Oh Fudge! Literally

"Oh Fudge" has become my favourite exclaimation to use around the house when either I injure myself or something doesn't exactly go in accordance to my plans. It started when I had kids in my effort not to say some of the other ..not so kid-friendly words that begin with the same phonetic prefix. Anyway...I recently discovered that I use that phrase more than I had realized when I dropped the lid to one of my pots in the kitchen and the 18 month old comes up behind me and says "Oh Fudge" in this adorable little baby voice! I had to look twice to make sure it actually came from her and not the older one. I cracked up laughing! I digress. The real story I intended to tell revolves around a chocolate cake that my husband's grandmother made us for Christmas. We had eaten several slices (yummy..it was delicious) and the remainder was sitting in a tupperware cake plate on my stove top in the kitchen. The way our house is laid out, there are two entrances to the kitchen. One doorway into the den/dining area and the other into the main hallway. We keep baby gates up across both entrances which keeps the kids in the den and denies them access to the rest of the house. That is about the only way I can get any work done without having to watch them quite so closely. (Or so I thought). Anyway...the stove in the kitchen sits right next to the doorway which was barred by a gate. I had taken a few minutes to go to the bathroom while the girls were content in the den. All of a sudden I hear Cat scream "No Sister!" followed quickly by "Mommy! Sister's in big trouble!" Oh fudge! I think to myself as I hurry up and finish my business and paper work. I'm hopping down the hall pulling my jeans up as I go and have just finished attending to the zipper when I look up and see what used to be my adorable, pajama clad 18 month old toddling toward me. She is covered quite literally from head to toe in chocolate cake and chocolate frosting. I can just see her eyes peeking out from a completely brown face. It's all over her clothing and between her toes. It's obvious that she has gotten into the rest of G'ma's cake...but how? Did I leave it on the table in the dining room? No...it was on the stove. It was then that I noticed the kitchen chair pushed over to the gate. I had promised the girls a piece after they finished their lunch. Apparantly Ash decided she wasn't going to wait on me to serve her. While Cat sat calmly and finished her meal, Ash pushed the chair over to the gate...crawled up in it...and pulled the cake off the stove into the floor. Luckily for her it landed right side up and the top popped off. She had helped herself to a little bit of cake and a WHOLE lot of frosting!!! I didn't know where to begin to recover from this disaster. There were little chocolate hand and foot prints all over the floors and walls...table...some toys...everywhere! What was left of the cake was sitting in a huge, gooey pile in the floor. I finally decided to clean the baby hands and feet first - at least that way she couldn't make copies of the ones I was already scrubbing off the walls. I finally got it all cleaned up and dumped her chocolate covered rear into the bathtub which promptly turned into a muddy chocolate swap...complete with little vinyl bathtub toy frogs. I was really too stunned to get onto Ash properly. It was one of those situations where you kinda have to laugh to keep from crying. When asked what she had to say for herself, Ash turned her adorable little pigtailed head in my direction...gave me a huge chocolate covered grin...and said "I EAT!" I guess that about summed it up.