The Guns Have Been Put Away

Yesterday Princess came home to a mommy armed to the gills with PLAN!! Before she got home, I cleared out the entire entryway floor. After snack I said, "so Princess, would you rather put your laundry in the dryer or scrub the entryway floor?" Surprise (not really)! She said she wanted to scrub the floor. I explained what a "done" floor would look like (wet all over with no visible crud) and said, "all rightie! I'll go put in your laundry." I spent all of three minutes de-clumping her clothes and tossing them in. She tried out a, "Mom, can you help me with this (unidentifiable piece of sticky orange coagulation)? I can't get it to come off?" To which I replied, "Oh Princess; I'm already done with your work." Then I stepped over her into the kitchen.

Five minutes or so later she informed me she was "ready." I looked her dead in the eye and said, "if I look out there and see dry places, I'll set the timer for 10 minutes, and you'll scrub until the timer goes off instead of deciding when you're done." She turned around and went back to work. Another three minutes passed, and out popped Princess. I stuck my head around the corner to view the, you guessed it! half-dry floor. I said, "thanks for letting me know you want to scrub with the timer," and set it. She turned around and went back out. I told her a few times how thankful I was that she was paying me back this way for my doing her work for her. No crabbing. No fussing. No blaming. No lying. Astonishing. Came out when the timer beeped.

She had some playtime, and came back to do her homework and only laid on a thin layer of crap. Again, shock. But apparently that was the extent of the goodwill and cooperation because at 6:00 I said, "well Princess, it's 6:00 and it's been at least three hours since you've used a toilet, so go ahead and clean up and change into your bathrobe and you can hang with me for the evening," and Princess exploded guts and glory all over the kitchen. But. She did come out in time for dinner. And, although she was not anything anyone would deem pleasant to be around, she stayed in the kitchen and didn't throw anything despite threats to the otherwise. She did stick something down the back of my pants, though. I still haven't figured out what. It fell out somewhere before I had the chance to investigate my heiner without looking interested.

Now the laundry needs to be put away. I will have the bathroom prepped for cleaning. Mwa ha ha ha haaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!