Dennis, I mean, Sarah the Menace

I have always said that age three is "worse" than age two.  By worse, I mean that the "Terrible Two" thing is nothing compared to the "Thunderous Threes". 

Then I had Sarah.  And I learned what the terrible twos are about.  It's not that she is terrible.  She's just very...passionate.  About everything.  Some might say she's got all of the characteristics of someone diagnosed with bipolar disorder.  Particularly the extreme highs and lows within nanoseconds of each other. 

The terrible twos, in my opinion, are the direct result of a yet-undeveloped means of communication.  She says lots of words, but mostly nouns - not adjectives.  So it makes it harder to describe how she is feeling.  That makes life challenging to say the least.  And the result is a violent reaction.  Thunderous even...a year early.  She's so advanced.

So in the times when there is a calm, I should know by now that mischief is abounding. 

And yet somehow, I find myself so relieved for the calm, that I enjoy it for thirty seconds, a minute, maybe even two.  And then...

I find her.

Sometimes she's digging in the refrigerator for string cheese or pepperonis. (Are two year olds supposed to be able to open the fridge unassisted?  Do we need to sign her up for the World's Strongest Girl competition?)

Sometimes she's quite literally scaling the pantry shelves in a quest for lollipops or other candy.

Sometimes she's buck naked jumping on my bed.

 

Sometimes she's coloring on Ben's bunk beds with markers that are available only in his room.  (The same bunk beds, I might add, that I grew up sleeping on, and that for the past twenty-some years, have existed with nary a single marker mark on them.  Thanks, Sarah.)

And sometimes, she finds something new, something exciting...

Something wet.

Like...overflowing the bathroom sink, but only after dumping an entire bottle of kids shampoo into it...and smearing her soapy hands all over the mirror.

 "Uh oh"

What you can't tell from the picture is that there was quite literally half an inch of standing water on the counter top, a cupful of toothbrushes tipped over and filled with the soapy water, and thanks to the non-existent overflow hole (which is something that's always troubled me) in our "fancy" sinks (which, by the way, came with the house when we bought it) there was also enough water to fill the two drawers under the sink, and wet every towel in the cabinets underneath. 

That's talent, ladies and gentleman.  (And apparently, I'm a neglectful parent.  Moral of the story:  Two minutes of Sarah-unseen is two minutes too long.)

Come to think of it, I don't think that this is an example of the Terrible Two's at all. 

I think it's just Sarah.  Period.

I'm pretty sure she's kin to Dennis the Menace.  (And here we thought Abby was our mischievous one.)

 

Just goes to show you - you can never get comfortable in the parenting role.  Because then God will give you a situation - or, in this case, a whole new kid to rock your socks off.

And that she does.  She rocks them right off.

I love this little girl.  Menace or not.

(And we're having another one of these???  Ha!  Bring it on.)