Sunblock and Spring Cleaning

Two weeks into July and we finally got around to spring cleaning. Tuesday was hot and humid - a perfect day for dragging things outside to wash. While Nate watched the baby, I balled up the grimy shower curtain, grabbed an old pot that I use occasionally for sterilizing diapers, and gathered a bunch of rags. I dumped them all in the grass in the back yard. Then I slathered the baby with sunblock while Nate dragged out the junglegym our neighbors handed down to us.

Sunblock is one of the things that I truly hate. I mean, I despise it. What makes it worse is I am a freckly-sunburny-got-Irish-in-me-white-girl. So I have to wear sunblock. And it drives me nuts.

It sticks to everything. It's oily and it makes your skin feel dirty all day long. If you have to use the really high SPF stuff like I do, it is literally like opening a bottle of Elmer's glue and trying to rub it all over yourself. It leaves gross, slimy fingerprints on everything you touch. (Although, once Evan left little sunblock fingerprints on my glasses, which blocked the U.V. rays on my Transitions lenses, so I had cute little un-sunglass fingerprints in front of my eyes...).

Sunblock makes it hard to turn a doorknob. And if your clothing moves just a fraction of an inch, you get this tiny sliver of a sunburn on the unprotected skin between the sunblock and your shirt. I would certainly rebel if I could...but then I remember that fateful summer.

I was at my friend's house in elementary school and we were going to go to a parade. Being a good little girl, I made sure to ask for some sun-tan-lotion. In my house, that always meant sunblock. What else would coat yourself with before heading out into the inhospitable UV rays? I fried like a piece of chicken.

It is the memory of those blisters that will keep me from foregoing the sunblock ever again. The same for my baby. So I slathered Evan with sunblock and covered him with a hat (which he kept taking off).

We met Nate in the yard and proceeded to soap down the pot, the shower curtain and the disassembled play set (effectively washing off a lot of the sunblock...) Meanwhile, Evan played with hose (supervised, of course). The water was freezing and he LOVED it. We left the rags to dry on the grass in the sun while we put the slide back together and tried it out with Evan.

Once he got over screaming that we took the hose away, he got really into the play set. We parked it under the big red maple in our yard to keep him out of the sun. As he climbed around the little windows and doors under the slide, the dirt and leaves from under the tree stuck to the sunblock on his arms and legs. It was like rolling a little vanilla soft-serve cone in sprinkles. Sorry, Evan. Get used to it!