#100DAYPROJECT Day 72 #littlepicasso #cousins
A week ago we visited my aunt and her family. Brett was away for the weekend on a ski trip and I packed up the kids on Saturday morning and headed south. We were going through the drive through getting breakfast at McDonalds when my aunt called at 8am to ask what time to expect us. I was pretty pleased to report we were already on the road - somehow I had managed to get all three kids in the car and on the road that early in the morning. Ok - I had some help with the packing. I just threw the stuff in the car and loaded up the little monsters.
After week arrived it wasn't long before all the kids were running around creating mischief and playing really well together. It was so fun to watch. They were running around and even the baby decided to take her first few steps. For a brief period it stopped raining and as far as I'm concerned in the Pacific Northwest not raining = good weather. "Let's get these kids outside before they destroy your new house." They rode their bikes around the cul-de-sac and splashed in a few puddles.
On Sunday my oldest cousin had her first reconciliation at church. For all the running and playing they boys wouldn't go to sleep the night before, so neither did I. So I stayed behind in charge of the little boys while they went to church.
I was putting a few dishes in dishwasher, trying to make myself useful while the boys played. They three boys were running around shooting Nurf guns and making harmless mischief...so I thought. That's when Eli's radar kicked in. Marker radar. It is a gift, really. Children have this seemingly magical power to find things they shouldn't have. Hammers, sweets, and markers. He was playing quietlyin the entryway, too quietly. I was adjacent to an office I hadn't realized was there. And the, I realized what he had been up to. He had been coloring on the walls of their brand new house with a red marker. His scribbles ran the full length of the wall in the entryway, at least 10 feet.
My aunt wasn't home. This had happened on my watch.
"AHHHHHHHH! Nooooooo!!!"
"Please be washable marker. Please be washable."
I scrubbed the walls with a rag and dish soap. It helped but it only faded. Now there were plenty of washable markers around. But like I said, toddlers have magic marker radar. So he found a red, permanent marker.
Then the true agony began. I waited for them to come home thinking up a plan to make it right. We don't live nearby, so coming back to repaint the wall wasn't an option. I could hire a painter, I thought. I felt absolutely terrible and it's not like painting was on their weekend agenda in their new house.
They arrived and H's first reconciliation had been a success. "Welcome home, I hope things went well. Now it's time for my confession. You see, Eli redecorated your entryway..."
Fortunately she was really cool about the whole thing. Yes, these things do happen. But U imagined them happening at home, not while I was at someone else's house. I went out and got a magic eraser for a last ditch effort to wash the marker away. No luck, but it did turn it in to a one coat paint project. During the magic eraser effort Eli found yet another marker and took a second pass - running by leaving a stripe behind him. He was on a tear. So I packed up my monsters and headed home.
We stopped at the Mt. Saint Helen's Visitor Center on our way back north. It was a beautiful sun break and I took a very much needed deep breath. Then I located the markers in our house in my mind.
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