Ah, your little princes, those gorgeous boys of yours, with faces like angels they couldn't possibly get into any trouble, could they?
The truth of the matter is that little boys can actually cause a lot of havoc in an impressively short space of time. If you're a mum who has been blessed with boys and boys alone, you'll know the ever present struggles you battle each and every day when you're the only female in a household.
From leaving the loo seat up to making dens out of your favourite bed linen, here are the 13 things only mums of boys can relate too…
1. You have to accept that your living room is a boxing ring
The play fighting (and sometimes real fighting) never stops. No matter how hard you try to suggest a nice board game, somehow it always reverts to jumping on each other from the arm of the couch or wrestling on your best rug.
2. You find pants in the strangest places
Behind the radiator? Check. Under their beds? Check. In the toy box? Check. There's no place too strange for a pair of pants to end up in your house - in fact you probably can't remember the last time you actually found a pair in the washing basket!
3. Every part of your house has been made into a den at some point
For this same reason their bed sheets never stay clean for long and your linen cupboard is constantly being pulled out of place as they find the essential sheet to cover their fort with. There's always a precariously placed weight holding the sheet in place too - you've learnt to look the other way and do some deep breathing.
4. Nothing is too strange to find in their pockets
Stones, feathers, twigs, toys, sweet wrappers, shiny things... You name it, you've found it in your sons' pockets.
5. You've had to learn to love baths, and not for yourself
How are little boys constantly dirty? Your team need a bath every night without fail thanks to those mucky knees and faces that look like they've been eating dirt.
6. Your perceptions of what's dangerous have seriously shifted
At first you were constantly asking them to stop climbing so high in that tree or to please not throw things at their brother, but now you just let them get on with it a little more than you'd care to admit...
7. You now find farts funny
You have no choice, little (and big) boys find farts hilarious and you've just had to get on board with it. Although you'd never admit it to them!
8. You can't remember seeing an undamaged pair of socks or trousers
How do they wear through their knees and toes so quickly and manage to so skillfully damage every new t-shirt you buy them?
9. Your fridge is constanty empty
Even when they're little, boys seem to have insatiable appetites and they're constantly raiding the fride for treats. One minute you had a full fridge, the next thing you know a sole lemon is left looking lonely.
10. The sound of computer games has become the soundtrack to your life
The bangs, crashes, shots and laser sounds haunt your dreams. Even when they're not actually playing the games they're making the noises anyway while play-shooting at their brothers with imaginary lasers.
11. You are fighting a constant battle with the toilet
No matter how much you tell them, that toilet seat never stays down!
12. You've learnt to live with severe pain on a daily basis
Plugs for their favourite computer consoles, Lego or plastic soldiers all hurt like nothing you've ever felt before, and somehow it never gets easier.
13. You are actually surprised when you see your boys dressed
As a mum of boys you just have to accept that those little chaps aren't going to let themselves be constrained by the confines of clothes. There's nothing they love more than stripping off straight away when they get through the door and they somehow always manage to avoid their pjs after a bath for quite some time too.
Where to next?
The types of mum you'll find at the school gates
The 15 struggles a dad of all girls will face
The 6 very real pains only mums of Lego lovers will know
