"Oops, Mama. . .Mess!"

I always think it leads to a funny story when kids get into trouble when their mom is busy in the other room. So far, I've been pretty lucky and Ella hasn't really gotten into much. However, last week she impressed me by getting into trouble when I was in the same room, no more than 2 feet away from her. How does that even happen I was literally right there!




Some background. . .
The most challenging time of the day for us since the day Ella was born has always been about 4:30-6:00 in the late afternoon/early evening. Right when I have to cook dinner, before Brad gets home. This is by far my least favorite time of the day. By this point I have lost all my creativity, Ella is bored with me, wants Daddy to come home, sees me cooking dinner and decides she needs to eat immediately. Recently we have come us with some sort of solution to this problem and Ella has begun to "help" me cook dinner. She gets out her apron and our step ladder and fixes dinner. She loves it, but of course it makes it a lot harder for me as I have to make sure she doesn't get a sharp knife or touch a hot pan on the stove while at the same time allowing her to see everything that is going on and help put ingredients in our dish.

The other night I was thrilled when she decided she was bored helping me and instead wanted to play with her toys on the kitchen floor. Yea! I was going to be able to get dinner cooked so much faster and easier. Now let me remind you not 2 minutes before this picture was taken she was sitting on the floor playing so nicely (literally 2 feet behind me), next thing I know she says, "Oops Mama, Mess!". At which point I turn around and see this. If you can't tell she somehow managed to take off her apron, got out all of our spices and then proceeded to dump out the baking soda. I decided there was not point in cleaning it up until I got the casserole in the oven, and then decided before I did Brad would want to see his daughter's work of the day. I took this picture before cleaning up. . .I think Ella must have known she had done something she wasn't supposed to because after this picture she was embarrassed and didn't want to stand by her mess anymore.

It reminds me of the saying Moms always come out with that seems far more accurate now: "I turn my back for two seconds and you . . . " I guess it really could happen that way after all.