My Mischievous Children

I tend to think very highly of my kids.  I think they are pretty awesome.  I think it may sometimes come off as bragging in my posts, but I hope those of you that know me would know that I don't intend to brag.  I want to be honest in how some of the changes we are making have been really beneficial for the children so I write about the positive benefits that I see.  There are, however, some not-so-positive moments :-)

Here is some proof of the latest:

A little while ago, I fell asleep on the living room floor (I was probably listening to someone read to me - that always gets me drowsy, I can't sit in one place too long without falling asleep).  I half-way woke up when I felt little hands tapping on my leg.  It took me a couple of minutes to start wondering why little hands were tapping on my leg.  I sat up and saw that little Ray had found a small canister of white tempera paint that his sister had left on the counter and was decorating my pants.

 Monday, I asked the kids to keep an eye on Ray while I got into the shower.  While I was in there, Bud, Little Miss and Bazinks decided it would be fun to stuff some long socks with smaller socks and use these socks as weapons.  They got on my bed and proceeded to hit each other and fall.  Bud was backing away from a hit, slipped off the corner of my bed, put his hand back to catch himself, and started screaming.  I hurried and got out of the shower to see what was the matter.  His wrist looked a little swollen so I put some ice on it, bandaged it up, and took him to Knights of Freedom (I figured we would keep an eye on it to see if it kept hurting and if I should take him to the Doctor).  Yesterday, it still hurt him to twist his wrist, so I took him in.  After lots of waiting and driving (to the Doctor, to the Hospital, back to the Doctor) he came out with a nice, new blue cast that he is very proud of.

When he learned he had a slight fracture on his wrist, he jumped for joy and exclaimed - "That means I won't have to do the dishes for three weeks!"  We'll see if he's still so happy with it in a couple of days :-)

Yesterday, I was fixing lunch and realized I hadn't heard from Ray in a little while so I asked Spice to go check on him.  I heard her say, "Oh no!  Mom, you better come see this."  That's never a good thing to hear.  I went upstairs and found that Bud had left a permanent marker on his dresser after making himself a chart for scouts.  Ray found it.  Here is the pretty art he created on the bedroom wall (I took this picture after scrubbing the marker with some magic eraser - obviously the eraser didn't work).

 Ray is learning to eat with utensils.  He's doing a pretty good job, but once in a while he decides his hands are easier and that he would rather wear his food instead of eating it.

I know I should put a stop to this behavior as soon as I see it, but he's often too quick for me.

This morning, I saw a bucket of flour in the middle of the kitchen.  Spice had made cookies last night and left the flour out.  I didn't put it away because I wanted her to remember to clean up everything she gets out when she bakes, but I did lock the lid on so no one could get into it.  I went to the couch to read my scriptures.  Ray likes to sit next to me as I read (no one else is awake), after a while, he got up and wondered into the kitchen.  I didn't think much of it because he loves to play with the cookie cutters on the bottom drawer and hang them up on the handles of the cupboards and drawers.  After a while he peeked out at me and I saw flour on his face.  I went to the kitchen and this is what I found:

I took a picture, of course, and then cleaned him off, swept the kitchen (today is mopping day so I didn't bother mopping) and locked the lid on the flour again, but I didn't put it away.  Don't ask me why.  Obviously, I wasn't thinking much.  I went upstairs to start this blog post, Bazinks was up by then, and he and Ray were playing together in the front room.  A little while later Bazinks came upstairs to tell me that Ray was playing with the flour.  I hoped he had caught him before the mess was too big, but he hadn't.  This time he decided to put it in his hair and throw it in the air so there was flour in all the nooks and crannies of the cupboard doors and drawers.  

Maybe it's time to start putting this child in time-outs?  Who could ever be mad at that sweet innocent face though?  Notice he had the broom out and was trying to clean up his mess.  As I was cleaning up, he tried to take the lid off the flour again and I sternly said, "No!" so he gave me a sweet hug as if begging me not to be cross with him.  I got flour all over me, but he's too sweet for me to care.   He's very good at getting his way.

As curious as this child is, he's not the one that's causing me the most worries.  Bazinks has picked up a strange new habit of picking out his eye lashes.  He has had the longest, most beautiful eyelashes.  His sister once told him he could make a wish and blow away his eyelash and he decided it was fun to pluck them out.  I don't know how to stop it!  They are almost all gone :-(  Any suggestions?

He is also developing this new habit of yelling out annoying noises at random times which are becoming more and more frequent.  Bud does this, so I'm sure that's where he picked it up, but he's doing it so much now that it's starting to drive me a little crazy.  Maybe it's a call for attention?  I'll make an effort to give him some one-on-one time today and see if that helps.

You may be wondering why I haven't said anything about the girls.  They do get into trouble, but theirs is a more emotional type, not something you can take a picture of or really document in specific words.  Except, Little Miss has decided that making nests with blankets and pillows is the best game to play and she's not very good at remembering to clean it all up when she is done.  I'm getting a little tired of finding blankets and pillows in piles all over the floor.  She's cleaning some up right now.  They are sweet girls, but do have their moments of emotional turmoil that they are learning to calm down.  They are getting pretty good at it though, so I can't complain.

My kids are telling me that Ray has a poopy diaper.  Their rooms are a mess (even though they think they're clean) since we've been mostly out of the house the last couple of days and I haven't been checking up on them, so I guess I better go and get started on our day!