boys!

Things I've Been Taught By My Sons

That eggs were indeed meant to be free. Though freedom really shouldn't include impacts with paved surfaces.

That when one child is violently ill it would be naïve and pointless to think that none of the other three will suffer the same fate.

That the instant you pick up a telephone to have an intelligent and more importantly, adult conversation, you will have small children clamouring about your legs for attention.

If you leave your camera around the house and it actually has film in it, it is of course an open invitation for your boys to practice amateur photography. Perfect subjects include the mess on the floor, your brothers, the television and of course ... your brother’s bare arse.

That it is never too early to think about Christmas.

I have learned that there are many reasons to cry in this cruel, harsh world, numbering among them:

- That there are too many vegetables on the plate.

- That you have to have a bath when you want a shower

- That you have to have a shower when you want a bath

- That you have to be the first out of the bath

- That you have to have your hair washed

-That you’re the only one not to have had your hair washed (yes, once Thomas was distraught because his brothers and sister all got their hair washed, but he had missed out).

- That things haven’t gone your way

- That your brother got an extra lolly

- That you have to go to bed (Even when its 2 hours past bedtime)

- And of course, sometimes just because you’re tired and need a good cry.

A cat is a perfectly good substitute for a basketball.

Cats really do want to swim in the mop bucket. Esepcially when they're kittens.

When ordering paving bricks, allow 1% more than you can imagine for all contingencies to account for un-help* After all, bricks will be thrown, dropped, levered, pushed, propelled, levitated, magicked and even misplaced in such a manner as to ensure they have at least a 3 foot drop onto a surface that will ensure they are rendered unsuitable for their given purpose.
*un-help is the collective term for all those wonderful little things that happen when you're working in the yard and have forgotten to otherwise entertain, restrain or deploy three boys under the age of six.

Don't bother with a puppy. Leave something in the yard that vaguely resembles a shovel. You'll get holes in the lawn anyway.

Don't ever bother cleaning your shed. All you're doing is putting everything that you don't want touched in a number of clearly defined places that ensures they'll be transported elsewhere before you next want to use them. And after all, what fun would it be trying to do some work around the house if you didn't get to spend the first hour looking for that elusive screwdriver that you know wass right where it was supposed to be for the last 6 weekends. The weekends that you didn't need a screwdriver.

If you have a little girl, you get to build a cubby house, then paint it, decorate it set it up with lights and tables and chairs and teapots. For boys, you get to build a cubby house, refix wall boards that have been hammered, kicked and otherwise removed because a slippery dip and a door with ladder aren't enough exits (even though you're five foot in the air) every three weeks. The blackboard will be useless when you find the kids up there with a tin of paint that was liberated from the garage. The old sink, telephone, chairs and other items that have been put in the cubby house for the pleasure of aforementioned boys are of course first checked for their ability to bounce when propelled from a window.

Clothes look best when removed from the irritating storage device called your wardrobe and re-distriubted in random fashion about the nearest horizontal surface (that would be the floor).

Whenever given five minutes alone you should raid every possible cupboard to check for the food that your parents have hidden from you. You know, chocolate, chips, biscuits etc (The fact that I personally still do this has no bearing what so ever)

The perfect place to consume said bounty is behind a couch. And that is of course where you hide any evidence, too.

When looking for a piece of paper to use, pull every conceivable piece out of the drawer, distribute liberally, then forget what you're doing and go play with something else.

If you suspect Dad has put new batteries in the torch, take it from the one place he knows where to look for it in an emergency, hide it and leave it on. If the batteries aren't new and are dull, then what the hell, hide it anyway.

Always blame someone else. Even if you're caught with the evidence.

If you have to, frame them.