Over the past month or so, I’ve been teaching the boys how to take showers by themselves. For the 6-year old, of course, this is no big deal. For the 4-year old, it’s a bit more challenging.

It also would have been easier if I’d told my wife. It’s not that I was hiding it from her, but rather that I just didn’t think of telling her.  In any case, showers with momma have been a lot different than showers with daddy.

The whole issue came to a head the other day with our youngest. I handed him the soapy face cloth and gave him the quick review as to what to do with it.

“I know,” he said. “I’ve been watching Momma.”

“Great.”  I turned away to make sure his towel was ready.

“AAAAhhhh!” he shouted. “My eyes! My eyes! AAaaahhh!  Help! Help!”

I spun back around to find him holding the face cloth on his face. White soap foam dripped from the cloth’s edges, running down his cheeks. I grabbed it and pulled it away.

“Ow!” he shouted. “Ow, ow, ow!”

“Hold still,” I grabbed a clean face cloth and used it to wipe the soap away from his eyes, then rinsed the cloth and cleaned the rest of the suds off.

He stood bravely, eyes scrunched tight, while little whimpers dribbled from his mouth.

“It’s okay,” I said as I splashed some more water over his face. “You can open them. It’s okay. We got it all.  What was that about?”

He peeked, “that’s what momma does!”

“Maybe without the soap?” I asked.

He thought about that for a second, and then burst out laughing. “Yeah!”