I’m at an age now where I can watch children without the threat of accidentally burning the house down. I’m also a bit of a homebody, so there’s no threat of any secret parties, an added bonus for my employers. For now, my main and for the most part only client is my Aunt Mindy. She has two kids, Avery and Jack. Or, if you’ve been reading Mindy’s blog, the bike spoke rider and the punishment. The first time I baby sat, ever, I discovered some of the perks. For one, the freezer is your oyster, and the contents within, the pearl. It rocks when there is an Xbox, and when Avery (thank God) knows how to set it up. Finally, the very expensive jewel in the crown of baby sitting: bedtime!!!
Bedtime is really like the end-of-shift for baby sitters. You can play the Xbox uninterrupted, and don’t need to worry about the questioning looks you receive when you back out of the freezer, ice cream filled bowl in hand. Some dishonest baby sitters might smudge the bedtime an hour or two, sending the kids to bed early. I would never dream of doing something so devious as that, even when the 6 year old wants another round of Chutes & Ladders, and Mr. 2 year old realized with sobbing horror that mom is gone. Okay, maybe once or twice bedtime was smudged a little for the young one, but never for Avery!
I might be a little lazy when I baby sit. Avery is mostly gone, playing with our cousin Sophie or some neighborhood friend. When she is home, she helps me a ton with Jack, and entertains herself. When she wants me to play with her, she isn’t creepy or bossy. She just quietly plays along. Jack is a little more difficult. Most toys will only hold him for so long. He likes his storybooks read multiple times, but that isn’t bad, because I like reading and he’ll just point out random pages, never the whole book. I know that he isn’t entertained anymore because he will start walking around the house saying, “Momma?” The smoke before the fire, I suppose. Most of the time, I play with them outside and bring out board games. Sometimes though, I’m surprised that I’m not putting Jack in the bath tub, so I don’t have to change any diapers.
The first time I baby sat, I had my first little bout of guilt. For one, their garage freezer was STUFFED with ice cream bars, and I had, like, um, 3? I, uh, can’t remember, especially since Aunt Mindy and my mom will be reading this. None of the ice cream cost them a penny, though. My Grandpa was helping tear down a gas station, and saved a huge garbage bag of the bars for us. I was guilty because I only let the kids have one or two, while I periodically snuck out to the garage to snark one down when they thought I was in the bathroom. I also found their chocolate covered macadamia nuts in the pantry. I was weak. When the kids were in bed, I burned with shame as I ate my who-knows-what-number ice cream bar. It wasn’t as bad as it could have been, though.
Aunt Mindy swore up and down that Jack would not poop. Except Jack didn’t get the memo. It wasn’t pretty. I still felt kind of bad, though. Until Avery had a night terror. A night terror is like a mix between sleep walking and a nightmare. You wake up, but you don’t wake up from the nightmare. It’s like your mind is blanking out what your eyes are seeing and replaces it with the nightmare. I was just sitting at the table, probably eating an ice cream bar, when I heard honest-to-God shrieking. At first I thought Jack had woken up and the baby monitor made him sound louder than he really was. I held fast to that theory until I went to turn the monitor down. Not only was it silent, I’m not even sure I had the other one on. I ran into Avery’s room to see her with her eyes wide open, staring at some point on the ceiling, pointing steadily yet shakily at it. I ran to her bed, eyes half turned to the ceiling. I couldn’t get her to respond, but I eventually got her to sit up. When she wouldn’t talk or even notice me, I grew concerned. The senseless mumbling didn’t help. I carried her to the living room couch, which was kind of difficult since I was making a cross with my fingers and watching the ceiling at the same time. When Aunt Mindy got home, I sort of babbled what happened in some high-octave scared voice. It probably sounded like I thought Avery had seen a demon while at the same time I was losing my mind. I might of cracked if she hadn’t come home only about ten minutes later. The moral of this story is, your aunt will pay you a bit more than necessary if her daughter scared you into buying holy water off of the Internet.
