Tuesday, August 19, 2014

Bored Children

I have discovered possibly the most entertaining reality show of all time; a toddler and a five year old bored with summer, trying to entertain themselves without adult or sibling assistance. 

First, there was the lounging on the floor, draping of the limbs to illustrate how tragic and difficult this state of life was for their spirits.  Failing to gain sympathy or even much of a response, one tucked herself into a laundry basket while the other took solace in scooting across the floor in a laundry bag.  The end of round one resulted in a ripped laundry bag.

The three year old thought her brother's antics annoying and proceeded to make a mad face.  When we laughed at her mad face, she devoted all of her thinking to how to make her face madder still.  She pursed her lips and shut her eyes to illustrate how much more irritation she felt.  They traded faces for a time but to render the impact of their mad faces better, they stood up and looked up whenever the other volleyed a new face.  This led to them marching in a circle in the living room with their eyes perpetually glued to the ceiling.  Thus, they became dizzy, ending round two. 

By now, united in their sufferings, they climbed onto the piano to engage in an improv John Cage type duet, but that switched to a turn taking with each child singing to their creation and the other wrapping themselves up like a sausage in a pink blanket.  Round three.

Round 4, they pretended to be sleeping, complete with snoring sounds.

Round 5, a laughing contest, who could be loudest, it morphed into stomping, screaming and sometimes hitting the ivories with vigor.  

Round 6.  Anna pretends to be a cat snoring, draped across the piano bench.   Paul tries to restart the laughing contest, but also lays down to try to snore.  I sneezed which made the snoring cat stop to say, "Bless you." breaking character and apparently making everything hilarious.

Round 7.  Earthworms.  Without using their hands or feet, they squirm, roll and crawl across the floor.

Round 8.  The sleeping cat is back and Paul doesn't like this game so he wants a different one.  Wake up Anna might prove to end the pleasant play of the morning so as ref of this contest of titan toddlers, I think about breaking it up.  But Anna has solved the problem herself until he grabs her feet to hold.

Round 9.  There's a double knock out.  Pretending to sleep has created to actual sleepers. 

Ding ding ding ding ding!  The Battle is over!  I WIN!



One week until school starts. 



They may have been bored, I on the other hand, was highly entertained. 

It's summer, but you can't end summer until you've had days that drag by like syrup and result in competitions to stave off the boredom of an unstructured day.

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