Adventures In Babysitting - Sunday

Sunday morning, and the Girls are up just after 8am.  They come trooping down, and Sharon immediately gets busy brushing their hair.  She is using some kind of spray hair untangler that Mommy dropped off as part of their kit; the fact that this product exists explains how it is that Jenna’s hair is not a perpetual mass of tangles.  The Girls tolerate me brushing their hair for about a minute.  I lack the brisk efficiency they have come to expect.

Now, the weekend was not all videos, although it sometimes seems that way.  The Girls kicked soccer balls for two hours on Saturday, for example.  Curiously, they refused to use our gigantic lawn, preferring the long concrete driveway, despite me going to the trouble of explaining that soccer was actually played on a grass field. 

Me: It will be easier on your feet. 

Kayla: Nope.

Me: Your ball won’t get all scuffed up.

Kayla: Nope.

Me: This is not the way the Europeans do it.

Kayla: We want to play on the driveway, Papa Pete.

After breakfast, Kayla walks up to me and says “Jenna would like to watch something on the computer.”  Jenna shakes her head in affirmation.  I open the laptop, pull up YouTube and ask Kayla what they would like to watch.  “Disney Princess!” she says.  Shocked, Jenna finds her voice and yells, “No!  Dora The Explorer!”  So which is it?  “Disney Princess!”  “Dora The Explorer!”  “Disney Princess!”  “Dora The Explorer!”

I remind Kayla that it was her that asked on Jenna’s behalf.  She gives me the same look I got outside when I explained about soccer balls and grass.  Sharon steps in and suggests they watch one, then the other.  Kayla says “But I can’t staaaand Dora The Explorer!”  I tell her “I’m with you there, Kayla.  Can you say ‘compromise’?  Ha Ha Ha!”  The Girls just stare at me.  For like the tenth time this weekend, I get no laughs. 

So I pull up a Dora The Explorer on the laptop.  Before they sit down to watch anything, Jenna announces that she wants to wear her fairy dress, and that she is “going in the other room to change, so nobody can see me.”  She walks around the corner into the foyer, strips, puts her dress on, and comes back into the living room. 

We settle down to a Dora episode.  Within minutes, I’m grinding my teeth.  Caca de mono Santo this is boring, but then, I’m not the target demographic.  The Girls stick to the plan, though, and swap off episodes for a while.   They take a break for a snack.  When they walk back into the living room, I realize the tissue dispenser under the coffee table is empty.  I pull the box out of the dispenser and present it to the Girls.  The following conversation ensues:

Me: Here girls; here’s an empty tissue box for you to play with (they look at me a bit puzzled).

Me: No, really, this will be great.  In fact, do you know what Mama Sharon called this when she was a little girl?

Them: What?

Me: A birthday present!  Ha ha ha ha ha!  (This earns me another look from Sharon, plus an eye roll).

Kayla: Why?

Me: Why what?

Kayla: Why did Mama Sharon think that was a birthday present?

Me: Because growing up, Mama Sharon was….

Sharon: Don’t say it. 

Them:  Say what?

Me: Never mind.

 

I cut my losses, because I again get zero laughs.  Tough crowd.  The conversation continues.

Kayla: Actually, we can use this (holding the empty tissue box).

Me: What for?

Kayla: A house for our Fairies.

Me: You have a Fairy?

Kayla: We BOTH have a Fairy.

Jenna: They’re fake.

Me: What’s fake?

Jenna: The Fairies.

Kayla: They are not fake.  They’re half fake.

Jenna: They’re half fake.

Me: Which makes them half real.

Kayla: Yes.

Me: So, if you put them in the tissue box, will they need air?

Kayla: No, because they’re not real.

Then they were off on all the different ways they would use the tissue box to house their Fairies.  This conversation goes on for several minutes, then turns into actual play on the floor for the next hour or so.  Cheryl calls from the road; she’ll be picking the Girls up in about 45 minutes. 

I could go on: I could tell you about the game the Hensley Girls made up during their last snack when they were eating animal crackers and got into an argument over who got to claim the one they named “Freda”; or I could tell you about Sharon bustling through the house, picking up the tissue box and dismantling it, only to be asked by the horrified Hensley Girls what she was doing to their Fairy House, and the look on her face as she hastily repaired it; or I could tell you about the game they played when for one brief interval they turned back into Hensley Girls 1.0, which involved jumping onto me as I sat on the couch, and their comment that they did this to Daddy all the time and he didn’t complain. 

But I won’t.  As usual, the Girls are a hoot; the weekend has flown by; they are so their parents’ children.  Cheryl bundles them into the car, and as they are driving out of the neighborhood, I recover the episode of My Little Pony on my laptop to see whether or not Twilight Sparkle was able to defeat Sunshine Shimmer’s nefarious plans for Equestria.