Locked Out

How many stories have you heard from friends, colleagues, relatives, random people even, that when they were little their parents would lock the door to the house, saying they weren’t allowed back in until dinner time.

So far we haven’t done this, but we’ve come close.   Actually, that’s not true, my husband locked them out just the other day for a short period of time while he got dinner prepared.  

It’s a balance of age and maturity I think, more than anything.   And safety.   We’re in a fairly safe neighborhood away from fast streets.   We have known families all around us with children that all play together.    My children are older now and can entertain themselves outside.   And they are almost always good at making wise choices.   Sometimes they aren’t the same choice an adult would make, but my children and their friends aren’t unnecessiarly reckless.

Maybe we’ll start locking them out more often and see what kinds of creative things they come up with with only the entire outdoors to entertain them.

The Big Boy Update:  My son took some sunglasses and was doing something with them.   I wasn’t paying attention but he came over to me in a bit and told me how they looked much better in blue.   Blue?  Invisible blue.    He had taken a blue sharpie and colored (very thoroughly) the inside of both lenses.   I gulped because I didn’t know if they were expensive glasses and had a conversation about asking before drawing on someone else’s things.   He walked into the pantry and said, “hey Mom, no offense, but I think the pantry looks pretty awesome with these on.”   I put them on and yeah, he was right.   Dad found the glasses later after the children were asleep.   The glasses were very cheap and he didn’t like them anymore and when I told him to check out the pantry with them on, he laughed, and agreed it did look cool in blue.

The Tiny Girl Chronicles:  My daughter had a sheet of homework to do tonight.   We don’t know what it was because the directions were in braille.   But she knew.   She put the paper into her brailler and started typing.   She typed one full page and then started in on a second page.   It turns out there was only one page of homework but she decided to write a story on a second page after finishing her homework.