Covert Op

As parents of a 6 year old boy and two girls, (Sophie is nearly 4 and Helena just turned 2), Mark and I are chronically sleep deprived. Much of our energy is expended while keeping the girls out of trouble. When I say trouble, I mean trouble with a capital "T" and that rhymes with "P" and that stands for Pool (you get bonus points if you can tell me that reference).

I would be wealthy beyond imagination if I had a penny for every time I have to break up the girls who seems to be training for extreme cage fighting, writing on surfaces that are not approved, and exploring every nook and cranny except their designated spaces and toys. They have a special radar for honing in on the exact wrong thing to seek out and destroy. I'm convinced they are special operatives in our armed forces.

To understand this story you must know that Sophie gets up like clockwork around 6am, every.single.day. Helena and the rest of us could sleep till noon, so Mark and I switch off on who has to get up at dawn. We have a series of baby gates and locks designed to keep our special ops from having access to specific areas but most importantly, from escaping the confines of the house without pre-authorization.

On this particular morning, we were sloppy. We've stopped setting alarm clocks as we know that Sophie will get us up. Her MO is to wake up and fuss, but never leave her bedroom. Our security system was unarmed and while the outside doors were locked, the baby gates were not closed.

The special forces leader, A.K.A. Sophie woke at her normal time. However, she remained silent as a mouse. Seeing her opportunity to leave her ungated room, she snuck downstairs and began a covert mission. At some point, she recruited her partner, A.K.A. Helena who joined the mission. They betted on their parents being so exhausted that they wouldn't wake up if they were sneaky and quiet.

From what we can gather, the special forces had free reign of the house for 60-90 minutes. What you don't see is the huge puddle of bubble juice left from the spilled bottle, a towel and bath rug that were stuffed in the upstairs toilet, and a living room and dining room that were virtual landmines of toys and shoes because we began cleaning before I thought to grab the camera.

Let me break this down for you. As upset as I am at the havoc created by this mission, I can't help but admire the cunning, planning, deviousness, creativity, ingenuity, and team work it took for the girls to pull this off.