November 9, 2008

Confiscated

It was really late one night. I was already tucked away in bed, and John was getting ready for bed as well. Just before his head hit the pillow, he realized he did not have a pillow.

"That darn anemone", he muttered, as he went in search of his pillow in the family room.

My boys have been finching every single pillow in our home to create the ultimate sea anemone home for their little sea creatures.

And yes, Finn is still wearing his orange striped shirt, so that everyone will know that he is Marlin, Nemo's daddy. Calvin has long talks with "Marwin" everyday. Such serious conversations these boys have. Calvin knows the deep importance of calling Finn by his proper sea creature name.

And Calvin insists on being called "Crush", who is the daddy sea turtle in Nemo. Every time we call him Calvin or GeGe, he immediately corrects us with "I'm Crush". Since he does not have a turtle shirt to wear, Finn fashioned him an outfit, by coloring a turtle shell on the back of a plastic grocery bag.







And Calvin's little sea turtle-child is named "Squirt" from Nemo. He also calls him "Change Studdit", because at the end of the movie, Squirt became an exchange student where Nemo lives.

Well, all of this pillow snagging became extremely overwhelming the last few days. Every time I turned around, all of the couch cushions were off of the couch, to build anemones and such.

No amount of discipline was working.

One particular morning they made the mess of all messes, while I was dealing with my morning sickness. Pretty much every room of the house was a disaster.

So I gathered up their stuffed animals and blankets and put them in a large trash bag.

"I'm not throwing them away", I said. "I am just keeping them here until you earn them back".

There were plenty of tears.

Later that morning I found Finn in the corner of his room, looking at spiders. When I tried to talk to him, his eyes got all red and his voice got extra squeaky. I said "If you make your bed, you can earn back Nemo".

I have never seen Finn so motivated to help clean the house in my life. We did all the laundry and cleaned up every room. He was on his best behavior.

After each chore Finn would request "Can I get back another animal?"

Finn was willing to do ANYTHING to regain custody of his kids.

And Calvin?

Let's just say that most of his creatures would have remained in my foster-care system indefinitely if it weren't for Finn wailing "what are we gonna do-ooo to get Calvin's animals ba-ack?"

14 comments:

  1. i think i was more like finn in childhood, but sometimes i just wish i had been more like calvin :))

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  2. what a gret idea! foster care!! is it hard to take stuff away from those uber cute boys???? =)

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  3. OMgoodness, funniest post ever! They are hysterical.

    My girls are just like Gee. Our "foster care" bag remained in the garage. Only a baton was ever earned back!

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  4. Too funny :) Calvin is too laid back for his own good in this case :)

    Looking forward to seeing ya'll over Thanksgiving!

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  5. I don't know you or your kids, but I totally love your family! I've said it before and I'll say it again...I'd love to spend a day in the life with Calvin and Finn! Oh what adventures these boys have...they are hilarious!

    And your husband..."that darn anemone"...classic!

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  6. Thank you! That dress was totally trashed by the end of the night, but Colleen and Ashley were nice enough not to post any of those pictures :-)

    By the way, I didn't mention this before, but my husband is the oldest of four boys (the second brother is named Calvin, trippy, I know.) And as their new (and only) sister, let me tell you, I never feel more safe than when I'm with my brothers.

    So, all that is to say, if your 4th is a girl, she will probably be the most well-protected girl in school and if your 4th is a boy, well, you will have some very lucky daughters-in-law.

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  7. Hilarious! I love how your boys all have such distinct personalities.

    How's the drumming going?

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  8. My parents did that also! And just last week my dad called me because he found a LOST bag of toys that never got earned back! So he GAVE them to me now, and they were hideous! Ryan begged me to march them right to the trash can (I collected stuffed pigs because they were the only pink animal). Too funny!

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  9. Ha! This is hilarious! Oh, the couch cushions, that are useful for anything and everything except the actual couch for which they are intended. I love my kids' creativity, but after awhile you have to draw the line. LOL! Your oldest two boys are totally like mine - Elijah will do all of the work to get the toys back, and Ethan could care less. His loyalties run very shallow, and if it costs him any work at all, he would rather say adios to the toys than to be bothered with actually having to clean up after himself. It becomes painful for me (well, annoying, LOL...I can't function in clutter), and completely stressful for Elijah, who is constantly cleaning up because that's just his nature, and mainly because he doesn't want to be in trouble.

    In one of the closets, I have a trash bag with toys from...2004, maybe? The toys have been long-forgotten and I will toss them eventually, but I keep it in order to make a point. I don't know what the point is, but I know there is one, somewhere.

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  10. oh that is hilarious davi. those boys kill me. =)

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  11. The picture on the grocery bag? Too cute for words. I love how they always help each other out!

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  12. Your little finn is always making costumes for calvin and Ollie. The cubbies vest and now that cute little turtle shell. He has the best imagination ever! They are so stinkin cute! :)

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  13. how funny!! We just had to do some confiscatin' of our own here this week too-- but it wasn't for anything so creative as making a sea anemone. hehe. I love it! And it sounds like it was just the motivation they needed!

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