Bait and Switch

Lily and Macey are 18 months apart, which I think is really great. Lily was too young when Macey came along to really get jealous of her new sister, so there was minimal upheaval when she arrived. For many months Macey wasn't mobile so she didn't bother her sister at all. Of course now Macey is walking, and has been crawling for months, which means she can get into her sister's toys. When she first started to crawl, Macey would wander over, select whatever toy looked most delicious, and shove it in her mouth. Lily would casually walk over and take it away from Macey, and of course the screaming would start. We told Lily that if she took a toy away from her sister that she must give her something else to play with. This worked very well in the beginning because Macey didn't care what she was chewing on. Lily is very smart and eager to please, so she went along with the "replace the toy" rule. Of course now that Macey is getting older, the switcheroo doesn't always work. You can see her thinking "Look, Sis. If I wanted the gingerbread man I would have grabbed it instead of the Sponge Bob Squarepants!".

So the other night Macey was playing in the office while Craig was on the computer and I was doing dishes. Lily was playing in the family room, but came into the office to see what was going on. She saw Macey playing with the lamb Pez dispenser and took it from her. Now, Lily has ignored this toy pretty much since she got it at Easter, but seeing Macey with it obviously reminded her of the six magical minutes she played with the toy weeks ago. Craig told her not to take it away from Macey, who was now crying and pretty pissed off. Lily ran into the family room and came back with something else for Macey to play with - Craig's dirty socks.

Here's the story with the socks. Every evening when Craig gets home from work he goes upstairs and changes his clothes. No big deal there. But later in the evening, for some reason, he takes his socks off and leaves them in the family room. There they will sit, on the floor, nestled next to the couch, until I pick them up and put them in the laundry. After a few days, if I don't pick them up he gets a whole stinky sock jamboree going on.

Lily presented her sister with the socks, which Macey batted out of the way and continued to cry and reach in vain for the Pez dispenser. Craig said "Lily! Give that back to her!". Lily looked down at her hands - in one hand the glory of the Lamby Pez, and in the other, handful o' sock stink. She looked at Craig, tiled her head to the side, held up the socks and said "Give these to her?" Two and a half years old and she's already playing dumb and acting innocent to get her way. How did we raise such a manipulative child?

Must be the stinky sock fumes.