Life with a child is, above all, one thing: unpredictable! Parenthood is full of surprises. Along with all the beautiful moments, a few mishaps are unavoidable, too. Isabel and Marie from Little Years have written down two of their favorite—and most challenging—experiences from the chaotic life with young children. It gets almost dramatic at times, but we can reveal this much: luckily, everything turned out fine in the end. Read for yourself!

Isabel

"My children are three years apart. I thought that was a relaxed gap, but I found it to be quite intense in the first few years with two children. Of course, there were still wonderful moments that I could truly enjoy, but one experience in particular stayed with me for a long time!"

During the second parental leave, when the children were three years and ten months old, we went on a long parental leave trip to South Africa. It was wonderful! But even there, neither of the children slept particularly well, so we were mostly TIRED during this time, too. And of course, everyday life with two small children is exhausting even on vacation: diapering, bedtime routines, preparing meals, entertaining, comforting, reading aloud, accompanying—all of this still has to happen, even during a supposed break.

One situation from this trip has stayed especially vivid in my memory. We had rented a house together with friends in a beautiful, spacious complex. The daughter of our friends was also three years old—perfect for our son—and the two wandered around together a lot.

One afternoon, everyone else was out—by the pool, shopping. I was briefly alone with the three children and still remember thinking, "Oh, this is actually more relaxing than I thought." My daughter was taking a nap in the bedroom, and the two three-year-olds were playing peacefully.

Eventually, the baby woke up. I went to him, picked him up, we cuddled, and I realized he needed a new diaper. I changed it—all good. At some point, I had that moment where I thought, “It’s awfully quiet over there with the kids...” Then I heard them giggling. And my son said, “Oh dear. I think we’re going to get in trouble.” That was followed by another giggle from both of them.

I walked through the house with the baby in my arms, looking for the two of them, and found them in the bathroom. OH. MY. GOD. They were sitting in front of the toilet, both holding red nail polish. And painting the toilet! In an Airbnb!!!! I shouted, “Are you crazy!!?? What are you doing??” and got shocked looks in return. Somehow they knew this wasn’t okay, but they also seemed to find the newly decorated toilet kind of nice. When I looked closer, I realized the bathtub had been “decorated,” too. I only remember scolding and scolding, securing the nail polish, scolding under my breath, and even getting really loud. “Nail polish is ONLY for nails! You can’t get this off anymore!!” Both children, of course, started crying, so I switched from scolding to comforting mode. Then I sat all three children in front of the TV, first called my husband to tell him what had happened (“They did WHAT?!”), and then opened a bottle of nail polish remover.

I couldn’t get everything out; in the fine cracks of the toilet and bathtub, there are probably still pink traces from that afternoon even today. We wrote to the Airbnb host with a softened version of the story ("Something must have leaked; we'll cover the damage"). A few days later, we moved out, and throughout the rest of the vacation I kept thinking, "Surely, a big bill will come our way someday..." However—nothing happened. We never heard anything again. Phew!

Marie

"I have three children. Wow, I never thought I would write that. My daughter is now one year old and is currently being introduced to daycare. The chaos of the last two years feels a bit more manageable at the moment. And yes, it really was chaos. Two children under two—that's the ultimate challenge of parenthood. If you've managed that, I believe not much can shake you in life. I'm sure of it."

Two small children in the toddler stage—we were all hands on deck (a shout-out to all educators: you are superheroes, truly). But now, back to the madness of those first days: the third pregnancy with a lively toddler was tough. There was no time for recovery breaks. But what came after was even harder: my son was in kamikaze mode at one year old. He climbed everywhere, feared nothing, and practically scaled the walls. I could never understand why parents buy a playpen; after my second son, I knew why. But even from the expensive, large playpen (we lovingly called it the baby prison), he soon escaped with impressive skill. My daughter was just a month and a half old, and I was home alone with the two little ones. We were just about to lie down for a nap (another huge challenge with two small children!), when a shrill beeping sounded through the apartment. What was that? I had never heard such a noise before! I jumped up and ran through our apartment in confusion. Where was that shrill beeping coming from?! Suddenly, I was in the kitchen—the lights were blazing. The source of the fire alarm was on the stove! My two-year-old had probably turned on the burners unnoticed. Completely in shock, I couldn’t remember where our fire extinguisher was (note: always keep a fire extinguisher within sight of the kitchen, but childproof!). I weighed my options: grab the children, run out of the apartment, and call the fire department (GOOD decision!) Or try to put out the fire myself (not such a good decision). I decided to put out the fire with water (BAD decision). What was burning brightly on the stove and barely recognizable was our kettle! It is important to remember that electrical appliances should NEVER be extinguished with water, or you risk getting an electric shock—and, well, I won’t go into what could happen next.

I was lucky in my misfortune: I was able to extinguish the fire quickly, threw open the windows, grabbed both children, and ran onto our balcony in a bathrobe. The two of them hardly noticed anything about the incident; only Mama probably looked a bit confused… The madness didn’t get any better for a while, but at least our little one stopped trying to set the apartment on fire—because since the incident, it’s as safe as a padded cell, and I have about 100 more gray hairs on my head.

Parenting always means being prepared for the impossible. There will surely be many moments with your little explorer that you’ll never forget. And even if small—or larger ;)—mishaps happen, it helps to process the shock afterward with a dose of humor.