Originally published March 29, 2007, thehive.modbee.com

It’s always easy to jump to conclusions and assume evil intent when the motive is pure. I was reminded of that recently with Little Guy.

For some reason, I’ve felt from the start that I understood Little Guy pretty well. Maybe it’s because he and I are a lot alike, temperament-wise. We’ll both take a ton of grief from people before we finally break bad on them.

That’s exactly what I thought was happening one morning a few months back.

I was in the kitchen baking cupcakes for a birthday party, while my husband was busy lying on the couch, watching an important 15-year-old basketball game on ESPN Classic. Granted, it was a good game, but I’m sure I’ve mentioned at least a few times over the years that Kentucky lost and that’s why I can’t stand Christian Laettner and Duke. Maybe he wasn’t listening.

Catching both parental units otherwise occupied, Little Guy seized the opening.

I finished the cupcakes just in time to see him walk from Big Guy’s room to his own and stuff an armful of socks in the diaper pail. What on Earth?

I opened the pail and saw, not only all of Big Guy’s socks, but all of his underwear as well. And Big Guy has a lot of underwear – what can I say, I like to put off laundry as long as possible.

It wouldn’t have been so bad, except Little Guy had woken that morning with a “call the HazMat team” diaper that still was smelling up the whole house. Took him directly from his bed to the bathtub. Note to self : No more chocolate pudding cake for Little Guy.

The mess left me with a ton of extra laundry, but I lucked out in catching on when I did. An open pajama drawer clued me in to Little Guy’s next target.

So what was Little Guy’s message?

• I’m tired of taking Big Guy’s crap, so I’m going to give him some back.
• Big Guy, dude, your feet really stink.
• Wonder how much progress I can make before Dad notices?

I wondered briefly what Little Guy’s future shrink will say, then just chalked it up to budding sibling rivalry.

Little Guy, you see, covets Big Guy’s underwear. It’s Elmo and Thomas and Lightning McQueen and Diego and all those other characters you buy in hopes of sparking a stubborn kid’s interest in potty training. Little Guy often tries to put it on, but never gets far. For some reason he thinks it goes over his head.

This week, though, I figured out the real reason for the toddler version of a panty raid.

Wednesday evening, I asked Little Guy to take the dirty clothes from the bathroom to the laundry hamper – he’s still really cooperative for someone who will be 2 in a few months, and I’m keeping my fingers crossed.

He picked up shirts, took them to the hamper. Pants, hamper. Underwear, diaper pail. Whoa! Wrong target again.

Then it hit me: Underwear equals diaper equals get that smelly mess out of the house. He was trying to help, not harass. Awwwww! How sweet!

Or maybe I’m just blinded by Baby Worship. Because my new theory still doesn’t explain the socks.

Copyright 2007 Debra Legg. All rights reserved.

Similar Posts:

None Found

Popularity: 9% [?]