving.” I wanted to get away from the memories that assault me every night of what my husband must be doing in Iraq at that moment.

And, most of all, I really wanted to prove to myself that my children could be allowed in public for a few hours a week.

In retrospect, the food was delicious.

My son started the evening off perfectly by walking into the beautiful home of this gentlemen and enthusiastically assaulting the pillows that adorned the nearby sofa and love seat. I must note that these pillows had done nothing to warrant such assault and, indeed, were merely being nice and polite throw pillows.

One pillow, within five minutes, ended up knocking my grandmother's drink onto the carpet and all over the furniture.

I think that's when the homeowner got an inkling of what he had gotten into, but he gamely continued by subtly suggesting we move the party into the family room, where there was less breakable stuff.

My son, at this point, agreed with alacrity because he'd noticed the family room's sliding glass screen doors and the huge chocolate lab eagerly snuffing them outside.

The very wet, huge chocolate lab. Did I mention it was pouring rain?

As soon as we'd sat down, my son, with his baby sister toddling behind him, was opening the door and running outside. Within minutes he was soaked to the skin, the dog's new best friend and thoroughly happy.

I'd managed to barely catch the baby before she followed her brother outside and she wailed in my arms from inside the house, not content at watching her brother have what she apparently considered all the fun.

After about an hour, dinner was ready and the 3-year old boy outside threw a temper tantrum that I'm sure scared the neighbors at being forced to come inside. His vocal cords are extremely good; a woman at my church had told me she was positive he is a high soprano.

Glass-shattering shriek not withstanding, the child was forced to come inside and, dripping water everywhere, eat dinner.

It was salmon, and my son had never tried salmon before. He decided then and there that he was never going to try salmon. He also exercised his considerable vocal cords multiple times at being told to eat.

His sister watched all this in fascination, and I swear she was copiously taking notes when she angelically smiled at me with her five-tooth smile and with one swoop of her hand, tossed every single object on her high chair tray and on my plate onto the floor.

I was mortified as I joined the peas and carrots and salmon on the floor, trying desperately to pluck the tiny pieces out of the plush carpet.

I decided then and there that we were leaving, at which point my 3-year old threw his glass (yeah, it was real glass) of milk on the floor to stress his unwillingness to leave.

It was a good thing I was already on the floor, because my mother joined me there with paper towels to help soak up the ensuing mess, and when she looked at me there were tears in her eyes.

I couldn't help it. My eyes began to well up also and together, surrounded by soggy peas, spilled milk and a delicious herb crusted salmon-blended carpet mash, we laughed silently and hysterically at just how quickly two small children can destroy a house.

When we finally calmed ourselves down, I was still insistent that the kids and I needed to leave while the nice man still had an intact house.

He insisted on showing us his beautiful study before we left, and while we were admiring it, my daughter found the watering can he kept in there for the houseplants.

The very full watering can.

At that point, I think he was out of paper towels so I started using the pretty hand towels in the bathroom to soak up the disaster. While I was working on that mess, my sweet little daughter can running up to be with a handful of beautiful plant fronds and proudly presented them to me.

I had last seen the long leaves adorning a gorgeous plant near the door. A plant that now appeared to be sadly naked.

I was ready to go. Really and truly. Then the homeowner asked my son if he'd brought his swimsuit, and offered to take him swimming on the lake on their property. In the rain. In 50-degree weather.

My son was thrilled.

So, the nice gentleman and my son waded and splashed and swam in the water, occasionally joined by the wet chocolate lab. I stood on a nearby dock and observed them, my daughter in my arms. She maintained a death grip on my shoulders as she watched her brother in bewilderment from beneath her flannel hat.

She, obviously, wanted less that nothing to do with that lake.

I was finally able to slink away after that with my destructive - but incredibly happy - children tucked away in their car seats, chocolate mousse cheesecake grins on both of their faces.

They were both asleep before we got on the highway.

I learned many things from this adventure, the most important being that I can now proudly announce my children can baby proof anyone's house in a single evening, provided the homeowners are not too terribly attached to their possessions.

Running a close second to that lesson is the fact that if I ever want to get my children to fall asleep quickly and sleep for 14 hours straight, I know where to take them.

But I'll bring plastic cups next time.

Tiffany Horvath is the mother of two and the stepmother of one. Her husband, Drew, is deployed to Iraq. She writes every Sunday abut life at home for the wife of a deployed soldier.