If I could put my finger on the day Elliott started to become as he so eloquently calls, mischievous (you wonder how he knows that word, that would be from the facial/emotions cards we go through sometimes to help the kids identify with their feelings and learn new feeling words to better understand their emotions…etc. etc. blah blah blah-it really works) It would be the day Paul was gone to Florida for business overnight – two months ago. I don’t think it relates, but that’s when it really started happening.
Here is a list of Elliott‘s experimental moments, ie. what he calls, being mischievous:
- Hiding up in my room before bed with a huge wad of his sister’s gum which he had quietly stolen from her backpack when Abigail and I were reading or something, in the kitchen. (Paul was out of town)
- Climbing up onto Abigail’s bunkbed while Abigail was in school and tossing the fish food, stored on Abigail’s shelf, up into the air, thus spreading it ALL OVER the room.
- Playing with the water in the toilet after going to the bathroom and BEFORE flushing. There was water everywhere.
- Flushing a bracelet down the toilet to see where it would go, if it would go in the little hole in the toilet, or the big hole.
- Getting a wine bottle that is sitting on the edge of the sink and opening it up to smell it. I was worried he had drank the remnants which would have surely made him drunk, since there was a half cup in there at least. He even had a purple ring around his mouth, but alas, it was only grape juice from his almost emptied cup in the sink (also, I did the smell test, just to be sure my curious son hadn’t really drank it!)
- Getting naked up in his bedroom while playing with Abigail and deciding to see what it would be like to just pee right on the carpet, after ignoring Abigail’s attempts to tell him to stop (she thought it was funny though).
So, that’s a list of the last couple of months of his emerging independence and indelible, insatiable curiosity. One reading this might think we don’t watch our son, but keep in mind these events did not occur all in one day, and now, more than ever before, are we alarmed when all is quiet, quiet signals that Elliott has found something else to be interactively curious about.
After correcting Elliott on his actions, here is what he has said, “Mommy, I won’t ever do that again.” and so far he never does repeat the same “offense”, instead, he does something NEW!