Rocks. It's what's for Dinner!

So I have a little bit of anxiety when it comes to doing things on my own with all 4 children outside the home. I over came the fear of going to the store alone, and took them all to Target one day earlier this year. (see photos below) I also have been taking Emmalee to a preschool class at the high school up the street 2 days a week for several weeks now, and have to load/unload/reload/unload the kids to drop her off and pick her up. I can do it! But it sure is exhausting.

Now that the weather is warming up, I decided to take them for a walk around the block yesterday before lunch. This went amazing! I pushed the Littles (this is what I call the triplets instead of calling them triplets) in the triple stroller, and Emmalee walked next to them. It was a perfect walk, and everyone was happy and took nice naps (minus Emmalee who is boycotting naps right now). I thought since the walk went so well I would try bringing them in the backyard on my own. To many of you, this may sound silly, but I have some serious anxiety about bringing them out for several reasons.

1. We have a raised deck off the back of our house and the Littles don't do stairs, and there's no way I'm going up/down a flight of stairs 3 times.
2. Even if I did that, what would the other(s) do while I was grabbing the next one from inside???? Not safe to leave them alone just yet.
3.We have a side door, which only has 4 steps, but they're all wonky and, again, the Little don't do steps, and again, what do I do once I bring the firs 2 out?

Okay, so the back door was out, side door it is. I got everyone ready, 8 socks, 8 shoes, 4 sweatshirts, diapers changed, and potty break, then I grabbed the smallest 2, (Lyla & Noah) and let Emmalee lead the way, while Owen waited patiently, in the doorway. I put them down on the driveway, and ran back in quick to grab Owen & closed the doors behind us. I come down the last step and Noah & Lyla are already to the grass, they move so fast! They played so nicely for about 10-15 minutes, all staying close by me, and then Lyla found some rocks. I guess we don't feed her enough delicious food, so she started stuffing this handful of small rocks into her mouth!!! BLECH!!!! I scoop them out and meanwhile Noah is as far as he can go, luckily we have a fenced-in yard, and clutching sticks in both hands, while he has another clenched between his teeth. I assess Lyla's mouth, it's empty, except for some dirt, eh, she'll live, and I run over to Noah. I pull the stick out of his mouth and get the little wood chips out of his mouth so he doesn't get splinters in his throat, and look back to Lyla, who is sitting on the ground straddling a patch of green that has grown through the driveway. I run to her, she has onion greens hanging out of the side of her mouth, we have wild onions growing somewhere, and in this random little spot in the middle of the driveway...and she thought it was hilarious! So I held onto Lyla for a little bit. Emmalee and Owen were playing nicely, not eating anything they shouldn't, so I went to sit with them, Lyla in my arms, Noah, still clutching his sticks, followed close behind. Lyla squirmed her way out and I let her run, and she went right back to that patch of onions. Time for dinner. Emmalee wasn't happy about going back inside, so after promising we'd come back out after we had dinner when Daddy would be home to help, she came in.

Ugh, that was more work than it should've been. I can't child-proof everything, so hopefully they'll stop putting EVERYTHING in their mouths soon. Or we'll have to wait until Daddy gets home every evening to go outside. That'll make a long summer. At least I gave it a try! I think we'll stick to a walk around the block for now.