This morning was a stay-in morning for me. My toddler son and I were enjoying lolling around in our jammies, eating cereal, watching TV, playing Play-Doh, and so on. My husband called from work to check in; and while we were chatting, the boy disappeared. I could hear him talking upstairs (to his stuffed animals?), so didn't worry about it.

When I got off the phone, I started up the stairs. Suddenly the boy came streaking (literally!) around the corner, wildly brandishing a Pull-Up in one hand and his clothing in the other. "Awww!" I started to say. "You brought your own clothes to get dressed --"

-- and then the stink hit me.

He'd "changed" himself.

Naked boy, one sock on, one sock gone, waving diaper and outfit; with bottom, back, legs, hands, diaper, and outfit SMEARED WITH POO.

I blinked at this pint-sized poopy apparition for a moment, unsure as to how to proceed. He was thrusting the Pull-Up and the clothing at me, chattering away, but I wasn't hearing him. Where to start? Where's the dirty diaper? Did he track poop from his room all the way down the hall? Did he touch his eyes or mouth with poopy hands?

Ick, ick, ick!

With a deep sigh and a prayer to the patron saint of mothering, I grasped his elbows -- I figured those were probably safe -- and steered him back up the stairs, trying not to let him touch me or my clothes or the walls or the carpet or the banister or his face.

It was a long, precarious trip.

We stopped at the bathroom, where there was no evidence of poop-carnage. It hadn't happened in these WASHABLE environs… no, of course not.

I plopped him into the bathtub. "Don't move!"

"'tay, Mommy!" he said, and froze with his smeary trophies still in his grubby little paws. Resigned, I stepped into the bedroom, dreading what awaited me.

Actually, it wasn't that bad. The diaper was on the floor, mostly intact, and thankfully right side up. The floor, however, was littered with numerous caca-encrusted wipes. I took a couple more wipes from the box, picked up the dirty ones, and dropped them in the pail. Under the last wipe I found a storybook adorned with a nice chunk of dook. I don't think we'll be reading The Giving Tree anytime soon.

After scrubbing a few smears from the carpet with more wipes (God bless wipes!), I went back to the bathroom to deal with Captain Underpants. He was still standing there in the tub, but he had tossed the diaper and the clothes onto the floor. He was busily playing with the bath toys, his little butt smearing crap all over the tub. At least it was the tub and not the couch.

I turned on the shower and told him, "We need to clean your bottom!"

"No, Mommy!" he replied. "Me!" He then proceeded to turn backwards to the spray, bend slightly, and let the water hit his bum, rinsing him quite clean. I was a little stunned. We hadn't taught him that! He figured that out on his own. Pretty smart, huh?

Then how come he couldn't figure out how to get his poop in the pot?