The spray spray.

It is a universal truth that kids love water.  Both of our kids have found endless enjoyment from dragging a chair over to the sink and playing in the running water.  And both of our kids have loved the spray bottle, affectionately known as a "spray spray" in our house.  Doug, being both older and wiser than me, capitalized on Elisabeth's love of the spray spray and gave her a hand towel to go with it.  He set her off to spraying the windows just as long as she'd wipe up after she was done.  You've never seen a kid so happy.  

Fast-forward about a year and now we have Charlotte, who adores the spray spray.  The problem is, she's a second child.  And she's quiet.  Which means that yesterday while I was getting dressed in our room while ostensibly watching Charlotte the clean laundry got spray sprayed.  The pictures laying up against the wall waiting to get hung up got spray sprayed.  The carpet got spray sprayed.  She followed each spray with a delightful squeal.

 

Then this morning, I told Doug that I was going upstairs to have a bath.  Charlotte heard the words "upstairs" and "bath" and demanded to come with me, and demanded to bring the spray spray.  Now, I might be dumb, but I'm not that dumb.  You're a sitting duck in the tub and I knew I'd spend the entire time getting spray sprayed.  I tried to dissuade her and failed.  So Doug told her the water was all gone and that she would have to come upstairs with me with an empty spray spray.  Well, she figured an empty spray spray was better than no spray spray...

And as I figured, I was indeed a sitting duck.  What is a bath without bath toys?  So I had about 10 of her favorite bath toys flung in my general direction starting with a very hard temperature taking whale that may well have left a bruise.  She dug through the big pink tub of bath toys looking for a suitable friend for me, hold up a rubber duck with a sort of maniacal look in her eye and holler "QUAAAACK!"  I begged her not to throw it, but in it went.  "QUAAAAAACK" again...  No Charlotte, no more toys!  They splash and get stuck behind me and those beaks hurt!!!!  

Splash.  

After pleading with her time and again to stop, she showed me some mercy and decided to try that spray spray and see how empty it was.  Turns out there's always a little more water in a spray spray.  Well, I was not going to sit there and get sprayed with cold water during what was supposed to be my luxuriously hot and relaxing bath.  So... I filled up her spray spray.  And suggested that Willy the cat was hiding somewhere in our room.  Off she went like a bolt of lightning looking for that cat.  I'll never know what happened, but when I came out the cat was happily ensconced  in the middle of our bed and Charlotte was adorably and quietly sitting on the chaise lounge spray spraying.

Now if I could just put some stain remover in the spray spray and set her to scrubbing the stains out of our carpet.  Or perhaps we could get her interested in a new toy - the rolly rolly - and get her to paint our bedroom.  At least the bottom 3 feet.  There are probably a billion outlets for these kids that could be beneficial to us...