Julie Haas Brophy - Sh*t My Kids Ruined: An A-Z Celebration of Kid-Destruction

A Villard Books Trade Paperback Original

Copyright 2010 by Julie Haas Brophy

All rights reserved.

Published in the United States by Villard Books, an imprint of The Random House Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc., New York.

VILLARD and V CIRCLED Design are registered trademarks of Random House, Inc.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Brophy, Julie Haas.
Sh*t my kids ruined : an AZ celebration of kid-destruction / Julie Haas Brophy.
p. cm.
eISBN: 978-0-345-52718-9
1. ParentingHumor. I. Title.
PN6231.P2B76 2010
818.602dc22 2010037948

www.villard.com

v3.1

This book contains some sensitive, shocking, and funny personal images. A few are downright unpleasant. Gross, really! You are hereby advised not to view while eating, driving, operating heavy machinery, or enjoying sex. Though touted by some as a powerful visual birth control, its prophylactic effectiveness is not guaranteed.

Sh*t My Kids Ruined (SMKR) was born the morning of March 3, 2010. I was somewhat harried, doing too much at once, and my boys were going to be late for preschool. They were dressed and finishing their breakfasts, and in an attempt at efficiency, I set up materials for a project I planned to complete during the two hours theyd be at school. I make glass mosaic housewares in my few spare hours each week, and was preparing for upcoming local events.

I made two mistakes that morning: One, I placed my brushes, trays, frames, and covered paint can atop a newspaper and tarp on my rug. Not bright. Two, I turned my back for the seconds it took to place our dishes in the sink and grab my keys. I spun back around to a loud gasp that spilled from one of their mouths and that uh-oh facial expression saved only for spectacular disasters. My then two-year-old had snatched the paint can and emptied its contents in one fell swoop, and I was now looking at a quart of glossy black paint spreading over my rug.

Cue momentary breakdown. I dont know if the nooooooooo of disbelief was said aloud or in my head. For the next minute or two before getting ahold of myself, I was a whirlwind of misplaced yelling and irrational tears that can accompany exhaustion and frustration. There may even have been a few seconds of baboonlike jumping up and down. Maybe. I do remember the deep breaths and snapping a Youre not gonna believe this shit picture with my phone, then dropping the boys off at school.

Though my son had technically carried out the spilling, the fault was clearly mine. After kicking myself repeatedly for having left the paint out to begin with, I uploaded the photo to Facebook. I was already in the habit of photographing and posting things that amused me, occasionally including the minutiae of my life. In the trapped isolation and discomfort I often felt as a new mom and reluctant suburbanite, Facebook served at times as an ideal outlet. I tended to post when procrastinating or feeling silly or bored, or in this case, seeking both comfort and laughs.

Comments regarding the rug photo poured inparents commiserated and chuckled, child-free friends guffawed and teased. With each new remark I smiled. I laughed! I wasnt alone with my paint-blob misery; I was virtually supported (and ribbed mercilessly) by friends near and far. Even though the rug incident left me upset, these comments helped me turn around a crappy morning. And though I loved the rugId bought it years earlier on eBay for not much moneyit was already quite threadbare. My struggle was with my frustration and my sense of powerlessness, not with the loss of anything valuable.

The same morning, I ran into a friend on my block whod seen the picture. And in the sophisticated manner for which Im known, I complained laughingly to her, They ruin all of my shit! With that phrase rattling around in my head, I returned home and searched for domain names. In minutes Id purchased ShitMyKidsRuined.com, and after a key suggestion from my brother Brian, added the Pets equivalent later that morning. Not long afterward, Husband and Wife joined the family of Ruined websites. After all, when I said they ruin my stuff, I was including all four beloved crap-trashing males with whom Im living (husband, boys, pug).

Later that day, I used my phone to photograph everything I could recall one or both boys staining, breaking, ripping, or somehow affecting adversely. As you may imagine I didnt have trouble finding many items in this category. For starters there was our off-white upstairs couch, our homes only other victim of truly stunning destruction, this one at the hands of our older son, then three. The night before we were going on a trip, hed snuck out of bed and into my handbag where he found a permanent marker, red nail polish, and zit cream. And with this thoroughly damaging trio he graffitied one side of the couch, which, incidentally, was made of canvas. Blank canvas.

The next obvious candidates for my gallery of crapped-up possessions (most of which are still in use) included a decimated laptop, yogurt-stained lamp shade, warped cabinet door, broken toilet paper holder, backless remote control, torn window blinds, and just about every pop-up book that had the misfortune to pass through our home. I posted these images together in an album online.

The next day my friend Sara, who loved the idea from the get-go, walked me through the basics of weblogging. She got me started on Tumblr (where SMKR spent its first four months), and she helped me understand things like Twitter and site analytics, which hitherto caused my eyes to glaze over. Sara also provided my first site photo that was not my owna fabulous photo of her dog whose white fur had red marker streaks courtesy of her youngest son.