Delusions of Grandeur

Y'all, I don't know about you but, true to my ADHD nature, I get super stoked when I see these elaborate play set ups on the mom groups that I follow and want to immediately set up the most beautiful scenarios for my kids to enjoy, completely forgetting that my boys are...well, how do I put this?  My boys behave in completely developmentally appropriate ways for their ages. In other words, they are tiny tornados of energy and emotions that can demolish my best laid plans in no time at all. 

Anyway, so I waited until the kids went to bed and spent an hour setting up an elaborate playscape, posted these beautiful pictures, and patted myself on the back as hundreds of comments and reactions came in through my FB notifications. I couldn't wait until the next morning when the boys saw it and explored it all while I drank my coffee and watched them. 

Needless to say, morning came and things did not go as planned. Within four minutes both of my boys were in tears. It seems that with my 1 and 4 year old boys, no matter how spread out the table activity is, someone is going to be a jerk to someone else and/or not play the way the other wants to play.

The one year old, also known as Thanos the Destroyer of Worlds, wanted to immediately rip everything off the table and put it in his mouth. I redirected him to the other area and showed him how to roll cars down the ramp. Then the 4 year old decided he wanted the car that the 1 year old had because I commented on how well it fit the 1 yo’s hand. Obviously, that was his sign that he should ignore the multiple other cars on the setup and take that particular car from his little brother. Next up Thanos decided to play a game of knock off and pick up with the wooden house big brother was using as a animal hospital. Big bro lost his mind over that but I persisted and went to grab some velcro to velcro the house in place so it couldn’t be knocked off.  While I was distracted doing that, Thanos lost interest in annoying his brother and decided he needed to go over and grab my coffee cup, pouring it EVERYWHERE. As I was cleaning that up, he went under the table and popped the cover off since the house was velcroed to it. Soooo, I velcroed the cover down.

In short, it was like that scene in the first Avengers movie where the giant worm thing flies through the portal and starts ramming into buildings in NYC and everything is chaos. My dreams of them nicely playing while instrumental music played and I drank my coffee went out the window. That being said, once the one year old lost interest and went in search of new worlds to conquer, my 4 year old loved the setup and played for a long while making up all sorts of scenarios. Included are some pictures of the devastation. I will be ordering some wooden counselors to come help the other wooden people through the trauma of being flung about and attacked by a mouthy toddler and a grabby preschooler.

 I wanted to share the reality of the day because I think sometimes we, or maybe just I do, look at these beautiful setups and think that “this mom here has her stuff together,” and picture everyone playing serenely with angels singing or some such nonsense.  Maybe that does happen somewhere.  Maybe there are kids that are unicorns and play gently side by side all day.  Given the comments I received when I posted the tragic update to all my mom groups the next day though, I think it is safe to say there are a lot more moms out there with spilled coffee and kids in time out for throwing an ice cream truck driven by a penguin at their brother's head.  If that is you, congratulations, you are not alone.  If that isn't, please share with us where you get the baby chloroform! (Please note, I am kidding and would never sedate or encourage drugging children).

Product Details:
Road Bin Inserts by Practically Playing 
Wooden People, Pets, Houses, Cars are from the Target Bullseye section of the store