Throughout the majority of my life, I've been the tall one
in my family. It started when I took a growth spurt in middle school and
bypassed my poor dad. Although, to this very day, he cranes his neck to its
absolute limit in an attempt to prove he can be taller than me. For the record,
I'm generally slouching when he does so.
Anyway, as the "tall one" in the family, I've
become accustomed to being tasked with standing on my tip-toes to stretch up
and reach something from its high perch. For the record, I don't really
consider my 6'2" frame to be all that tall. In fact, a fair number of the
teenagers I work with in our church already surpass my height!
 |
| Almost got it... |
I bring all of these height-related ponderings up for a
special reason. You see, Ellie seems to have noticed all of my stretching and
reaching for things that are high above my head. Not only that, but she's decided
to put her rapidly growing frame to use by reaching up valiantly for things
that were once out of her reach. I have to say once because our baby girl is
now tall enough to reach all counters in our house. Need an example, I must say
I'm happy to provide.
Small amount of background information for your reading
pleasure first. Today officially marked Day 1 of Ellie's new daily schedule. At
19 months of age, Bethany and I, with the help of Ellie, finally came to the
decision it was time to drop Ellie's morning nap from the rotation. Instead, we
would focus on not only getting a quality after-lunch nap for her, but getting
her to sleep until at least 6 am each morning. Ellie's habit has long been to
head to her crib within an hour of Bethany leaving for work around 7 am. Today,
though, after I abstained from following her to her room, Ellie returned with a
confused look on her face and a renewed vigor for playtime.
Of course, there were issues with this new way of life for
Ellie. You see, over time, we have carefully cultivated an idea of right and
wrong in Ellie's head. Rules for what she should and should not do. While it's
not chief among those rules, it still goes without saying that one important
rule is to not drag stuff off of the counters, especially the kitchen
counters. Obviously, we don't want her getting hurt by a heavy pot or stray
knife. We also don't want her just helping herself to anything that's on the
counter.
Taking all of that into account, picture me sitting on the
couch in our living room minding my own business when I hear a vicious ka-boom!
My first inkling was that Ellie had likely pushed her milk cup and snack of
cereal off of the kitchen chair both were sitting on to the wood floor below.
As she wasn't crying or reacting negatively, I chose to give her some space and
not hover. At least, that was my plan until my daughter sheepishly turned the
corner into the living room with a look on her face screaming "I think I
did something wrong." With that, I decided it was probably time to get up
and check the kitchen for anything out of the ordinary.
The first thing I see when turning the corner are Cheerios
spilled all over the kitchen floor accompanied by a small puddle of milk from
her glass. To me, this isn't exactly a big deal and I was actually much more
interested in the second thing I saw. Ellie's sweet tooth had overtaken her
decision-making, causing her to do something very bad. She had managed to reach
up onto our kitchen counters and drag a covered Pyrex dish containing peanut
butter drop cookies onto the floor below where it landed upside down. Luckily
for me, the Pyrex dish remained in one piece. Unfortunately, a large percentage
of the cookies had broken down into tinier bits. There was no real harm done
and Ellie escaped severe punishment, instead receiving a literal smack on the
wrist for her transgression.
 |
| Poor cookies... |
If nothing else, this little escapade reinforces the fact
that it's time for us to start being extremely careful about what is close to
the edge of our kitchen counters. That and there's no end to the lengths to
which Ellie will go just to eat a cookie. #DaddyWrite
 |
| Did somebody say cookie? |
No comments:
Post a Comment