Ability to Destroy

I need to vent for a minute to help myself calm down. I have been frustrated and taking deep breaths this evening. Owen and Daniel really seem to be at each other constantly. They'll play nice, then they'll be fighting. They'll be laughing one minute, the next they are yelling and crying. It's a bit exhausting. And I'm also a bit tired today with all the kids ability to make messes. A few examples: I was loading the dishwasher this evening after school and I couldn't get a pan off of a plate, when I noticed that it was sealed to it. Natalie had cooked an egg and then put her hot pan onto one of the new plastic ikea plates, a yellow one, and it melted to it. It took me a minute to pry it off with a knife, and the edge is ugly and melted now, but it's still functional. I haven't decided yet if I should throw it away or if we should still use it. I don't like stuff in the house that might made me remember moments when I was irritated, so we'll see if we keep it or if I throw it away later. That might be the first plate to disappear. I'm always amazed with our kid dishes, how we'll start off with 5 or 6 sets, and then eventually there will only be one or two of some colors, but still 6 of some. And we're also missing like half of our spoons from our nice silverware. We have all 12 knives and 12 of the dinner fork, salad fork, and soup spoon, but only 6 of the small spoons. What happens to them is a mystery to me. 

Another almost mess from today - Lily left out some acrylic paints from making a costume yesterday for a school play - she made a mask for herself to be the Coronavirus. She left the two bottles of acrylic paint, red and gray, in the kitchen up behind the sink. Daniel got them down when I was helping Sophi practice and brought them into the front room, telling me he wanted to paint. "Ok, I will help you, but you have to wait until I'm ready to help you, and right now I'm helping Sophia practice, so you have to wait until I'm done." He whined and said "no!" to waiting, and repeated as much many times, and thus I repeated my above sentence to him many times as well. When Sophi and I were done, he asked "Mom, can we paint now?" "Yes!" I said, as I put away our violins and music books. He said "Yay" and I wasn't looking yet but was putting things away and then 30 seconds later I turn and he's on the new ottoman of our new furniture, and he has paper, a paint brush, and red paint, and he's painting the paper... "AHH!!! Not in here! Ahh! Daniel you have to WAIT for me!!!" I say as I grab the stuff and thankfully this time he didn't drop anything as I freaked out and I was so relieved that nothing was on the ottoman (actually I should go double check it and the carpet around it...) phew, and I took it into the kitchen and set it and him at the table, which I have to clean off now cause he got paint on that. Note to self: do the counter next time. 

Tonight, Sophi was cutting up an apple. She saw me also cutting up one. Mine had been bruised - I saw it had been mauled by a child yesterday but I didn't throw it in the garbage cause half of it was still good, so I was cutting the good parts for myself to eat. She asked if she could have some of the apple. "Sure, but this one isn't good cause some kid poked it yesterday so it is all bruised on half of it...." She sheepishly said "sorry..." Oh! Did you do that to this apple yesterday? "Yeah." "WHY?! I honestly want to know what was going through your brain..." I didn't know how she did it either - it wasn't a poke from a pencil. She told me she did it with Legos - like a lego wand. Ah, that makes sense for the size of the holes. She wasn't able to say why she did it, so that shall remain a mystery still to be uncovered. 

And the last mess from this evening that made me ticked off and also amazed - today I learned that I did not protect some of my things that I try to protect very well. So, I have some Micron pens that I use to mark my scriptures, and I love them and I do my best to protect them from the children. They all like them and want to use them, especially Daniel seems to have an ability to smell them out. The red and blue, which are two colors I use a lot, went missing yesterday. I looked all over, looked in the little boys areas, didn't find them, thought maybe I had misplaced them but then no, I always keep them together, so they were gone and I didn't press Owen or Daniel about it, I just thought I'd try to find them. Well tonight, after helping the girls practice (they put in a great practice session), and after setting Daniel to paint in the kitchen, I go upstairs where I see both pens by the Hyrum/Wes/Owen's room, but without the lids... and I could feel my blood boil and the brown lid was there and I was like "Darn it, they took 3 pens!?!?" 

...and then I look at the pens and the blue and red were missing the whole entire pen tip part!?

Like.... what the heck?!?! HOW?!?! I was asking the toddlers for a confession, and pressing them for details as to who had just barely used these and left them on the floor there, cause they weren't by that bedroom door an hour ago... and WHERE THE HECK are the tips? Are they in the garbage? That would be unfortunate cause I emptied the garbage earlier and I didn't see any trace of pen tips in there now... WHY children? Why do you destroy? I try to keep things away from you. I try to teach you how to not destroy and lay waste to food and dishes and writing on walls and ruining the carpet... How do you always find ways to destroy things that I want to keep nice? I questioned all the kids - nothing. NO leads as to where the brown pen was or where the tips were, and I sent Corey a text to check his polo cause I need to share my frustration with someone. 

After 10 minutes of looking and shaking my head I found the brown pen and the two lids. The brown pen was entirely intact, but it wrote like it was a bit dried out. I looked around some more in HWO's room and then I found the tips! They were on the floor in the doorway close to where the pens bodies were originally found, they are just so small that I missed it. I hurried and put the tips in and then the lids on, hoping there might still be a chance that they will work... Three little scribbles... and my hope is restored a little bit. 

And I go and ask the kids again, WHO got the tips off and HOW!?!? Owen confessed that he took and used them, but didn't admit to destroying them or seem to understand my question as to how the tips came off, since I couldn't show him an example of a pen with the tip off. Maybe I'll show him my polo later when they aren't afraid to tell the truth. But I'm truly like mystified as to how whoever did it - like did they use pliers? Their teeth? I don't think their fingers would have worked... I can't grab and pull them out with my fingers... which leads me to think it was the work of a smarter and older child, or maybe I just have gifted toddlers. I'm amazed. 

So - I was still trying to calm myself down. I got out the packages of skittles that I got for the elementary girls to use as their Valentine treats. They worked in my locked room, while I kept the little boys out - they were busy and distracted playing in the room while I washed Peter's scribbles and writing off of the walls as I cleaned in the boys room. I also worked on the hairspray that is still on the walls in there from O&D over a year ago. Valentine day parties are tomorrow, and then we're going on a little ski trip to Jackson Hole. Should be fun, but I also feel like I want a break from them. I have felt totally unenergized today, I called my life coach bff Nicole to help me see if there is something in my life or stress that I am not seeing. She agreed that my desire to rest and try to have quiet time is probably due to my brain trying to prep for two long weekends away with the kids - Skiing this weekend, then St. George for biking next week. Deep breath, you can do this, hang in there.

(I Saw in this video how to take off the tip. Like, did Owen have an exacto knife with him?!?! HOW did he get it off? I didn't dare try to get it off again since I didn't want to risk breaking it. I guess you can do a lot of amazing things when you don't worry about breaking stuff?)