Being a mom is much easier when kids just think they are being sneaky. They sneak a cookie from the cookie jar and forget to put the lid back on. They push a chair to the counter to climb on, and forget to put it back. All too soon though, they figure out that the reason mom and dad know everything is because of the evidence they leave behind, soon they perfect their sneakiness, making my job a lot harder.
The other night, my three year old said, "Goodnight, mom."
That was his first mistake. My three-year-old rarely decides to go to bed on his own. He never says "goodnight" in such a cheery tone. Normally his goodnights are followed by a couple of heartfelt sobs. Needless to say, my momma radar kicked on.
I looked up to see him hightailing it for the stairs. His hand was up the bottom of his shirt.
"Come here a second," I told him.
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"Okay," he said as he runs past me out of the room. After he tossed his stash of q-tips that he tried to sneak upstairs on the bathroom floor, he walked back to me, ever so innocently.
"Goodnight," I said, "Go straight to bed. Do not pass the bathroom. Do not collect the q-tips."
He looked at me in shock, wondering how I could have possibly figured that one out. I didn't explain. The longer he tries to be sneaky, the longer I have the upper hand.
After we send him to bed, he'll often come down to use the bathroom. Very conveniently, he will drag his blanket down stairs with him. Once he is done in the bathroom, he'll take his blanket and go set it over a toy.
Then he'll pick his blanket back up, careful to keep his tractor inside. I tend to figure that one out too.
Other times he'll hold his hands behind his back as he walks through the living room. Unfortunately for him, he forgets to put his hands in front of him once he passes me. Of course I see the cookie.
At times it is something he says that gives him away. He has come to me and said, "There is no candy in my pocket. Okay, mom." After I took the candy out of his pockets, he said quite defensively, "Well, I wasn't going to eat it."
Other times I'll be so engrossed in my own work that I don't even notice what they are playing with. A little voice brings me back to reality, "Don't look at me, K Mom." Of course I look, and take his dad's hammer away. He says a little annoyed, "I said not to look at me."
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When it becomes obvious that I am about to catch him using something that isn't a toy, he'll quickly give me the object and claim that he "found it".
I know that kids are pretty curious creatures. They are always imitating the world around them. Their desire to learn and grow is so strong, that sometimes they can't help but to try out dad's hammer. Other times the need to fulfill their sweet tooth is so tempting, that they bear the consequences. Although some days I am very frustrated, I actually enjoy the stage when they disobey so obviously. Disobedience seems more innocent this way.
All too soon they start putting the lid back on the cookie jar, leaving nothing but a couple crumbs as evidence. They push the chair back to the table. They put the q-tips up their sleeve or in their pockets. They wrap smaller, less noticeable toys in their blankets. They quit mentioning the gum and screws in their pockets, letting me find them at laundry time.
Of course I still know that something is going on. I mean it's pretty obvious when there aren't anymore cookies in the cookie jar that someone has been eating them. I may be on my fourth trip to the cookie stash, but I certainly didn't eat them all. Yet when I confront them, "nobody did it." They could have cookie crumbs on their shirt, and chocolate around their mouth, and still they would claim "it wasn't me."
If I insist that someone ate all the cookies, they equally insist that it must have been their one year old sister. My job is no longer easy. At least though I have the simple truth to fall back on when the blame game starts. I just ask, "So what did God see?"
