my son: and his path of destruction!

The other day I thought I'd leave the mess my son created in the house until after he went to bed. Since it felt like I was putting away the same thing multiple times anyway...why not do it just once? So after I put him to bed for the night I walked into the living room and I swear it looked like somebody had broken into our house and ransacked the place.

Today I watched my 17 month old son push a very large cooler across the kitchen floor, over to the sunken living room, push it down the stairs where it landed upside down. He then climbed on top of it, stood up, and then laughed like an evil superhero. After he was finished announcing his world domination,he climbed off, rolled it over and tried to push it back up the stairs. This he could not do...so he yelled at it for not obeying his will and moved on to the next order of destruction. Which just so happened to be taking the phone, saying "hi" a few times and then slamming it against the fridge door.

I swear he went from 16 months to "the terrible two's" almost overnight. Every room in the house he leaves behind a trail that screams, "Jacob was here!" For example, the bathroom. There are miscellaneous objects in the bath tub at any given time. This morning I found one of my slippers and a wooden spoon. He also loves to pull the towels off the rack so they are in a pile on the floor. And of course his final move before his exit is flushing the toilet once or twice.

Then he may move to a bedroom where he opens the bottom drawer and pulls every item of clothing out. Then he'll go into the closet where he likes to push back the pants and hide behind them and yank them off the hangers. Which brings us to his latest fascination...shoes.

Aside from the great joy throwing the shoes down the basement stairs does bring lately he has been really fascinated by putting items in shoes. My Mom told me she walked around with a magnetised piece of the alphabet from the fridge in her shoe once. I found his sippy cup stuffed inside a shoe. I find his sippy cup in the most hilarious spots. Once I found it in the flowerbed. Yesterday he had a runny nose so I gave him some decongestant. When I went to give it to him again before bed it wasn't on the bathroom counter where I left it (sealed tightly of course). The little stinker can get things off counter tops now. And guess where I finally found it? That's right, inside a shoe in my bedroom closet! Now when I can't find something, my first thought is to start holding any available footwear in an upside down position and shaking out its mystery contents.

I would love to hear your kid's destruction stories too...