Maybe they ARE out to get me!

At times I become convinced that the boys are conspiring to do away with me. Sometimes it has to do with the special placement of toys, right in my path from the bedroom to the bathroom, just waiting to wreck my feet on my nightly trip to the toilet. Other times it is the quick maneuvering of a nearly 4 year old, right into my path as I struggle to carry a heavy object (or his baby brother) that sends me sprawling. And sometimes, more recently, it has been the attempt to scare the life out of me by performing death defying acts just out of my reach.

In the past week or so, the boys have created all kinds of new "games" involving jumping, climbing and pulling each other all over the place. The current favorite is climbing onto the arm of the couch, standing on the narrow platform with arms raised like a gymnast then flinging their small bodies down onto the cushions wildly rolling off the couch onto a pile of pillows on the floor. Each time they start, my heart skips a little and I nearly hold my breath until they stand up and shout "TA DA!". And this activity is endorsed by their loving father. He helps to spot them, while calling to me "Oh man, you have to see this!"

Another favorite is the wild leaping on the bed, tossing themselves from the foot of the bed to the mound of pillows at the head. I was unaware of this game until this weekend when my mother was sitting for me. Big Dog had her convinced that I knew all about it and even gave my approval! To my surprise, his father had signed off on this game! (secretly I think he may be in on the plotting of my demise, he knows how this type of activity rattles my delicate sensibilities) What his father didn't know was that Django had modified the game slightly to include a mid-air twist, an acrobatic summersalt that ended up leaving him with a banged up bum when he underestimated his velocity and smacked into the wall!

More troubling than the supervised antics of Big Dog, are the overestimations of skill by Little Dog. Now, I will give him some credit. He is very coordinated for his age, he has a strong sense of balance and the ability to brush off his falls, which is great since he apparently was born WITHOUT FEAR or even a sense of survival! He thinks he is a master of the stairs and insists on making many unaided trips up and down. When he slipped and fell a few steps, I thought he'd have a bit more caution, but instead he decided it was fun and spent the next 10 minutes trying to intentionally fall down a few more steps!

I'm sure at some point they will either do me in or toughen me up, but I fully expect that between the two of them, I will get to know the ER doctors very well in the next few years. Too bad they tend to look less like Dr. McDreamy and more like Dr. McI'mVerySleepy. Sigh.