Nine Lessons You'd Rather Learn From Us

Some lessons you learn the hard way. Some you learn from watching other people make mistakes. Here's your chance to pick up nine free lessons from our mistakes. We've had quite a week and someone may as well benefit from it! : )

NINE LESSONS
FROM THE PEAPOD SPRING BREAK

1. It is not a good idea to paint anything with a toddler nearby. It takes more than twice as long as it should.

2. Whoever told me that you could edge the ceiling-wall at the top of the staircase by taping a brush to a long pole, was wrong. Very wrong. Now we have to paint the ceiling too.

3. Never place a bucket of paint on top of the washing machine. More importantly, never wash wet potty-training pants while that bucket of paint is sitting there. You WILL have to stop painting and clean up a very large mess. In a hurry.

4. Paint dries on the floor very fast.

5. A lot of dust, lint, socks, dryer sheets, random screws, barrettes, pennies, and sidewalk chalk fall behind a dryer that barely fits in a laundry closet.

6. It's very difficult to get out from the behind the dryer after you've plugged it back in and reconnected the vent. (Not that connecting the vent is easy. It isn't.)

7. When you are potty training, don't plan to take an all day trip away from home. Your child will forget everything by the time you get back.

8. While giving your child lots of juice will make them pee more, it will also eventually give them diarrhea. Which immediately halts your potty training efforts. stupid, stupid, stupid

9. Every project will have setbacks. The banister in your stairway is probably screwed in pretty tight. It might take knocking a pretty good hole in the wall to get those brackets out of there. Oh, and paint doesn't cover the wall patch as well as you're led to believe.