Santas Little Helpers

For the sake of all the small children in the world who are looking forward to waking on christmas day to a bulgy sack of pressies, I am glad my two boys are not Santas little helpers. They are Mumma's Little Helpers, and aren't they just such a help.

Little Brother has been helping me cook. By licking handfuls of cocoa off the floor. Where it fell while he was raiding the cupboard, perched on tippy toes on the box of beer he'd tipped over, while trying to reach the Milo tin. Who's lid fell off also. He stopped eating cocoa and went for the milo.

Another time he was helping me make my annual white chocolate christmas-only cheese cake for the big X-day.( Its only a yearly occasion cause its so yummy I'd eat so much I could audition for the next Kung Fu Panda movie. Once I'd trained to do Kung Fu.)
So both boys like to operate the kichen whizz, which is typical for them in being intrigued by the toolkit more than the actual cooking. With only 3 buttons on the machine its pretty safe to put them onto ON/OFF duties. Little Brother however, decided to help with the adding ingredients bit, so while I had my back turned popped in to the mixture what he could reach - the foil top from a cream cheese packet, the lid of the machine (upside down). And a teaspoon...which I only discovered after fishing the other objects out, and turning the motor on. CRRuuunnncch.

Big Brother is very helpful. When bribed. Occasionally he goes for gold, like today when he tidied a glass jar off an outdoor table by throwing it onto the concrete. Thanks dear. To be fair he is an ace egg cracker, and even fishes out the pieces of rogue shell.

They are great little helpers and like to help their Mumma. Copying is such a huge method of learning, however it makes me a little nervous when I see my LB at 18 months get a beer out of the fridge, find the right tool out of the draw, and start bashing the bottle top with the opener. When the coast is clear he grabs the BBQ slice and heads out to the patio. And he loves to get a knife from the draw and try and pry open the cupboards (who on earth did he learn that one off?)

I love letting them have a go, and try to be positive about the resulting mess. I can only imagine what carnage it would be to let them loose in Santa's workshop. Lucky you Santa. But believe me, they have been very good (helpful) boys this year.