Tuesday, October 03, 2006

The orange marker

Today, I was in my office working and my children were playing semi-friendlyish on the floor near me. Anytime they’re quiet, I should really pay more attention. All of a sudden, Eli yells, “Mommy! Mommy! Mommy! Look at Georgia! Look! Look at her!”

I looked. Her back was to me, so I said, “What exactly am I supposed to be looking at?” Eli responded, “Her face! Do you see her face?” I told him that I could not see her face because she was looking at him and not at me, although I have to admit I was getting a little worried at this point.

Eli took Georgia by the shoulders and turned her around to face me. *gasp*

There she was grinning widely with her face covered in bright orange marker. I said, “Georgia! Were you playing with a marker?!”

Eli helpfully replied, “No. She wasn’t.”

Oh, really?! I then said, “Eli, were you playing with an orange marker?”

Eli: “Yes, I had it in my hand.”

Me: “Eli, did you draw all over your sister’s face with a marker?”

Eli: “Um . . . well . . . yes.”

Me: “And why exactly did you do that?”

Eli: “Um . . . well . . . because I wanted to.”

Me: “Eli! You do not draw on your sister!”

This is my favorite part. He looked at me and said, “Why?”

Ugh! I stopped myself before I could say “Because I said so!” and just said, “Because that is not a very nice thing to do.” Honestly, what do you really say to that? The other day he asked me why birds have wings. I hadn’t had any coffee yet, and it took me a full minute to come up with “So they can fly.”

Anyway, apparently, he thought that was enough of a conversation to satisfy me, and off he went. I was left with a grinning baby and a very orange face.

*sigh* I guess I should be thankful it wasn’t black marker.

6 comments:

Jules said...

Because you could have poisoned your baby sister!!!! That's why you shouldn't put marker all over her face!!!!

I don't think that's really true, but scare tactics always worked for my parents when I was a child.

Ian said...

"Because then people will think she lost her head and we had to replace it with a pumpkin!"

Ian

Peg said...

LOL!!

I'm a big fan of "Because I said so!" myself ;-)

My kids are currently limited to Color-Wonder markers--for very similar reasons!

Irene said...

Our son doesn't have a sister. So he marked our white walls instead. Sigh! c",)

Unknown said...

when I was little, i some how managed to get a ring of mauve nail polish around both of my eyes. This so as it looked like a raccoon mask. Mom couldnt take me anywhere, and when she did people thought she had beaten me! Now we all laugh about it, but then it was not so cool, i mean i looked like a bruised kid, and all we could do was let it wear off because it was so close to my eyes!!! childeren are so funny!

Mo and The Purries said...

hopefully it was washer-friendly ink and not indelible! or would that be inedible?

"because I'm the mommy, that's why" always worked in our house, and somehow the two of us survived to be semi-normal dysfunctional adults...