In my mind, I envisioned great splatters and abstract paintings all over our back patio. What I got was this.
There's a small playground in the neighborhood adjacent to us that's designed for 2 to 5-year olds. I took them there to burn off a lot of energy. I expected they would climb and slide and drive the pretend truck. They did do all of that...for about five minutes. The other 40 minutes or so were spent doing this.
I do not mind messiness as long as it can be contained. But my girls bring new meanings to the word. The funny thing, though, they have SO MUCH FUN when they do it. I've gone from cringing about it to full on embracing it. A couple of days ago, when they were getting rowdy, I just let them play with cups and a bucket of water. If I knew of a nearby sandbox, we'd be there in a minute.
So how dirty do you let your kids get? Do you get dirty with them? (Chalk is my limit.)
We get MESSY! I let my guy splash in puddles and play in mudholes regularly. Of course, with our swampy backyard areas, this is unavoidable... especially this year. We also use paints and such. Those are the days I put him in his oversized (on purpose)white undershirt and a pair of white underwear or a disposable and a pair of washable sandals and say, "You'll wash." It's so much easier to be more laissez faire about mess when my two arms can wrangle ONE child to the hose and get him into the tub before the mess spreads than it must be for you with TWO children. I'd do more really messy stuff with the girls but I'd save the super-messy for when their daddy could join in the fun! ;)
ReplyDelete