Lesson #2

Little Children should never be trusted with scissors.

This lesson has two "case in point" stories. The first comes from my childhood, the second from a nephew (who is teaching my brother what trouble is).

C.I.P. #1
When I was 3 years old my parents bought a new house. We had lots of lovely new neighbors, one of whom had brought us a plate of cookies to welcome us. A few days later, my mother and I walked down the street (I remember it being quite a long way, but it was probably only 5 or 6 houses) to return the plate. This kindly neighbor had a daughter that was a year or two older than I and she invited me to see her bedroom. I went upstairs to see what treasures she had while our mothers visited. (I do not remember the following events, but my mother has repeated the story often enough that it seems as though I do.) After a few minutes, my new friend escorted me down the stairs and told our mothers that we had been playing "beauty parlor". She then presented one of my pigtails to her mother. My mother gasped and stared. I had just had pictures taken that morning (this is the only picture of me that has been blown up to approximately a 24" x 30" print) and my sweet blond hair was clipped in two pigtails. She had cut off an entire pigtail ABOVE the clip. I don't remember ever really playing at her house again.

C.I.P. #2
My sweet nephew (approximately age 5 when this occurred) had decided their family dog needed a haircut. He took the poor dog (t.p.d.) into his parent's bathroom (that's where haircuts are done, right?) and began "cutting" t.p.d.'s hair. I can only imagine how challenging this must have been for a five year old. They barely have enough motor skills to cut a piece of paper into equal parts, let alone trim a dog's hair. I have a dog and I know personally that dogs don't like to hold still for any kind of grooming (that will probably be another lesson down the road...). Well, m.s.n. (my sweet nephew), is a very determined young fellow. Unfortunately, he trimmed t.p.d.'s ear instead of his hair. This resulted in a good deal of yapping and crying- from both t.p.d. and m.s.n. and naturally a good deal of blood. Of course, you all know what a dog does when it gets wet, right? Yes, you are picturing it now... the shake down. T.p.d. did not differentiate between water and blood, so he began to shake and that is when my sweet sister-in-law (s.s.i.l.) discovered the activity. She had the mighty task of calming down m.s.n. and taking t.p.d. to the vet to attempt to reattach the ear. The good news here is that they were successful in reattaching t.p.d.'s ear. It is quite floppy however, since nerves and muscles were severed. We like to think it adds character. Also, when my brother returned home, he got to practice his crime-scene investigation skills in the bathroom. He said it really did look like a murder had been committed in there.

Again, the lesson here is always keep scissors in a safe (preferably locked) place. You never know what your child is dreaming up...

Lesson #1

Never underestimate the curiosity of little boys...

So, a few months ago as I was helping my oldest son with homework, my middle two boys decided they wanted some s'mores. They proceeded to get graham crackers, marshmallows, and chocolate chips out of the pantry and place everything strategically on my kitchen table. Suddenly, I smelled a terrible burning smell. You know the kind when you burn the popcorn in the microwave and then your whole house smells like burnt popcorn for a week? Yes, that's the smell. (Did I mention this is our brand new house that we've only lived in for a few months?) Well, I quickly ran down the stairs to discover they had put the chocolate chips in a bowl and put it in the microwave on HIGH for 5 minutes. UGH! I quickly removed the stinky bowl from the microwave (the bowl ended up in the garbage), and opened all the windows. When I saw the mess on the table I calmly told my boys that I was already quite upset and if they didn't want me to get more so, then they had better clean up the mess. I went back upstairs to finish helping big brother. When the homeowrk was done I returned to the kitchen to find that it was relatively clean. The only problem was that they had used the dustbuster to vacuum all the crumbs off my table and that had left a myriad of scratches all over the surface of my (also brand new) solid wood table. Sigh..... The lesson learned here is to never leave little boys alone or out of earshot for more than a few moments... especially if there is more than one boy because the mischief will increase exponentially.