Scary Genius

I came home from work yesterday all a flutter.  I had the ANSWER.  The SOLUTION.  The parenting concept that would make our lives PARADISE.  I had it and I couldn't wait to share it.

I sat my love down on the sofa in the living room.  I positioned my laptop in front of him and directed the browser to the genius herself, Scary Mommy . 

"What's this?" he asked warily.  "You want me to read it?  All of it?"
"Yes.  Read it NOW."

As he read, a smile played on the corner of his mouth, slowly working into a full grin.  His sleepy eyes lit up and shifted to look at me.

"Are we going to do this?" He asked.

"Oh, we are going to do this...we are going to do this ALL. NIGHT. LONG."

We called the monkey's together in the living room and explained that for one hour, Mommy and Daddy were going to spend time together and they were going to "play."  They could do anything they wanted with the exception of TV, Wii, and any other technological devices. 

"My brudder hitted me."

They were rather excited by the challenge of this assignment.  After a few clarifying questions from the Monster Monkey, who needed to be SURE of the RULES, they were off to parts unknown.

They spent a portion of the time plotting about how they would "spy on us." The Middle Monkey even stole my camera and snapped a few photos of us sitting on the couch talking, however, they quickly deemed us "completely boring" and moved on. 

"It's my dollhouse and I'm the police princess!"

A few times the Mini Monkey came to report some harm that had befallen her at the hands of her "big brudders" but after we refused to respond with our usual interventions she scooted back into the thick of things and delivered some interventions of her own.  We could hear her yelling the rules of playing with "her dollhouse."  Instructions to the big boys, who of course promptly obeyed.  

They laughed and squealed, they giggled and screamed with delight.  They had a BALL and the best part was that by 8pm, which is thier normal bedtime, they were BEAT - SPENT- EXHAUSTED.  "Playtime" had moved upstairs to the bedrooms by the time I went looking for them around 8 o'clock.  I found three sleepy monkey's snuggled into the Monster's bed while he read to them from a Leapster book. 

Ignoring your children is a brilliant idea.  Giving them enough room to just. be. kids.  Genius.  I wish I had thought of it first but I have to give the credit back to Scary Mommy and also to the generations of parents before us who knew when to say, "Go play."