New Ways of Torture

My kids have always been very creative in finding new ways to torture me, but this week they stepped up their game.
Beautiful has been eating my chapstick. He loves the stuff! I keep it on my night stand to use before bed, so when he crawls in bed at night he sneaks the little tube and has himself a snack. I've gone through four tubes of Blistex this week. I can't imagine it tastes good, yet the constant teeth marks prove he loves the stuff!

Then there's Austin. Oh dear. He has been extremely sneaky lately. While cleaning out some stuff in the closet upstairs, I discovered 2 cases worth of soda cans. He's been sneaking them from the fridge, hiding away in his room to chug them down, then quickly stashing the cans in the back of the closet. No wonder he's been so hyper lately! But it does make me wonder when he's managing to sneak the cans. We're in the living room most of the day, so he can't sneak into the kitchen without me noticing. So he's either timing my bathroom trips perfectly, or coming downstairs between 2 and 5am, the only time both Lee and I are in bed, and helping himself to the fridge. It's not that he's thirsty. He has his own cup which he can get water in at any time. He just wants the sodas he knows he's not allowed to have.
Then last night I discovered the best surprise ever at the worst possible time. He had gone into the bathroom at some point, and unwrapped every single one of my tampons, pushing them out of the applicator. Perfect. now they are completely unusable, unsterilized, and useless to me. Aside from the fact that it was a brand new box, and those things aren't cheap, what the heck was I supposed to do?! And WHY? WHY would you feel the need to do that? WHEN did you have time to do all this? I don't watch him go to the bathroom, and I certainly don't time him. If he's taking a while, I just assume he's taking care of business. If he needs me, he can yell for me. I tend not to interfere. But maybe I should.
Then Lee discovered his new, family size bottle of Head and Shoulders shampoo was empty. I don't use the stuff, and the babies are never unattended in the bathroom...so that only leaves Austin. He's been using it as bubble bath! Which seems fruitless, as it doesn't really bubble- probably why he used the whole bottle. For the most part, he's not alone in the tub. I get the babies out, put him in the tub while I put them in bed, then it's back to him. So in that five minute window he manages to drain an entire bottle of shampoo. Lovely. Another $10 down the drain.
Oh, but he didn't stop there! He found my hair dye. Which had to be quite a feat for him. It stays in a cabinet, top shelf, above the toilet. So he had to stand on the toilet and rifle through the cabinet to find the box, buried way in the back (my roots can vouch for this fact)then open all of it. Again, WHY?! So now we've gone from annoying and inconvenient, to possible dangerous. What if he had gotten the dye in his eyes or drank some? I would assume that my child would not drink hair dye, but I'd also assume he wouldn't play with my tampons. And just like everything else, he shoved all the contents back into the box, placed it back on the shelf and pretended nothing ever happened. Another $20 out the window. So in a few days, and a few short bathroom trips, he's wasted $40 and caused more gray hair- which I now can't cover up. The joys of motherhood. And we have no idea how to fix this problem. I think it would be a violation of privacy to stand there and watch him every time he has to go, but I can't let him continue to play with chemicals. We use mostly homemade cleaners and the few store bought things are organic. I don't like chemicals in the house. But hair dye is full of them, and I'm not willing to give that up yet. 22 year olds shouldn't have gray hair, but I do. This is why. I'd like to continue to dye my hair, and not be worried my kids will eat it. Everything has child locks on it, but he's smart enough to work it. He can open all the gates, door knob covers, fridge and cabinet locks, and everything else we've tried. So short of following him around all day and never letting him have a single moment of privacy, there's no way to stop it.
And then there's Chloe Beth. The cutest little girl, with the biggest personality- and the creativity to make me crazy! She will attempt anything, right in front of you, grinning innocently the whole time. As if she looks cute enough you won't mind her stealing your drink, sneaking money from your purse, or pulling all the books off the shelf. She started walking this week. Now I have three mobile terrors. Awesome! She thinks she is the coolest thing ever and can do everything she wants. And should the dreaded "no" be uttered, you can expect her to fall to the ground in a flailing fit. She's learned to roll her eyes. I thought I had a few more cute years out of her. Not so lucky.
I think my kids have a secret meeting once a week, where they share ideas and plot against me. They make the plan that Chloe Beth will need a diaper change at 3:42pm, when Austin will sneak in behind me to grab a soda, Beautiful can rush to the bedroom for his Blistex fix, and everyone be back in place by the time the new diaper is on. This would make sense, as she fights changes to the death, stalling so they have plenty of time to sneak a cookie too. I don't want them to grow up. I want them to stay little. I just want them to be cute AND innocent, not one or the other.