Fixing things and covering up

N’s getting crafty.  Well, not exactly crafty, but knowing when he might have done something he shouldn’t.

It might have something to do with my scary ‘what’ve you done?’ voice, as he tends to have a really guilty, shamed look whenever I start to say something.

But he’s started trying to fix what he’s done wrong.

The other morning I got out our big roll of art-paper for him to do some colouring and drawing on.  I suggested we draw round him, then he could colour in some clothes.  He quite happily let me draw his outline and looked surprised to see it afterwards.  One green scribble and that was it, bored.  So we left it on the table, while I went to have a shower.

He wanted to stay downstairs and play, waiting for his dad to come in before going back out to work again.

When I returned back downstairs again, what did I find, but shreds of paper, lots crumpled up, and his outline ripped and ruined.

N looked all sheepish, so I said I’d get a bin bag and he could tidy it away.  No problem, all tidied up by himself.

Later on though, I was making a salad ready for tea, came back into the living room where he’d been playing to find a tea towel on the floor by the chair.  I lift it up to see a huge water mark…he’d either been using his water bottle to squirt (he’s discovered it squirts like the empty shampoo bottles in the bath), or had tipped the water from my water bottle straight onto the floor.

It was quite hard to tell him off as he had tried to soak up the water using the tea towel.   He’s obviously quite observant in watching me clean up and sort out problems as he seems to know what to do.  Shame he does the actions (however rare) that cause the problems in the first place.