Tuesday, September 05, 2006

Lesson via Ian-Style

It never ceases to amaze me, that it is we parents who are continually learning from our children.

Paul occasionally scores Diamondback baseball tickets through the company he works for. Ah, not just any tickets mind you, he gets Suite Tickets, and this time he got the entire suite! This includes three parking passes, two of which are reserved. All together now...sweet.

Paul needs to find bodies to fill the seats, not the easiest thing to do when the game is on a weekday afternoon. He calls friends and family. Fortunately, our friends Chris and Beth are able to go and bring along their daughter Riley. Ian now has a playmate for the game. Things are looking great!

Beth decides to stop by on her way home from work to pick up the tickets. I'm upstairs giving my dark and graying roots a salon treatment out of a box, while Paul watches the kids. Eventually, I hear Beth's voice and decide to say, hello. Looking down from the top of the staircase, I see Beth looking through Ian's toys and Paul looking at things around the room. Ian is excitedly running around the room wearing a huge smile. I'm curious, "Hi guys, what's going on?"

Puzzled and still scanning the room, Paul yells up, "Oh, I put Beth's tickets on the side table. I think Ian took them and put them somewhere."

Well, of course, naturally. Evidently, we still have not learned the age old lesson: anything within a toddler's reach should be considered GONE!

Trying to be helpful, I ask my happy-go-lucky son, "Ian, where did you put the tickets?"

Pointing at the den, he yells, "There!" He then bounces towards the den, Paul following close behind. No luck.

I try to think of all the places Ian has been interested in lately. Could the tickets be under the couch or between the cushions? In the trash or recycle bin? On the bookshelf? With his train set or car collection? Under the refrigerator or stove? In the VCR? In the air vent? In the toilet? Repeatedly the answer is no (thank goodness especially on that last one).

This could go on all night, so I tell Beth to take our tickets. We'll keep looking and hopefully find the others. We may have to put Ian under a bright light and interrogate him, but we'll find the tickets. Relunctantly, she takes our tickets and heads home.

Looking around the family room where the tickets were last seen, I repeatedly ask Ian, "Where are the tickets?"

He is all giggles as he points to different locations and delightfully squeals, "There!"

Paul and I search everyplace Ian directs us, but alas, no sign of baseball tickets. Finally it dawns on me, Ian spends a lot of time playing with items on the shelves by the laundry room. Extremely hopeful to solve this mystery, I practically run to the location and search under and between things on the shelves. I take my purse off the shelf and a stack of tickets falls to the floor. Oh glorious day, I found the tickets! A quick phone call to Beth to ease her worried mind, and then a hug for Ian for reminding us of yet another toddlerism.

Lesson learned, we do not put anything we want to see again on a surface that is shorter than four feet high. Of course, this height restriction will change as Ian grows, or when he learns to use a step ladder, chair, or similar object to get what he wants.







Ian and Laurel enjoying a walk during the 7th inning.











There's plenty of room to play in the suite. Give it up Ian, Riley just isn't interested in trading her cars for your space shuttle.

4 comments:

Knitting Maniac said...

Ah yes... the toddler reach. My mother always says they have octopus arms!

Lady M said...

Glad he didn't eat the tickets! If Q had gotten them, they'd probably be in small damp pieces. :0

Chicky Chicky Baby said...

I'm so glad to hear that the tickets didn't end up in the toilet. But for suite tickets (sweet) I bet you would have fished them out and dried them off.

beth said...

I had a bad, bad feeling about how this story was going to end. So glad you found them before the start of the game.