Little Interruptions

It was while Motivated Mom and I were cleaning up from dinner that our granddaughter, Little Miss Grabby Fingers, decided to rearrange the placement of the dishes in the dishwasher.

So I paused in the cleaning of the kitchen to wipe the tomato sauce from Little Miss Grabby Fingers' fingers and then moved our granddaughter to the family room where she could play with her toys.

It was while I continued to clean up from dinner that Little Miss Grabby Fingers decided to remove the soil from the potted palm tree.

So I paused in the cleaning of the kitchen to wipe the black smudges from tiny fingers, sweep up the potting soil that had been cast across the floor, and move Little Miss Grabby Fingers back to the family room where she could play with her toys.

It was while I worked to wrap up the cleaning in the kitchen that Motivated Mom started folding laundry... until Little Miss Grabby Fingers decided to unfold the clothes and build a pile that she could fall into.

So I paused in the cleaning of the kitchen to carry Little Miss Grabby Fingers back to the family room and sat down on the floor so we could play with her toys together.

Sometimes the important things are not what you think they are.

Baby Proofing

I never appreciated just how many cabinet doors and drawers there are in our kitchen until I had to baby-proof them.

It seemed I would never finish drilling tiny holes so that I could use tiny screws to affix tiny clips in order to keep tiny hands out of places they shouldn't be.

This undertaking was prompted by Little Miss Grabby Fingers' discovery that if she pulled plates out of the cabinets and dropped them on the floor the plates made the most marvelous shattering sound.

Thrown into sheer terror by the sight of a bare footed baby standing in the midst of a ceramic shards, I moved baby-proofing to the top of the to-do list.

It seems there ought to be an easier way to address the problem of babies getting into things they shouldn't. I'm thinking of developing baby-sized oven mitts that can only be removed by releasing a combination lock. While wearing the mitts, the baby would be limited to clapping hands in imitation of a Sea World sea lion clapping its flippers.