LOCKED OUT

Dear Mummy,

I'm not sorry for locking you and Ollie out of the house this morning.  You were occupied on the phone, chatting to one of your friends, whilst Ollie was playing outside without me.  I just figured that I'd teach you both a lesson for ignoring me.

You should have seen the look on your faces when you realised that I was not only able to reach but also activate the locking mechanism, on the big glass sliding door, from the inside.  It was amusing the way you and Ollie commenced shouting instructions to me through the door.  The use of melodramatic arm movements was captivating and the funny faces you created were absurd.  As I was struggling to decipher this strange new language and dance, I thought I'd take advantage and use this rare opportunity instead.  Finally I got to tug on that cord you avidly refuse to let me touch and to freely visit that large cold room where you keep our big white car and all of Daddy's fun tools.  You shouldn't have worried though because I wasn't in there for long and toddled straight back out to watch your crazy antics which were much more entertaining.

I think you eventually realised that I was not going to reverse the lock because I was staring at you through the thick glass, like you were a creature from another planet.  Watching you check all the other windows and doors was fun too.  Mummy, you looked a little frantic and I'm not sure why.  You think you'd be happy that all your security screens on the windows were immovable and that they were all closed anyway, keeping the rain out.

I don't know why you suddenly worried about only wearing a flimsy house dress without a supporting bra or pair of shoes.  Ollie later told me that, although you weren't very graceful, you looked quite pretty, in the rain, scaling that rickety six foot fence in a last ditch attempt to check the other side of the house and laundry door.  I'm certain that our neighbours thought so too.

After the fence debacle, you discovered you were proud of another security measure.  The laundry screen door was key locked.  For a minute I lost sight of you, but then you came back with Ollie.  I can only assume you also managed to maneuver him awkwardly over the fence.  By the way, I don't know why you and Daddy don't put a gate in that backyard fence for moments like these.

Without giving up, you encouraged Ollie to become a contortionist and pretend he was a cat so he'd crawl through the small cat flap in the bottom of the door.  You looked relieved when he just barely managed to squeeze through the little opening without getting wedged in the flap.  Lucky for you, Ollie was able to follow through with your instructions and retrieve the house keys thus allowing you access to re-enter the house.

By the end of the whole saga, I was happy to see you and Ollie.  I was getting a bit bored and really wanted someone to play with. 

Mummy, I think you were a being a little over dramatic when you mentioned to Daddy that you had visions of fire trucks and strangers coming to assist you, in your inappropriate attire, "to help rescue our trapped two year old and to pry our three and a half year old out of the laundry door using the 'jaws of life'."  I just hope you have learned your lesson and will remember not to ignore me again.

 Love Linc xoxo

STUNT MUMMY

Dear Mummy,

We're really sorry for the way you discovered our latest bedtime rampage last night.  It took loads of hard work and a long time to construct that skyscraper of story books, furry creatures and hard shaped little people at the end of Linc's bed.

When you came to check up on us, we also didn't mean to laugh out loud the moment you tripped over our beloved tower of toys and crumpled awkwardly to the ground.  At the time, we thought it was hilarious when you suddenly dropped out of sight and ended up sprawled across the floor.  Mummy, you have to see it from our point of view.  At first you were there, walking towards us, carrying the drinks that we had ordered earlier, and the next thing we knew, your arms and legs were flailing clumsily around in the air.  When you finally surfaced, dripping with water, we thought you had just performed one of your funny stunts for the purpose of our merriment.

We had no idea, that not leaving you a spare piece of carpet to walk on, would be considered a 'death trap'.  Despite being under duress to clean up our castle this morning, we understand our mistake and apologise profusely.

It's still makes us giggle though ... but only because you survived.

Love Ollie and Linc xoxo

LITTLE HELPERS

Dear Mummy,

We struggle to understand why, when we offer our services, that you often say to us, "Thank you, but I don't need your help".  We know you love to be independent and self reliant but we are such wonderful little helpers, ready to assist in every moment and activity, that we think you're silly for rejecting our proposals of help.

When you ask us to clean up our room, it might be a slow process, but I like to pick up each toy individually, play with it, to assess its condition and examine it, to ensure it's still functional.  There is no point putting things away if they simply do not pass my rigorous inspection test. I maneuver planes to ensure they remain aerodynamic, trains to make sure my "toot toot" sound continues to work in conjunction with them and cars to see if they are still able to crash through lego blocks, drive over Linc's head and swerve in and out of obstacles without breaking down.  What I don't understand is why you need to rush this systematic approach.

Linc likes to help out too by gathering up as many toys as his little arms will allow. Instead of dumping them in the designated area though, he scampers out of the room because he likes to help you find new homes for them.  This procedure alleviates the problem that our toy box is too full.  We also believe it helps you because you don't need to rummage for something for us to play with later, as our toys are already conveniently scattered around the house.  As this streamlines things for you and makes playtime more efficient, our assistance must be extremely beneficial.

We like it when you cook but especially love it when you bake.  Most times you actively seek to get us involved.  Within minutes though and for unknown reasons, our help is suddenly no longer required.  Last week we would've like to help you clean up that cupcake I tried to grow halfway down the cupboard and the flour that Linc sifted onto the cat but you distracted us with other, not so imminent, projects to help you instead, such as colouring in Postman Pat. We managed to help you lick clean those beaters though. Lucky you have us to tackle that job.

Daddy allows us to follow him around and assist with garden jobs sometimes, but also gets quite agitated when we are only trying to help.  I love to stand between him and that noisy lawn mower to help push it around.  However, I don't understand why he always insists on going in a straight line and at a faster pace.  We're also dumfounded as to why, Daddy herded us back inside the moment Linc tried to help him with the car.  Linc thought it was a good idea, whilst Daddy was under the bonnet, to copy him and pick up the screwdriver and start whacking the rest of the car with it.  Our favourite time to assist Daddy though, is when he washes the ute.  Taking turns with the hose, we help him to water the lawn, the sky, the letterbox, the dog and ourselves.  Daddy should cherish our help as this saves him time from having to take a shower.

When you wipe the walls, we love to help with crayon and chalk.  We offer our assistance, when you vacuum, by trying to de-flea the dog.  Dropping new rolls of dunny paper into the bowl soaks up excess water which supports you in cleaning the toilet.  Whilst shopping, I like to run a few aisles ahead of you to check out the specials and Linc likes to help select things off the shelves to save you from reaching over.  To help you save money, we hide your purse.  To relieve the boredom whilst driving, we occasionally produce loud screeching noises from the backseat to entertain you.  Picking the flowers in your garden before you knew they were there, gives you extra time to do other things.  As we both love helping you mop the floor, we wrestle with each other to decide whose turn it is, rather than you having to make that decision.  Saving you time, we like to help you web surf and write gibberish emails to your friends.  We enjoy educating you on the remote controls and helping you find buttons that you never knew existed or can never find again.  On that rare occasion, when you have nothing to do, we like to remedy the situation and create chaos and produce frenzied clutter, filling your time and generating other opportunities for us to help.

We are your special little helpers and believe that you should utilise our assistance more often.

Love Ollie and Linc xoxo 

P.S. Sometimes we catch you trying to sneak things into the wheelie bin or gather mail from the letter box without our assistance.  Just in case it isn't obvious from our screams, we don't like it when you do this.  They're our jobs.

BROTHERLY LOVE

Dear Mummy,

You call it a headlock.

 I say it's brotherly love.

Tamato. Tomato.

I do love Linc, I do. 

Promise!

Love Ollie xoxo

TOY SALES

Dear Mummy,

I'm not sure if you intentionally tried to hide the fact, that there are mid-year, giant toy sales currently occurring in those big shiny shops which you try hard to bypass.  As you probably overlooked these major events by mistake, I'm writing to advise you, that it's not too late to purchase goods and avoid a massive impending disaster.  


To guide you in this quest, I have now surveyed the catalogues, studied the brochures and compiled a list of all the toys required and desired.  Having investigated our options, there are some terrific deals both in store and available online.  Please also note that we are leading up to that inevitable Christmas period and there are some fantastic, no deposit, layby options for you to consider.   

Mummy, I am now old enough to realise that the fat, bearded, jolly man in the red suit must only be able to carry a couple of presents for every child in the world and which leaves the rest up to you and Daddy.  The choice was too hard though, so I have put in an order for one of everything.


Thanks in advance, for fulfilling my dreams and wishes.


Love Linc xoxo


P.S.  Please also be advised that I have now forwarded these brochures to Ollie for his perusal.

BEDTIME CAPERS

 

Dear Mummy,

Another series of games that we love to play with you and Daddy is "Bedtime Capers".  We admit that we occasionally give you the impression that we don't want to go to bed, by using tactics such as relying on our severe case of 'bright and shiny' syndrome to start procrastinating like we're professional time wasters, easily distracted by the smallest glint, shimmer or sound.  If this fails to work, we quickly transition into plan 'B' which is adopting our emotional blackmail strategy.  We slump our shoulders, shake our heads, pout our bottom lip and act as if you have just stolen our precious bag of lollies.  After you announce that the day has come to an end, we then behave like you've crushed all our remaining hopes and dreams.  We all know better.  We all know that this is just the beginning of the game.

Once in bed, with the lights out, Linc and I often take bets as to how many times we can get you to return to our room, repeatedly attempting to get us to settle down, climb back into bed, close our eyes, put our books away and turn off our music making furry friends, before you 'lose the lot' or 'crack a banana'.  All winnings are tripled if you have to resort to forcing Daddy to get off his butt and chase us back to bed and threaten us into submission.  Sometimes we draw mega blocks to see which one of us dares to toddle out, wide-eyed, as if it's morning, with a story book, expecting compliance.

Mummy, when we finally succumb to the pressure of the sandman and head off into the land of sweet dreams, the last thing we see is, you, looking a little frazzled.  Don't worry, we understand.  After a couple of hours of playing chasey with you and Daddy and participating in other bedtime escapades, we're a little exhausted as well.

Well after our bedtime frolics have subsided and when you think we are deep in sleep, you come back into check on us.  We know you're there though.  Your smile starts to beam across your face again and the twinkle creeps back into your eyes.  We wait for your visits.  Tenderly you kiss our foreheads, brush our hair lovingly behind our ears and pull the blankets up under our chins.  You gingerly remove toys wedged in our ribs or the books that we cling to.  We love these moments. 

We also love watching you sprint from the room, the nanosecond we start to twitch, move, roll or flinch.  Giggling quietly to ourselves, we know that's the fastest we've ever seen you move!

 

Love Ollie and Linc xoxo

P.S.  However, seriously Mummy, when you did pop in to visit us the other night and discovered us both finally crashed out in the same bed together, what we're you thinking when you decided to use flash photography?!?!  You must be either a sucker for punishment or you just want to keep playing the game.

MR POTATO HEAD

Dear Mummy,

What sort of cruel world do we live in?  Is this payback for taking a few liberties on my birthday the other day?  Is this a bad joke or just cruel and unusual punishment?

Mummy, you know I normally love Mr Potato Head, both in the Toy Story movies and as little, cute, adorable plastic toys.  Well, I just wanted to let you know that you have now severely ruined my love for potato heads forever!  That giant potato head thing, that you and Daddy call a birthday present, is the scariest creature I've ever come across.

Big, bad Mr Potato Head creeps me out as he stares at me with those intimidating, angry eyes.  Unexpectedly he erupts into deranged movements.  Suddenly he begins to wobble his legs, wriggle his ears and flap his big lanky arms about madly, like he's coming to get me.  If that wasn't bad enough, he starts yelling cantankerous gibberish at me in a gruff and boisterous voice and then without warning he explodes into pieces.  I'm not sure what that cranky beast is trying to say to me because I don't hang around long enough to find out.

Seriously Mummy.  What were you and Daddy thinking? Thanks for the nightmares.  : (

Love Linc xoxo

________________________________________________

Dear Mummy,

OMG Mummy! I love the new Mr Potato Head that you and Daddy gave to Linc, to give to me.  He is so cool.  We are now the best of friends and chat happily to each other.

I discovered he doesn't like it when you yell at him though, because his bits and pieces pop out and scatter all over the place!  The first time I hollered at him, I thought I had broken him forever and would be blamed for his demise.  Now we've gotten to know each other, I can't wait until he bursts apart again.

He's the best toy in the world!  Thanks. : )

Love Ollie xoxo