You Know You’re the Parent of a Toddler When…

• you enter a beautifully decorated house and wince at the swathe of destruction that is surely imminent.
• you breathe a sigh of relief when your host whisks the lovely runner and basket of flowers off the coffee table.
• Saturdays are the highlight of your week because you get to go to the bathroom alone, with the door shut.
• a ten-minute shower in the morning seems absolutely luxurious.
• the bottom two shelves of your bookcase are empty.
• the toilet paper is on the window sill instead of on the holder.
• you have to wrestle with child locks to get a dish out of the cupboard.
• you have to wrestle with a baby gate to go up the stairs.
• no trip out of the house is complete without a diaper bag.
• the diapers are the least important things in the diaper bag…heaven forbid you are caught without snacks or small toys in a public place.
• you can accurately interpret various grunts, screeches, and gestures—but only for your own child, as every toddler invents their own “language.”
• you compose long mental lists of everything you will do during The Nap, but when the time actually comes, you’re too worn out to do any of it.
• it’s been so long since you had an uninterrupted conversation that you wonder if you’ve forgotten how.
• you can’t believe how sweet her smile is, and you’re convinced you’ve never heard a more infectious giggle.

Have I missed anything? Add your own!

We call her Destructo-Baby.