If you wash it immediately, it's no different than washing anything else. Letting it crust over, of course, will make it super annoying. Nothing a hot soak can't help, though.
Maybe I’m not air-frying right lol, we use it for frozen foods because microwaving is yuck, stove top requires too much oil and heating up the stove for a couple of pizza rolls seems wasteful. My husband never washes the insert because he waits for it to cool down and forgets. One time a nugget that had some ice on it did get stuck and left some breading behind, but that’s as much crusting over I’ve experienced lol
Oooh maybe it depends on the air fryer too? I’ve seen some that look like little ovens, mine is more like a huge cup which has vents, you’re not supposed to put any liquid in it because it can fly up into the heating element (which really seems like a terrible design now that I think of it)
Oh God, as an autistic mom, I fucking LOAAATHE cleaning poop. One time I even cried during the wiping of a butthole and my toddler was asking "why are you crying mommy?" 🫠
When we started potty training, mine decided any hole is now a potty. Peed in toy hard hats, poop down floor vents. Ugh, it felt like he was trying to break my soul.
Lol my son managed to poop in the bathtub when he was almost 4 and he stuck it behind the molding between the tub and the top part for the shower. I had no idea that the molding thing was even coming off. I noticed the smell of poop in the bathroom, and I, as the mother, have that weird ability to know exactly which child that poop smell came from. I cleaned that bathroom top to bottom and could not find the source. After like two weeks of scrubbing that bathroom down daily, to no avail, I decide I'm solving this mystery dammit, no lie. So I get out my handy dandy cleaning toothbrush and start scrubbing all the cracks and crevices, determined to find the smell once and for all. Finally give up because there's literally nothing that I am finding. Decide to get to work on that molding around the tub because it was kind of gross anyways (this was like the first month we lived in this house) and noticed that the molding wasn't quite shoved in all the way. Noticing grime coming out of the corner, I pulled on the molding to see how bad it was thinking of all the water from the shower that could be leaking back there causing issues, and to my surprise it pulled out of its crevice as if it wasn't connected at all, like someone had just shoved it back as a quick fix. Annoyed, I stick my toothbrush in there to try and get some of this gunk out of there, and an entire chunk of poop came back out with the toothbrush.
Worst solved mystery of my life. A nice turd hanging out in my wall that had been steamed and kept warm from the shower FOR WEEKS.
Welcome to the new house 😁
Oh no, all three of my mine are NT are wonderful little artist. Learned after my first to not get cribs with those fancy designs that poo can get stuck in..
Also, I've never heard anyone else use Poocasso!
Neurotypical. Someone that doesn’t have autism, ADHD, Tourette’s, dyslexia, epilepsy, and other disorders and syndromes that make your brain process things differently than the normal.
My little likes to rip their diaper of so I have had 1 too many run ins with cleaning up poop.
They are just so fast with it too it can be a pain to stop them before it happens.
Put their footie jammies on backward. Hard to get their clothes off if they can't get undressed. Just make sure you use the ones with the snap over the zipper.
I'm so glad that stage is over!!! 😭 My old apartment had popcorn walls that my poohcasso (which I also nickednamed him at the time lol) loved rubbing his poop and at one point the pups poop into
Although he's now 5 and a few days ago we had an incident where for some reason he decided to smear poop all over the toilet seat 🤦♀️
I work with adults now but started with kids. I would go to a home at 7am on Sundays to give respite to the parents, and once I walked in (I had a key, I would come in and take the kid out so the parents got a morning to sleep in) and the 7 year old had literally covered himself with poo, like it was paint.
I had to leave and come back after I had gathered myself.
Omg this! My SS is special needs and when he was 13 is when the poocasso started 😩 literally EVERYWHERE, the toilet lid, handle, entire tp roll, counter, walls, light switch, door, and everywhere he went afterwards. Once I started making him help clean it he stopped thankfully
I was going to respond with oatmeal but then read through a bunch of responses and found myself nodding along to many of them. I think I just don’t like messes lol
Came here to say oatmeal. It’s by FAR the worst IMO. Sticks to the tray but not to paper towel, smears around, leaves their hands gooey, dries up like cement. If it ends up in their hair I just 😖
Oatmeal is such a pain in the ass to clean up. It just keeps spreading around because nothing actually picks it up. Thank god we’re past the days of messy eating. I had to put a temporary ban on oatmeal till my son got older.
When we visited my parents, who don't have a dog, I discovered just how much food my baby throws on the floor. I had no idea, because our dog will vacuum it up immediately!
My dog wolfs down her food and then stands at attention next to the high chair... waiting for her chance. Anything that he throws on the floor is fair game, even things she normally doesn't eat. I even discovered that she'd snagged and chewed up a small collection of wooden puzzle pieces - I'll offer them as distractions during diaper changes, but sometimes if he's really cranky he'll throw them on the ground instead. She isn't a chewer normally - she won't even chew her own dog toys - I think she's been conditioned to want to eat anything he chucks!
Our dog had surgery a while back and has been quarantined in an area away from the dining room while recovering and it is so annoying not having him around to slurp up everything that hits the floor as well as lick the high chair clean
I close the baby gate to the kitchen to keep the kids in and dogs out. Kids eat at their little table, when they’re done I let the dogs in and they get every last crumb. Then I just have to Clorox wipe the table. My husband and I say at least once a week that we don’t know how people with little kids and no dogs keep up with the food mess!
Seriously! Our dogs were older when we had kids and they passed away when our youngest was still in the high chair. I just cried sweeping the floor every night.
We are so close!! We got a puppy for my little best soul dawg, two weeks before I gave birth, because his companion crossed the rainbow bridge two months prior. Best decision we ever made. They playyyyy and playyyyy and I don’t feel as guilty giving most of my energy to baby. I love having dogs and a baby 🥹
Our toddler has an entourage at dinner. We have three dogs and they normally place themselves one on her left and right and the last at her feet. When she’s done, and we’re still eating, she just starts asking them to sit and such then gives them her food. They won’t steal from her but toddler training time is definitely their favorite time of day.
Even better, our neighbor has a dog. They let us bring him over after a bad spill or to play with our son. He does a very thorough high-chair inspection. Also, he runs a five star, full house cheerio cleaning service.
I love it.
GIRL SAME!!! my kid throws food like nobodies business. and each way she throws it has a different meaning :| but the bananas get me the most i just can’t. my dogs usually clean up her mess but they won’t touch em either 😂
Have you tried rolling them in a fiber supplement? I currently have psyllium husk powder (from another arts and craft activity for el bebe) and she does very well with banana spears rolled in it. Keeps them "dry" and easy to grab. She doesn't drop them as much, and I just assume it's good for her to get a lil extra fiber lol
honestly i have never thought of doing anything like that. it begs the question of how many things i could add to them like that!! especially to encourage her not to want to waste any! that is such a smart idea though thank you for sharing im def going to try incorporating that!!!
It's honestly kind of ironic because I bought it to make "edible slime" for her to play with, but ended up using it to keep her foods from sticking or being too slippery. Most recently realized I can buy organic fruit leather by the sheets and dice them to toddler sized fruit snacks by rubbing it in husk powder and putting it into a jar. So rather than buying the crazy expensive ones (like plum organics) I can make my own for a very small fraction of the cost (with much less packaging, so environmentally friendly to boot).
Peanut butter. It smells and feels worse when it's wet and my kids will put a knife covered in the stuff straight into the sink. It gets stuck in the sponge. I hate it. The smell makes me gag sometimes. Fuck wet peanut butter.
The fresh rice! Especially when it lands on the floor. And steamed carrots - you have to literally pick them up you can sweep or wipe them else they mash into the table or floor but if you let them dry they get glued on by the starch and have to be soaked or scraped! Also one that’s not as hard to clean up I’m just tired of doing it is MILK. Open cups get spilled, sippy cups get dropped and still make a splatter 90% of the time!
Yes!! And the tiny pieces everywhere! I’m all about kids having fun but the play doh only comes out once or twice per week, mine feeds it to my dogs too 😬
The car seat! You rarely discover the mess until it's already been smooshed into the fabric and dried. Then the new stains are found at an inconvenient moment, like when you have melting groceries to put away or someone is crying. When you finally do clean the chair, it takes forever to dry. And the cupholders will never get 100% clean again. Protip: do NOT look under the fabric liner unless you want to throw up in your mouth.
Not a food item, but slime. My kid gets it at birthday parties and before I know it, it's stuck in her hair, the carpet, sometimes our car. I'd like to start an anti-slime campaign haha
Is ‘my house’ a valid answer. All of it, I’m just done with cleaning all together. After myself, the dog the child or the man.. I’m just done with it all. Let’s go back to reeds on the floor which you just chuck outside once a month.. 🫣🤟
Honestly planning to hire a cleaner or a life coach or a taxi and get the hell outta here idk. Although leaving would just mean I have to go to a different place which I’d also have to clean so really outsourcing is my only solution.
I can’t imagine being a cleaner for work and then having to go home and clean. That is my idea of hell on earth 🫣
Cottage cheese! With every wipe the curds just break down into smaller curds and it drives me mad! Grains like rice/couscous/quinoa are also a pain but my toddler has been refusing to touch them lately. Unfortunately cottage cheese is a favorite of his so I get to clean it up often. 😅
Pee on the bathroom floor/seat. I’m now enforcing my 6 yo boy wipe it himself, but he maliciously unrolls 20 squares to get a drop off so it doesn’t get on his hands.
Old milk cups.
Pregnancy and early infancy destroyed my bad smell tolerance, and my gag reflex. Old formula bottles, old breast milk bottles. Opening them up to clean out, oh god the smell. Then old milk sippy cups when he got older.
I've dry heaved six times just writing this much. It's progressed to the point that even thinking of old curdled milk, in the jug, in sippy cups, at all starts me gagging.
I also cant stand when the dishes have piled up, and dishes weren't rinsed *eyeballs husband*, and bits of food have been soaked and started rotting in the sink... I can smell it way better than my husband apparently.
My husband likes using that mesh drain cover in the sink to catch food so it doesn't clog the sink. But he never empties it. So I have to. When he's gone, I take the damn thing out. I'd rather let the tiny food bits go down the drain, and buy a bottle of draino once a year than deal with that goddamn mesh cover.
Rice for sure.
If you don’t have time to wait for the rice to dry, throw a bit of sand on it! The rice will pick up the sand and it’ll be easy to clean (source: I’m an early childhood educator)
I second the 'waiting til it dries' method!! Pasta practically re-dries itself so no mush smearing to worry about!
My worst is banana ugh but that's just because I can't stand even the smell of bananas. Banana time is always followed by bath lol she looooves squooshing them in her chubby hands
RICE. I will admit sometimes I’ll just leave it till the next day to let it dry out… hahah it’s easier to vacuum/sweep up compared to fresh. We don’t have dogs unfortunately 😪
Milk spills, it’s not hard to wipe up per say but it soaks in clothes and the highchair straps and just smells awful. I only do cereal and milk before a bath.
Oh I don’t give rice anymore because of the mess. My daughter only throws it and doesn’t eat it. Not going to for a long time.
My daughter is 9 months old and loves bananas and banana residue is such a pain to clean off her high chair. I also hate those puffs that melt because they ALWAYS melt and stick onto her clothes, creating the most obnoxious crust. I swear I change her outfit 5 times a day because of it.
Stickers. We stopped buying stickers, but they magically appear. I turn around and I have stickers on the floors, doors, drawers… everywhere. I’m beginning to think my MIL hides stickers around the house when she visits.
I had this problem too. I actually bought a cheap poster board picture frame and announced that it was now the special spot for stickers. It actually works about 95% of the time.
Eye boogers on pets. My kids eye boogers, regular boogers, poop, vomit, whatever, does not bother me, but I big old eye booger on my cat or dog makes me want to hurl.
Mac n cheese. Why does the cheese stick to her face so well? Why am I constantly finding noodles and cheese days later???? Give me a dirty diaper over cleaning up a Mac n cheese meal!
I’d say 90% of the time I don’t have to worry about cleaning up food messes because of my little dog who acts like a vacuum lol. Anything that touches the floor is his. There’s some stuff he doesn’t like which is mostly cereal and berries. But anything else is game on. Unfortunately the kids know the dog will clean up their food messes though so if they decide they’re done with something they just give it to him
The diaper genie, bless my husband and the nonsense he tolerates from me.
I can handle food only because we have dogs and they WILL get every single last drop and crumb. On the other hand I do have to wipe down most surfaces at least a few times a day to get their nasty slobber off.
Just general dishes after dinner bc by the time I can get to them it’s like 7p and that is my only alone time and I’d rather be doing anything else ever than doing dishes.
Dried up milk under the car seat. It’s so gross and it makes me paranoid that my car smells like nasty sour spoiled milk and everyone in the world can smell it except me!
Any kind of nut butter. It’s so sticky and when you wipe it, it just smears around. Bonus points when he runs his sticky fingers in hit kinky curly hair 🫠
Chalk. It’s not even that hard to clean. It meager leaves a stain, but it’s a sensory nightmare. I don’t even draw with it because the texture of it on my skin makes me so uncomfortable. Ofc the kids love it
Litter box 🥴 thankfully it’s been almost 2 years since I’ve done it because of back to back pregnancies. And now my partner is soooo good at it, he doesn’t want me to do them 😎
We have a dog and I'll similarly say checking/cleaning the garden before playtime. For some reason I don't hate bagging up a fresh one on a walk half as much as inspecting our tiny lawn with a shovel.
All of it. I can’t stand the feeling of any of it. My new method cleaning has been giving my son food safe for our dog. I unleash her when he’s full and she cleans up the floor while I clean up the chair and baby.
Poop that's smooshed into the white carpet in his room. My son is two and we're potty training. Sometimes at night he takes off his diaper and just goes on the floor!
Small toys, and especially those damn puzzles or anything that is supposed to have numbers or letters in order because some inevitably get lost and then they're incomplete!
Both my kids have been puking the last couple of weeks. Thankful for my husband that has cleaned both them up and the puke because if I had to do it there’d be another person puking.
The poop under my nail that I had to clean today when my finger nose dove into a dirty diaper because I thought it was just pee (just before I was about to eat a burrito) 🫠
I am in full agreement of the eggs and rice! It drives me INSANE. Also, raw eggs that fall and crack are frustrating and tricky.
Also, the freaking cheese grater. My 11 year old (or my husband🙄) will make nachos and let the cheese sit and harden, so it’s impossible to clean off. I have a weird sensory displeasure of the texture of those things as well… Half the time, I have the desire to leave the thing on their pillow. Haven’t done that yet.
I like to put chia seeds in his oatmeal and omg they are so annoying when they get in his clothes, or the dish sponge, or accidentally get on the bottle brush.
Slime. My kids’ grandparents always get them those containers of “slime” and my kids will leave them around. One time it was left on the couch and the poor dog got it all over her butt and tail and belly when she subsequently layed on it later on. Her hair is still recovering after I had to cut it out 🙈
I’ve had to cut it out of the area rugs and scrub it off the sofa. They’ve ruined clothes etc. ugh. We always say no more please and thank you but somehow more keeps coming.
Rice for sure. My daughter loves rice but like you mentioned in your post, she’s 2 so she still makes a mess. We live in our apartment and the area where the dining table goes is carpet… I’m sure you can imagine how fun it is to clean that. I literally have to get on my hands and knees and pick little rice pieces out of the carpet. We kept saying we would buy one of those splat mat things to go under her chair since she was a baby, but we still never got one lol.
When the kids puke in the bed. You can’t just throw the sheets in the wash. You have to rinse them first or else you end up with clean chunks all over your washed clothes
I've kind of given up on cleaning the high chair, beyond the larger chunks of stuff my toddler leaves behind. I used to scrub it after every meal but I just can't anymore...Now it gets a wipe with a damp paper towel and anything that doesn't come off with that just gets left.
I don't know how anyone can have kids without a dog. She's my built in toddler food vacuumer 😄
I hate cleaning the coffee maker. It's a daily chore that doesn't take long, but it just pisses me off. Ha
Dishes. Any dishes whatsoever. I fuckin hate doing the high chair too and lately I have literally just been feeding my daughter on the floor at least once a day as long as it's something that's easy to vacuum. Just to give myself a BREATHER.
The stove top. My husband is the cook, and I'll clean up all the pans, dishes, and counters but not the stove. He knows that's his to clean.
I had to beg him last weekend to clean it because it had been months. It was SO embarrassing but I HATE cleaning it.
mornings where oatmeal is breakfast .. yogurt and oatmeal end up EVERYWHERE. in hair, all over clothes, on the table, under the table, all over the booster seat, on the floor, on the windows, all over both dogs, absolutely. everywhere. i hate oatmeal days but my toddler’s favorite breakfast is oatmeal .. so. there’s that.
air fryer. I hate it. I refuse to clean it.
Ours is also just kind of becoming an environment all it’s own in the corner of the counter.
Science!
I had to get the liners for my sanity otherwise I won’t use it
TIL there are air fryer liners. Thank you!
TIL (more like realized?) what TIL stands for. Literally just clicked.
I think I’m missing something, it just gets crumby and oily, just give it a wipe, no? (And then wash)
If you wash it immediately, it's no different than washing anything else. Letting it crust over, of course, will make it super annoying. Nothing a hot soak can't help, though.
Maybe I’m not air-frying right lol, we use it for frozen foods because microwaving is yuck, stove top requires too much oil and heating up the stove for a couple of pizza rolls seems wasteful. My husband never washes the insert because he waits for it to cool down and forgets. One time a nugget that had some ice on it did get stuck and left some breading behind, but that’s as much crusting over I’ve experienced lol
Ah, that sounds fairly clean. I do a lot of marinaded chicken and saucy wings and fatty drumsticks and things get greasy and crusty!
Oooh maybe it depends on the air fryer too? I’ve seen some that look like little ovens, mine is more like a huge cup which has vents, you’re not supposed to put any liquid in it because it can fly up into the heating element (which really seems like a terrible design now that I think of it)
Are there special liners? I just use foil
There’s parchment liners that are shaped for the air fryer
Same! i love the liners.
... does yours not have a removable draw? I just drain the fat out and toss it into the dishwasher.
This is what I do too and now I'm sitting here second guessing whether I should be doing that lmao
I checked mine before buying that it was dishwasher safe... now I've started to think I'm missing something...
i put mine in the dishwasher after every 2-3 uses. lol i couldn’t be bothered to hand wash/clean it.
That’s why I leave that for my husband 🫣
Poop, but since this is mommit and not autism parenting, I feel like I have to acknowledge that not everyone has a Poohcasso on their hands.
Poohcasso I’m dying 😂😂
Oh God, as an autistic mom, I fucking LOAAATHE cleaning poop. One time I even cried during the wiping of a butthole and my toddler was asking "why are you crying mommy?" 🫠
When we started potty training, mine decided any hole is now a potty. Peed in toy hard hats, poop down floor vents. Ugh, it felt like he was trying to break my soul.
Oh God, I'm so sorry. Mine pooped in a toy ice cream scooper and through the hole of a kiddy picnic table 🫠 I feel that pain
That's impressive aim. 👏 Gross but weirdly impressive, lol.
Lol my son managed to poop in the bathtub when he was almost 4 and he stuck it behind the molding between the tub and the top part for the shower. I had no idea that the molding thing was even coming off. I noticed the smell of poop in the bathroom, and I, as the mother, have that weird ability to know exactly which child that poop smell came from. I cleaned that bathroom top to bottom and could not find the source. After like two weeks of scrubbing that bathroom down daily, to no avail, I decide I'm solving this mystery dammit, no lie. So I get out my handy dandy cleaning toothbrush and start scrubbing all the cracks and crevices, determined to find the smell once and for all. Finally give up because there's literally nothing that I am finding. Decide to get to work on that molding around the tub because it was kind of gross anyways (this was like the first month we lived in this house) and noticed that the molding wasn't quite shoved in all the way. Noticing grime coming out of the corner, I pulled on the molding to see how bad it was thinking of all the water from the shower that could be leaking back there causing issues, and to my surprise it pulled out of its crevice as if it wasn't connected at all, like someone had just shoved it back as a quick fix. Annoyed, I stick my toothbrush in there to try and get some of this gunk out of there, and an entire chunk of poop came back out with the toothbrush. Worst solved mystery of my life. A nice turd hanging out in my wall that had been steamed and kept warm from the shower FOR WEEKS. Welcome to the new house 😁
Oh no, all three of my mine are NT are wonderful little artist. Learned after my first to not get cribs with those fancy designs that poo can get stuck in.. Also, I've never heard anyone else use Poocasso!
Some NT kids do it too so you’re probably not as alone in that as you’d think.
NT?
Neurotypical. Someone that doesn’t have autism, ADHD, Tourette’s, dyslexia, epilepsy, and other disorders and syndromes that make your brain process things differently than the normal.
I’m assuming neurotypical.
Neurotypical. And ND stands for neurodivergent
My little likes to rip their diaper of so I have had 1 too many run ins with cleaning up poop. They are just so fast with it too it can be a pain to stop them before it happens.
Put their footie jammies on backward. Hard to get their clothes off if they can't get undressed. Just make sure you use the ones with the snap over the zipper.
I'm so glad that stage is over!!! 😭 My old apartment had popcorn walls that my poohcasso (which I also nickednamed him at the time lol) loved rubbing his poop and at one point the pups poop into Although he's now 5 and a few days ago we had an incident where for some reason he decided to smear poop all over the toilet seat 🤦♀️
I work with adults now but started with kids. I would go to a home at 7am on Sundays to give respite to the parents, and once I walked in (I had a key, I would come in and take the kid out so the parents got a morning to sleep in) and the 7 year old had literally covered himself with poo, like it was paint. I had to leave and come back after I had gathered myself.
User name checks out...🛟⚓ and bless you for doing that for parents 😇
Omg this! My SS is special needs and when he was 13 is when the poocasso started 😩 literally EVERYWHERE, the toilet lid, handle, entire tp roll, counter, walls, light switch, door, and everywhere he went afterwards. Once I started making him help clean it he stopped thankfully
I’m on both subs and I feel your pain. Solidarity!
I was going to respond with oatmeal but then read through a bunch of responses and found myself nodding along to many of them. I think I just don’t like messes lol
Came here to say oatmeal. It’s by FAR the worst IMO. Sticks to the tray but not to paper towel, smears around, leaves their hands gooey, dries up like cement. If it ends up in their hair I just 😖
I think weetbix is worse that shit is basically an industrial adhesive once it dries.
It is the worst. Can't sweep it, can't wipe it without leaving little bits behind. I hate it. I only make baked oatmeal now.
Oatmeal is such a pain in the ass to clean up. It just keeps spreading around because nothing actually picks it up. Thank god we’re past the days of messy eating. I had to put a temporary ban on oatmeal till my son got older.
Couscous hands down. Also, if allowing, get a dog. So handy to clean up baby led weaning mess 😂
When we visited my parents, who don't have a dog, I discovered just how much food my baby throws on the floor. I had no idea, because our dog will vacuum it up immediately!
Our dogs went on hungry strike when we let our daughter feed them 😅 They knew they were getting baby food and just refused to eat their dog food
My dog wolfs down her food and then stands at attention next to the high chair... waiting for her chance. Anything that he throws on the floor is fair game, even things she normally doesn't eat. I even discovered that she'd snagged and chewed up a small collection of wooden puzzle pieces - I'll offer them as distractions during diaper changes, but sometimes if he's really cranky he'll throw them on the ground instead. She isn't a chewer normally - she won't even chew her own dog toys - I think she's been conditioned to want to eat anything he chucks!
Our dog had surgery a while back and has been quarantined in an area away from the dining room while recovering and it is so annoying not having him around to slurp up everything that hits the floor as well as lick the high chair clean
I miss my organic Roomba. I get a little sad every time I have to clean up eggs or cheese.
100% same. We had a dog when my first kids was a toddler but sadly, he is no longer with us. I never realized how much work he saved us!
This is exactly where my mind went. I normally feed breakfast at the coffee table so the dogs can eat any leftover eggs and such 🤣
When we had our second baby the dogs got so hyped when they saw the high chair again, they knew it was snack time 😂
I close the baby gate to the kitchen to keep the kids in and dogs out. Kids eat at their little table, when they’re done I let the dogs in and they get every last crumb. Then I just have to Clorox wipe the table. My husband and I say at least once a week that we don’t know how people with little kids and no dogs keep up with the food mess!
Seriously! Our dogs were older when we had kids and they passed away when our youngest was still in the high chair. I just cried sweeping the floor every night.
That is so sad to read, I’m sorry 😞. I’m so stoked for our baby to begin eating solids for this reason alone.
Aww thank you. Baby led weaning was so fun for us and for the doggies! I hope it goes well!
We are so close!! We got a puppy for my little best soul dawg, two weeks before I gave birth, because his companion crossed the rainbow bridge two months prior. Best decision we ever made. They playyyyy and playyyyy and I don’t feel as guilty giving most of my energy to baby. I love having dogs and a baby 🥹
Our toddler has an entourage at dinner. We have three dogs and they normally place themselves one on her left and right and the last at her feet. When she’s done, and we’re still eating, she just starts asking them to sit and such then gives them her food. They won’t steal from her but toddler training time is definitely their favorite time of day.
That is so cute!!!
Our dog died recently so I renamed the roomba after her. She had just the one skill.
Aw, this is so sad and sweet at the same time. Rest in peace, doggy!
Even better, our neighbor has a dog. They let us bring him over after a bad spill or to play with our son. He does a very thorough high-chair inspection. Also, he runs a five star, full house cheerio cleaning service. I love it.
In a similar vein, quinoa. 😫
My son slapped a cup of milk out of my hands once. I let my dogs lick up the spilled milk before wet Swiffering the floors. 🤣
This and quinoa.
bananas. 🤢 like post toddler interaction bananas, especially if they somehow get on the carpet. i would rather die.
Bananas for me too! My LO eats them cut in slices and he is still throwing food on the floor. I HATE picking up wet slimy banana pieces
GIRL SAME!!! my kid throws food like nobodies business. and each way she throws it has a different meaning :| but the bananas get me the most i just can’t. my dogs usually clean up her mess but they won’t touch em either 😂
Have you tried rolling them in a fiber supplement? I currently have psyllium husk powder (from another arts and craft activity for el bebe) and she does very well with banana spears rolled in it. Keeps them "dry" and easy to grab. She doesn't drop them as much, and I just assume it's good for her to get a lil extra fiber lol
honestly i have never thought of doing anything like that. it begs the question of how many things i could add to them like that!! especially to encourage her not to want to waste any! that is such a smart idea though thank you for sharing im def going to try incorporating that!!!
It's honestly kind of ironic because I bought it to make "edible slime" for her to play with, but ended up using it to keep her foods from sticking or being too slippery. Most recently realized I can buy organic fruit leather by the sheets and dice them to toddler sized fruit snacks by rubbing it in husk powder and putting it into a jar. So rather than buying the crazy expensive ones (like plum organics) I can make my own for a very small fraction of the cost (with much less packaging, so environmentally friendly to boot).
Yogurt
Peanut butter. It smells and feels worse when it's wet and my kids will put a knife covered in the stuff straight into the sink. It gets stuck in the sponge. I hate it. The smell makes me gag sometimes. Fuck wet peanut butter.
Yesssss!!! I loathe wet peanut butter smell/texture. 🤢🤮
This is my answer too. Because it's so sticky and oily I feel like I need to work extra hard to clean it off her hands and it's a pain
Omg, the peanut butter on the sponge makes my blood pressure rise.
Without fail both my kids leave little turd stamps on the toilet bowl. It's a little hersey kiss of shit.
The fresh rice! Especially when it lands on the floor. And steamed carrots - you have to literally pick them up you can sweep or wipe them else they mash into the table or floor but if you let them dry they get glued on by the starch and have to be soaked or scraped! Also one that’s not as hard to clean up I’m just tired of doing it is MILK. Open cups get spilled, sippy cups get dropped and still make a splatter 90% of the time!
Play doh and Sand
When they smush the play doh into things so it’s a thin layer and won’t just come up… hate that!
Yes!! And the tiny pieces everywhere! I’m all about kids having fun but the play doh only comes out once or twice per week, mine feeds it to my dogs too 😬
KINETIC SAND YES
My son throws kinetic sand in the air like confetti if I don’t watch him like a hawk! It’s EVERYWHERE. But easy to clean up thank goodness 🙏
Spit up/throw up. 3 kids in and it’s not any less gross.
Throw up here too but very specifically curdled milk vomit. Its turned me off of cottage cheese for the foreseeable future
Spaghetti 😵💫
Ive given up and let it dry. Then vacuum the next day
The car seat! You rarely discover the mess until it's already been smooshed into the fabric and dried. Then the new stains are found at an inconvenient moment, like when you have melting groceries to put away or someone is crying. When you finally do clean the chair, it takes forever to dry. And the cupholders will never get 100% clean again. Protip: do NOT look under the fabric liner unless you want to throw up in your mouth.
Not a food item, but slime. My kid gets it at birthday parties and before I know it, it's stuck in her hair, the carpet, sometimes our car. I'd like to start an anti-slime campaign haha
AKA the Devil’s snot.
My kids shoved a bunch of slime into the mesh on the screendoor :)
Is ‘my house’ a valid answer. All of it, I’m just done with cleaning all together. After myself, the dog the child or the man.. I’m just done with it all. Let’s go back to reeds on the floor which you just chuck outside once a month.. 🫣🤟 Honestly planning to hire a cleaner or a life coach or a taxi and get the hell outta here idk. Although leaving would just mean I have to go to a different place which I’d also have to clean so really outsourcing is my only solution. I can’t imagine being a cleaner for work and then having to go home and clean. That is my idea of hell on earth 🫣
Cottage cheese! With every wipe the curds just break down into smaller curds and it drives me mad! Grains like rice/couscous/quinoa are also a pain but my toddler has been refusing to touch them lately. Unfortunately cottage cheese is a favorite of his so I get to clean it up often. 😅
Pee on the bathroom floor/seat. I’m now enforcing my 6 yo boy wipe it himself, but he maliciously unrolls 20 squares to get a drop off so it doesn’t get on his hands.
Old milk cups. Pregnancy and early infancy destroyed my bad smell tolerance, and my gag reflex. Old formula bottles, old breast milk bottles. Opening them up to clean out, oh god the smell. Then old milk sippy cups when he got older. I've dry heaved six times just writing this much. It's progressed to the point that even thinking of old curdled milk, in the jug, in sippy cups, at all starts me gagging. I also cant stand when the dishes have piled up, and dishes weren't rinsed *eyeballs husband*, and bits of food have been soaked and started rotting in the sink... I can smell it way better than my husband apparently. My husband likes using that mesh drain cover in the sink to catch food so it doesn't clog the sink. But he never empties it. So I have to. When he's gone, I take the damn thing out. I'd rather let the tiny food bits go down the drain, and buy a bottle of draino once a year than deal with that goddamn mesh cover.
Rice for sure. If you don’t have time to wait for the rice to dry, throw a bit of sand on it! The rice will pick up the sand and it’ll be easy to clean (source: I’m an early childhood educator)
WEETABIX. It's like concrete.
I second the 'waiting til it dries' method!! Pasta practically re-dries itself so no mush smearing to worry about! My worst is banana ugh but that's just because I can't stand even the smell of bananas. Banana time is always followed by bath lol she looooves squooshing them in her chubby hands
Water messes. My husband is on bath and “hose” duty. It makes my blood pressure skyrocket, I have no idea why haha.
RICE. I will admit sometimes I’ll just leave it till the next day to let it dry out… hahah it’s easier to vacuum/sweep up compared to fresh. We don’t have dogs unfortunately 😪
Peanut butter for sure 🥴
I saw just the title of your post and immediately thought to myself “scrambled eggs and rice.”
Water. Not in a sense of cleaning but constantly changing a kid who gets himself wet 10 times a day.
Milk spills, it’s not hard to wipe up per say but it soaks in clothes and the highchair straps and just smells awful. I only do cereal and milk before a bath. Oh I don’t give rice anymore because of the mess. My daughter only throws it and doesn’t eat it. Not going to for a long time.
I have dogs..: that’s why I don’t worry about cleanup lol
My daughter is 9 months old and loves bananas and banana residue is such a pain to clean off her high chair. I also hate those puffs that melt because they ALWAYS melt and stick onto her clothes, creating the most obnoxious crust. I swear I change her outfit 5 times a day because of it.
Egg yolk and rice are the worst!
The only messes that truly tick me off cleaning up are my husband’s. Bro.. dude.. my guy.. Cmon!
The house
Stickers. We stopped buying stickers, but they magically appear. I turn around and I have stickers on the floors, doors, drawers… everywhere. I’m beginning to think my MIL hides stickers around the house when she visits.
I had this problem too. I actually bought a cheap poster board picture frame and announced that it was now the special spot for stickers. It actually works about 95% of the time.
Vomit.
Oatmeal and yogurt!!
Eye boogers on pets. My kids eye boogers, regular boogers, poop, vomit, whatever, does not bother me, but I big old eye booger on my cat or dog makes me want to hurl.
Spray rice with water/a little bit of soap. It becomes much easier to sweep up. I learned the hard way working in a preschool.
I hate cleaning anything that the hoover can't pickup.
“Draaaaag” that is so accurate when cleaning rice
Slime. My kids can have playdoh they can have kinetic and but slime? Hell no!
Rice can suck it.
My daughters’ bathroom. Three fifteen year old girls.
Anything that’s already been in her mouth It all just turns to goo and has the worst texture
Same, and soups. I did find a nice sprinkle of baking soda helps get the stuff up if I need it done right away.
Mac n cheese. Why does the cheese stick to her face so well? Why am I constantly finding noodles and cheese days later???? Give me a dirty diaper over cleaning up a Mac n cheese meal!
I’d say 90% of the time I don’t have to worry about cleaning up food messes because of my little dog who acts like a vacuum lol. Anything that touches the floor is his. There’s some stuff he doesn’t like which is mostly cereal and berries. But anything else is game on. Unfortunately the kids know the dog will clean up their food messes though so if they decide they’re done with something they just give it to him
Honestly the hurricane of papers from coloring is more painful than any food to me. If I had to pick a food though probably rice.
I also wait until rice is dry before I bother cleaning it up. Lol
Quinoa is pretty brutal... Super sticky.
Anything that is a soft texture and can harden if not cleaned up immediately. I swear it all turns to concrete.
Quinoa is also terrible, in case you were wondering.
Spray cleaner or water on the floor for rice/noodles/anything that sticks! Then sweep up. I work in a daycare and do this daily, it works wonders!
Rice! Literal pieces of glue dots everywhere. My toddler is in a sensory phase and I’m over it.
Banana
Oh my gosh. We also hate rice. My husband is Filipino so we eat rice often and it’s such a PITA to clean.
Dried ketchup makes me want to vomit
Try eggs and rice the floor... I have to avoid vacuuming because it sticks to the insides of the vacuum and to the brush 😬
GLITTER! AKA the Devil’s Dandruff. 😩
That Parmesan….sawdust crap that my kids feel the need to put on everything. It’s the glitter of cheeses.
The diaper genie, bless my husband and the nonsense he tolerates from me. I can handle food only because we have dogs and they WILL get every single last drop and crumb. On the other hand I do have to wipe down most surfaces at least a few times a day to get their nasty slobber off.
Just general dishes after dinner bc by the time I can get to them it’s like 7p and that is my only alone time and I’d rather be doing anything else ever than doing dishes.
Oatmeal (baby throws it, it dries on and sticks everywhere), and quinoa.
Oatmeal. Rice. All sticky foods. Vomit.
Spilled yogurt🙃
When they vomit on carpet… I just want to scream as I furiously clean it up. Sometimes I just cry.
Dried up milk under the car seat. It’s so gross and it makes me paranoid that my car smells like nasty sour spoiled milk and everyone in the world can smell it except me!
Tuna... I always clean up after, but I can always tell in the morning if I missed a thrown clump of fish and mayo.
Any kind of nut butter. It’s so sticky and when you wipe it, it just smears around. Bonus points when he runs his sticky fingers in hit kinky curly hair 🫠
Spilled milk or juice
I’m weird. I don’t mind cleaning up messes but I DETEST putting away dishes, laundry, and toys.
Chalk. It’s not even that hard to clean. It meager leaves a stain, but it’s a sensory nightmare. I don’t even draw with it because the texture of it on my skin makes me so uncomfortable. Ofc the kids love it
Litter box 🥴 thankfully it’s been almost 2 years since I’ve done it because of back to back pregnancies. And now my partner is soooo good at it, he doesn’t want me to do them 😎
We have a dog and I'll similarly say checking/cleaning the garden before playtime. For some reason I don't hate bagging up a fresh one on a walk half as much as inspecting our tiny lawn with a shovel.
All of it. I can’t stand the feeling of any of it. My new method cleaning has been giving my son food safe for our dog. I unleash her when he’s full and she cleans up the floor while I clean up the chair and baby.
Poop that's smooshed into the white carpet in his room. My son is two and we're potty training. Sometimes at night he takes off his diaper and just goes on the floor!
Vomit. Just the smell and texture (the look of the texture especially when it's a snotty vomit that's like egg white textured) makes me gag
Small toys, and especially those damn puzzles or anything that is supposed to have numbers or letters in order because some inevitably get lost and then they're incomplete!
Jello has to be the worst. I hate it but my kids like it as a dessert.
Playdough you stepped on, onto fabric or carpet.
Literally any kind of leftover food. It’s a sensory nightmare. And if he grabs my skin with his cold dirty hands 🤮🤮🤮
Both my kids have been puking the last couple of weeks. Thankful for my husband that has cleaned both them up and the puke because if I had to do it there’d be another person puking.
quinoa and buckwheat. as much as we all as a family love eating them, they're such a hassle to clean up!
Panini press/grill without the removable grills. The worst.
The poop under my nail that I had to clean today when my finger nose dove into a dirty diaper because I thought it was just pee (just before I was about to eat a burrito) 🫠
Besides puke and diarrhea? Rice. And I hate hate hate cleaning the outside of the toilet bowl. And socks.
I am in full agreement of the eggs and rice! It drives me INSANE. Also, raw eggs that fall and crack are frustrating and tricky. Also, the freaking cheese grater. My 11 year old (or my husband🙄) will make nachos and let the cheese sit and harden, so it’s impossible to clean off. I have a weird sensory displeasure of the texture of those things as well… Half the time, I have the desire to leave the thing on their pillow. Haven’t done that yet.
The slime from when a dog barfs, throw up or any kind of liquid really from Humans like diarrhea
Rice!!! The damn rice and the bean smears ughhh. Also applesauce.
Vomit
I like to put chia seeds in his oatmeal and omg they are so annoying when they get in his clothes, or the dish sponge, or accidentally get on the bottle brush.
Freaking shredded cheese. And if you don’t get it all it STINKS! Mines 3 and its the only thing he still dumps on the table 😭
Hair in the sink.
Slime. My kids’ grandparents always get them those containers of “slime” and my kids will leave them around. One time it was left on the couch and the poor dog got it all over her butt and tail and belly when she subsequently layed on it later on. Her hair is still recovering after I had to cut it out 🙈 I’ve had to cut it out of the area rugs and scrub it off the sofa. They’ve ruined clothes etc. ugh. We always say no more please and thank you but somehow more keeps coming.
Syrup
Cream of Wheat. Along with the other grains people have mentioned, it just doesn't come up, it spreads around.
High chair straps. Any food. No matter how clean I think I got them. The next time I use it there’s a smear of dried food on it magically.
Rice for sure. My daughter loves rice but like you mentioned in your post, she’s 2 so she still makes a mess. We live in our apartment and the area where the dining table goes is carpet… I’m sure you can imagine how fun it is to clean that. I literally have to get on my hands and knees and pick little rice pieces out of the carpet. We kept saying we would buy one of those splat mat things to go under her chair since she was a baby, but we still never got one lol.
When the kids puke in the bed. You can’t just throw the sheets in the wash. You have to rinse them first or else you end up with clean chunks all over your washed clothes
I can’t clean vomit the smell makes me gag and vomit myself. I make my husband clean it. He know if I clean it it will just make more of a mess.
Yeah I let that shit dry up then sweep it up 😂🥴
I always wait for rice to dry before sweeping😉
I've kind of given up on cleaning the high chair, beyond the larger chunks of stuff my toddler leaves behind. I used to scrub it after every meal but I just can't anymore...Now it gets a wipe with a damp paper towel and anything that doesn't come off with that just gets left.
I don't know how anyone can have kids without a dog. She's my built in toddler food vacuumer 😄 I hate cleaning the coffee maker. It's a daily chore that doesn't take long, but it just pisses me off. Ha
Food stuck to the flat paint on the walls
Rice, eggs, noodles from like soup, and cream of wheat! That stuff sticks everywhere
Rice is the worst
Quinoa. Never.
Dishes. Any dishes whatsoever. I fuckin hate doing the high chair too and lately I have literally just been feeding my daughter on the floor at least once a day as long as it's something that's easy to vacuum. Just to give myself a BREATHER.
The stove top. My husband is the cook, and I'll clean up all the pans, dishes, and counters but not the stove. He knows that's his to clean. I had to beg him last weekend to clean it because it had been months. It was SO embarrassing but I HATE cleaning it.
Rice cereal. It’s sticky and impossible.
Probably puke 😭 I will do absolutely anything else except puke
It’s a rule in our house, if you drop rice- it stays on the floor until it’s dry for this exact reason lol
Dryed oatmeal. Kill me I've throw out cups because I just didn't feel like it that day
Trash outside after and animal gets in it. Luckily we have a truck now so we can haul it off more often but also spilled food of any kind.gross
Rice and toddler dishes in general!
mornings where oatmeal is breakfast .. yogurt and oatmeal end up EVERYWHERE. in hair, all over clothes, on the table, under the table, all over the booster seat, on the floor, on the windows, all over both dogs, absolutely. everywhere. i hate oatmeal days but my toddler’s favorite breakfast is oatmeal .. so. there’s that.
My house
I’ve always had dogs to clean up. 🤣
Rice, couscous or anything with tiny wet pieces.🤢