Thursday, November 13, 2008

Toys Gone Wild

Remember the premise of the Toy Story series-- when humans leave, the toys come to life? I don't think it's a cute little story designed to endear kids to their toys. In my house, I think it's true. How else do all of the toys in all of the buckets end up dumped unceremoniously on the floor every day? My kids insist (eyes averted) that they have nothing to do with it, or else blame Maren for the mess (she does make a mess, but it's usually confined to Dora, Little People and my makeup-- legos, action figures and Polly Pockets are not her purview). I've been a very mean mom lately, yelling and threatening no Christmas presents if I have to pick up a single toy at the end of the day, but we had something happen last night that makes me wonder if the kids really aren't to blame.

At 2:41 and an ominous wail started up in the playroom. Eddie and I became semi-conscious and ruled out that one of the kids was having an emergency. So what was it? A sick cat? One of the pigeons that roosts outside our bedroom window? We were too tired to figure it out. Over the next ten minutes or so, the sound repeated weakly two or three times. Then, all middle-of-the-night heck broke loose, and it gained in strength and sounded somewhat familiar, though oddly distorted. I feigned sleep, while Eddie went out to investigate (all of those years of nursing babies have gotten me a free pass in the "investigate in the middle of the night" responsibilities) and returned to our room carrying a possessed Little People Castle-- lights flashing, trumpet blaring madly. We were too brain-dead to go hunting for a Philips-head screwdriver at 3 am, and I debated internally whether or not it would be appropriate to huck it into the middle of the street. Thankfully, Eddie found the switch on the bottom and we all went back to sleep.

But I still think our toys are alive. They're probably upstairs right now, ready to spring out of the buckets at the first convenient moment.

1. toys without batteries
2. Christmas shopping underway
3. nothing big on today's agenda

8 comments:

Anonymous said...

I laughed out loud. And remembered when your Mom and I were staying with the kids while you were cruising in February -- we had a similar experience with a toy that started wailing all on its own! I guiltily admit I've contributed to the toy stash ...
Love, Annie

lyn said...

Ha ha! how annoying.

I had a friend who would put run down batteries into toys on purpose. Just because she didn't want to hear really loud toys all the time and half dead batteries mean half dead toys. :)

Patience said...

That's hilarious! We had a stuffed bunny that said "peek-a-boo, I see you" in the middle of the night. It was destined for the dumpster, I guess.

Sheree said...

Oh that happened to me when I was babysitting once. The scary baby doll started saying "ma-ma" and I about freaked. I had to laugh about Maren's messes, Simone is going through that tornado stage too!

Courtney said...

We've had toys come on in the middle of the night (usually when the batteries were going). It is hard to process mid-sleep.

Sister Molly said...

We only let our children play with all natural toys. It is better for their creativity and helps their little brains grow! Batteries are also contributing to the pollution of our environment. The devil is real though and if your toys are coming to life you may consider blessing your home (well, having your husband do it) to rid if of any of the '1/3' that may be lurking around.

Love,
Molly

frugalmom said...

we had a Little People toy start singing in the middle of the night the other night too!

Anonymous said...

LOL!! At least it's not your oven baking, ROFL (yeah I think I'm the only one that thinks that's funny ;) )