Confusing the Little Ones

"Jenny... How did Uncle Nate get through the window? Can you go through windows?"

These questions were asked to Jenny by me niece this weekend while we were away babysitting. Let me set the stage.

6 kids, 3 boys 3 girls. 3 kids from each of two families. The kids are all cousins and three of them were the three kids in our wedding. Jenny and I were tasked with babysitting. I was tasked with the boys.

For a while, this became a 6 on 1 wrestling match while Jenny would prepare meals. I would chase the kids, grab one of them, hold them, and the other 5 would try to get that kid free, only succeeding when i decided it would be fun to change what kid I was holding onto. Eventually, they would ask me to count to 10 and then chase them again.

Often, they would say the inevitable "I bet you can't get me now."

The last statement had taken place while two of the boys were playing playstation. It was me, chasing one boy and three girls. A slight problem is that they ran into one of the bedrooms and locked the door. The boy, stepped out on the deck off of this room. A deck, with no door besides the one to the bedroom, no stairs, and on the second level of the house. I ran to the door to wait them out, eventually getting bored.

After informing Jenny of my plans, I went out the front door to ready myself for climbing the deck. I got in position and immediately realized one thing, I'd be too slow doing this if the boy was still on the deck. He could easily get too far away. After waiting about a minute, he re-joined the girls in the bedroom and they looked for shadows by the door to see if I was still waiting there. Jenny had gone and filled my position there, so they were not leaving the room.

I then noticed the second thing. Climbing this deck was about to be an extremely unsafe adventure, but I didn't take off my socks to stop now. The ground, and deck were wet, the footing at first (and landing place if I fell) was rocks. Not landscaping rocks, large retaining wall rocks. The places to hold were, well, moving. The railing was small iron pipe like structures, that spun when held. I just hoped all the boards would be stable.

It began. Jump and grab. Walk the legs up a corner beam. Stick one foot between deck and railing. Pull self up enough to grab top of railing. Place other foot up. Pull body up. Jump over rail. Open door and shock the daylights out of the kids looking the other way.

It worked wonderfully. It sparked curiosity. How did you get up there? They looked to see if it could be climbed, and decided it couldn't. They then saw a window from the living room that led to the deck and was convinced that somehow I went through there, though the screen had not been taken off.

I wasn't about to tell or show them how it was done (like I said, it was unsafe).

In fact, my dad (reading this) is probably mad I even did it in the first place.



What can I say? I go all out for the kids enjoyment while I'm babysitting, and even kept the children's safety in mind.