Evil Geniuses

So – Saturday was cruising along pretty good. Anders made pancakes for breakfast, Nina had been to the groomers and back and we had gone for a walk in the sunshine. We had just finished lunch, Anders was on the laptop, I was reading and the kids were upstairs playing. Christmas was really busy so we were enjoying a lazy day of no real plans and nothing which had to be done.

When the kids are upstairs playing and neither of us is up there with them, we can always count on Max to give us a running commentary on what Molly is doing.

“Hey mom - Molly put her pajamas on!”
“Hey mom - Molly just spilled her toys out!”
“Hey mom – is this your blue sparkly nail-polish and can Molly open it?”

Without looking up – or realizing how bad this situation could get – I absent mindedly replied back that no it was Molly’s nail-polish, and that no, she couldn’t use it unless I was there to help.

It took a good 10 minutes for me to fully digest that sentence and clue in that shit had probably taken a hard left upstairs. It was too quiet – no running updates from my favourite little narc – and there was the trace of paint fumes in the air.

Anders must have clued in at about the same time as we met at the bottom of the stairs and ran up together.

The two of them were sitting square in the middle of the tan carpet in the bonus room – surrounded by about 15 open nail-polish bottles – having a great time painting each other, their clothes, the carpet, their hair and Molly’s backpack. 

I remained calm enough to tell them to both go into the bathroom and not to touch anything until I came in. Anders herded them onto the safety of an old towel in the bathroom while I surveyed the damage. Apparently the favourite colours had been a hot pink, and sparkly teal, and a glittery navy. All of which looked really awesome on the tan carpet.



At this point I didn't know whether to cry or go totally bat-shit crazy. 

Those little buggers couldn’t have picked a worse spot for their little mani-pedi party. The main damage is in an area which is pretty much in the middle of the room, with a trail into the hallway. So it isn’t like we can put furniture over it or hide it in anyway.

Anders was handling the situation a lot better than I was. He was calmly explaining to the kids why putting nail-polish on each other and the carpet isn’t a good idea. I was still in the crazy-angry zone, and as I made trips by the bathroom door in my desperate search for cleaning products which could remove paint from fabric, I shouted various helpful pearls of wisdom at them. “You know – I was really hoping that you guys would be smarter than me, but I guess we can confirm that dumb-ass-ness does not skip a generation!” “Why didn’t you guys use the nude nail polish or the clear stuff…glittery teal? REALLY?”

Anders came out to see how the cleaning was going. It was not going well. I had basically created a big blob of swirled colour. I was calming down a bit, and Anders reminded me that we had been talking about replacing the carpet with hardwood anyway, so really, this was just the final deciding vote. We will be getting new hardwood. What is done - is done right?

We figured we mind’s well try and see the humour.

I followed Anders into the bathroom – camera in hand – and Anders started explaining that we couldn’t clean the nail-polish out of the carpet. That didn’t seem to faze them much – they just kind of stared back like “and your point on why we should give a shit is….”

Max is doing a pretty good Mick Jagger, and Molly is the picture of innocence.
Note the legs, face and clothing. Yup - that is nail-polish.

And then Anders - in a moment of sheer genius - dropped the hammer. He stated that maybe we wouldn't be able to go the Disney Land like we had planned, as we now had to buy new hardwood or carpet. Their reaction was awesome - and probably secured Anders’ and my seat in hell.

I love the fact you can actually see the news sinking in...

After we calmed them down, we threw them in the tub to try and soak the polish off. Anders went to the local drug store to get some stuff to take it off their skin, while I went back out to try and cut the nail polish stained tops of the carpet strands off with manicure scissors (this didnt work too well, and just sort of cemented my position as leader of the dumb-asses.)  

During my misguided clipping, I could hear them whispering in the tub so I moved in a bit closer. Max was telling Molly that when I came back in, she should tell me that I am a party pooper (nice Max - already smart enough to make Molly do it). Molly for her part was all for it and eagerly agreed – adding “yeah – and Max, I have a good idea. We should push mom out of the door when she comes in.”

What the hell? They are THREE! If this is any indication of their teen years, it is not going to be pretty.

When I called my mom and dad to tell them, mom quickly replied with “remember when you were like 12 and spilled red nail-polish on the grey Berber rug in the family room and then removed it with bleach thinking we wouldn’t notice a three foot circle of bleached out carpet in the middle of the room?”

So, we can 100 per cent confirm that dumb-ass-ness does not skip a generation. But what is concerning to me is that they have accelerated the dumb-ass stunts, and they have an accomplice. I had to work solo and could only get into as much trouble as I could cook up by myself. These two little criminal geniuses have someone to help them take it to the next level.