sneaky

So it turns out that the mouse we saw in the living room isn't the only pest living in our home. Our two boys, you may have heard of them--Roman and Greggs? have been known to have a bit of a scavenger side to them.

To illustrate:

Instead of an alarm clock, I know that every morning I will be woken up to the screeching sound of chairs being moved around in the kitchen. Unfortunately, it's not my dear husband making me breakfast in bed, it's my two little rascals looking for food. Normally, it's not a problem, this exploring and rummaging, I consider it a lesson in not only self-preservation but independence. But since they don't exactly have a craving for frozen broccoli or the spaghetti squash that's been sitting in my "help yourself bowl!" it's always the sweets that invariably get attacked first. And since I consider myself a decent mother that requires a desire to have my children to eat something besides chocolate cake for breakfast, this poses as a bit of a predicament.

And lately they've gotten a bit more aggressive in their hunting and gathering efforts. If there is not food in plain sight on the counters then they will climb on top of the counters to investigate in the cupboard. It's always the fantasy of finding the last chocolate chip in the cupboard that motivates this behavior. Sometimes they'll get lucky and find candy that even I didn't know we had.

This just fuels the fire as you can see.

So what to do in this situation? Well, I've learned to put food that I want them to eat directly on the counter, sometimes making it even easier for them by leaving a trail of crumbs from their bedrooms directly to the "prize". But mostly, I've learned that if I don't want my kids to eat a certain something then I just can't have it in the house. At all.

Oh yes, I've mourned for the lost dreams of having chocolate candy bowls sprinkled throughout my house, but I realize that with kids, you can't have everything.

So after only a few minutes of internal debate, the boys have it. They can stay. I'll just save the chocolate candy bowls for the grandkids.