How come the only person in the house who doesn't actually LEAVE pee drips all over the bathroom is the only one cleaning them up???

SERIOUSLY!

Now, I knew it would be challenging living in a house full of boys. Being outnumbered, three-to-one. I knew it would be louder and messier than living in, say, a house where the females outnumber the Daddy, instead of the other way around. I knew it. I expected it. And, I am not so naive to think that it isn't going to get a whole lot worse, when my little guys hit puberty. (I am a middle school counselor, afterall. I have no delusions about the sights, smells, and hormonal surges of adolescence that await my little family...)

But, if I have to clean up one more droplet of pee from the toilet seat, back of the toilet, side of the toilet, floor right in front of the toilet, wall right next to the toilet, shower curtain a foot away from the toilet, or anywhere else in either of my bathrooms, I am going to LOSE IT! It's not going to be pretty. This mommy's head is literally going to spontaneously combust and then somebody ELSE will have to clean up the *@*!!@*!!* mess!

The really frustrating thing is that I've been working with my boys on wiping their drips, since the time they began to show an inkling of interest in the potty. I foolishly deluded myself into thinking that I could instill in my boys an early habit of cleaning up after their own bodily fluids. (You know, maybe try to make a difference in this generation, since it obviously didn't happen with my husband, when he was a child.) Regardless, it didn't work. Unless I am right there next to them, reminding them every single time they pee, or shouting from the other room, "Don't forget to wipe your drips!", it just doesn't happen, most of the time.

What's a mother to do??? I know that I could go on strike. I could shout to the world that I am no longer cleaning a toilet in this house. But, the truth is, that's total bunk. There's just no way I could allow my bathrooms to get to the point of pee-soaked stinkiness that all three of my boys (I'm including hubby here) would be able to tolerate quite happily. Not. Gonna. Happen. I don't want to have a house that smells like a men's locker room in a Seattle train station. I do occasionally have company, and there are some minimum standards of cleanliness and lack-of-stinkiness that should apply, don't you think?

On the positive side...All three of my boys do put down the toilet seat when they're done.

Most of the time...

I need a glass of wine.

Cheers!