Live.Awake

How to Destroy a House in Six Months

// November 8th, 2007 // Family Life

Ben recently wrote a hilarious article on How to Sell a House in Over Six Months. In honor of our true 6 month mark, I thought I would summarize the way my two year old has tried to single-handedly sabotage our efforts.

Anyone who knows her, knows she is a little spit-fire always looking for adventure and a way to have a good time. I have too many stories to recount in a blog of all the messes she has gotten into, so for now I will just concentrate on the sabotage of our house. I am not sure that I will be able to recount them all, but I shall try.

When we decided to sell the house I knew that crayons would be my enemy, so I got creative and put a box high in my closet with all the art supplies. As far as I could tell there was not a crayon in sight….Well, my two year old found one (twice). The first time was in the hall way. She came running in to the living room saying “Mommy, I did it. I did it!” In 2 year old language that is not usually a good thing to hear when you haven’t been present. So, I went to assess the damage. Yep! Crayon all over the hallway wall. I thought, “I’ll just get a Mr. Clean sponge (love those things) and get it off.” I didn’t realize that Mr. Clean doesn’t really work on flat paint and for some reason our builder chose to use flat paint throughout the house (obviously he didn’t have a two year old). I scrubbed and scrubbed to no avail. It would have to be painted.

I had a friend over with her three year old. The kids were playing wonderfully. Being loud, but for the most part very good. My friend and I realized that there had been too much time without interruption and went to see what was going on. We walked into my daughters room. They had found my older daughters black fingernail polish that stays hidden away and had decided to use the wall as their backdrop for their next masterpiece. So, now we have two walls that need to be painted…no big deal. Right? Right…Well, you would think that all crayons and writing paraphernalia would have been burned at this point, but somehow she found another crayon. When I came home from work one day I found a very large coloring display across my entire bedroom wall. Ok…so make that three walls that had to be painted.

I went to the paint store and of course the only paint that matches my sample is the most expensive kind (that won’t even wipe off!!). So, I buy it and bring it home. Ben painted the walls and touched up areas that looked smudged. We were good to go.

I went to work again and when I walked in the door I was greeted with the scent of bleach. Being that I am the only person that does laundry I knew that this was not a good! I asked Ben why it smelled like bleach and he just quietly said “Eliana.” I went back to their bedroom and found that she had poured bleach on the floor..and on her brother’s clothes. I still am not quite clear on how she climbed on top of my washing machine, reached my tall shelf, got the bleach down, got it open and managed to pour the bleach all over the floor, but we will leave that for another day. I found a nice cute little children’s throw rug and put it on the spot. Then I went and priced carpet. There was no way I was going to pay for carpet that she was likely to do something else too, so we added a carpeting allowance and that was pretty much settled.

Our agent suggested that we paint our girl’s room a more neutral color than pink, so we went and bought some more expensive paint and Ben got to work. He locked and closed the door while he was letting the first coat dry, but because of the weather change the door doesn’t always latch. Well, you guessed it….she found the glitch in the system and went into the bedroom and poured our expensive paint on the floor…at least it was the floor that already had a carpet allowance on it. Ben was able to get the stain out with our friends steam vac…thank God we had that.

So, here we sit….amazed by all the mess a two year old can cause in 6 months and hoping we have found everything that her little mind could use as a weapon against us…and for those of you who are wondering if we ever discipline our child. We do…I promise (hard). After she gets over it, she will come and say “Come ere…me show you. I did it. I got a sfanking (spanking).” So, she understands but I guess the shock on our faces is worth it??? I don’t know. Maybe someday she will be able to tell me.

Technorati Tags: children, messes, discipline, crayon, coloring on walls, stains, carpet