My children are chicken-fried nuts. Jacob is chaotic at times, but underneath that boy who’s running around screaming and pretending to be a robot is a very keen mind. Exemplar gratis: we used to own a hammock. It’s strings have long since rotted away, but we did keep the hammock stand, a set of tubes of metal that looks like a minimalist canoe. Jacob took the chains that the hammock would hang from, looped them together, and wrapped them around the handle of a little tykes see-saw. He then walked over to the other end of the canoe and applied force, lifting the see-saw into the air. Essentially, it was a lever. 5 years old and the kid’s got more mechanical engineering in his blood than I ever did.
Jessie also belongs in the devilishly sweet category. She managed to pull out the stepladder, climb up to the kitchen countertop, climb on the countertop, open the cabinet, get out the green treat bucket, set it on the counter, then climb down after helping herself to a treat or two. When we confronted her about it, the following conversation took place:
“Is Jessie allowed to walk on the countertop?”
“Nooooo.”
“Is she going to do it again?”
“Yeeeesssss.”
Sigh.