No, really...

It dawned on me, as I was thinking about the antics of the boys, that you probably read these posts, or listen to our stories, and think that we are giving you just the worst (or best, I suppose, depending on your point of view) of their behaviour. In actuality, our lives are a 4-dimensional collage of images, actions and responses that are an ongoing tropical storm, if not quite a hurricane.

I got home late Friday night while everyone slept. I slaved in Portland, Oregon last week. On Saturday morning, Grayson awakened before his brother, and in order to try to let Noah sleep a little longer, we brought Grayson into bed with us. As Theresa was exhausted from managing the household in my absence, when Noah got up I took the boys downstairs so that T could get a little extra sleep. Mattea was still sleeping, so we headed downstairs and got the boys some cereal for breakfast. After pouring their second bowls for them, I went into the family room and lay down to stretch out my back.

Edwina and Mark had come down on Wednesday to spend a few days, and had gone up to LA to see the King Tut exhibit at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. Friday was Edwina's birthday and apparently Theresa had gotten an ice cream cake, which everyone shared after dinner on Friday. The remainder obviously went into the freezer.

The boys couldn't see me as I lay on the floor, stretching my back. After I was out of sight for a moment or two, I heard in a stage whisper "Noah! Want cake?"... "There's some in the fridge!"... "It's chocolate!" Then the pat, pat, pat of footsteps, and I see Grayson moving toward the freezer. From my prone position in the family room I just said "No!" Grayson didn't say a word. He just executed a quick 180, glanced my way, and made his way back to the table and sat back down as if none of this had actually occured.

On Thursday night, Theresa thought she had covered all the bases. Mattea was in her room, and her door was locked. Mattea's door actually locks from inside her room, so Theresa had locked the door after Mattea went to bed to keep the brothers from waking her in the middle of the night. She closed the doors to my office, to keep the boys out. She had locked the upstairs bathroom to deter another band-aid mellee. And yet, Theresa awoke to lights ablaze. They weren't the hall lights. They couldn't have been from any source other than the boys' room. But that didn't seem right. There is a light switch by the door, but we always turn the light out at the ceiling fan, so that they can't use the light switch to turn the overhead light on and off, which they delight in doing. Investigating, Theresa found Noah standing on the changing table, which had apparently been navigated under the ceiling fan by Grayson, who was still moving the changing table around with Noah standing on it to reach the pull chains.

I won't tell you about them attacking the raspberry tart on the kitchen floor with a knife. Now we're probably delving into CPS territory.