How to Keep Your Little Kid Busy While You Get S**T Done

Summer's over. My BFF went back to work today, so it's back to business at home. By business, I mean trying to work and entertain Ruby at the same time. The television goes a long way toward allowing me to write in uninterrupted 25-minute increments, but I try not to plant her in front of it for too long, although she's become an official emergent reader as a result of watching Super Why. She recognizes most of the letters in the alphabet, and is beginning to understand that letters are symbols for sounds. She'll say things like, "S is for soap, Mom!" So yeah, keep up the good work, TV! Save me some time teaching my kid to read. She also watches Batman, Power Puff Girls and The Littlest Pet Shop, which aren't "educational" but introduce her to a wealth of popular culture.

When she's done with TV, I've usually gotten enough done that I can take a break for awhile and pick up the house or do a load of laundry, and Ruby helps a lot with that. (She loves to fold towels and clean the bathroom sink.) Or else she makes huge messes, but whatever. Her messes are usually easy to clean up, and they keep her busy in one place for a long time so I don't have to go looking for her and stumble upon some horrific scene that's going to cost me an hour to rectify.

Here are Ruby's favorite messes to make, and the ones that keep her busy for as much time as I can hope for.

Fun with Corks

We drink a lot of wine, and for some reason (posterity? habit?) we've saved wine corks for the last 12 years. They come in really handy nowadays. I fill a couple of big plastic bowls with corks and set then on the floor, along with a ladle, the blender (she loves that thing for some reason. She never plugs it in, of course.) and a few more bowls of varying sizes. She plays with those things forever.

Go Nuts with Art Supplies

The key to keeping your kid busy with art supplies is to not care if they break the crayons, drown the watercolors or make tiny confetti out of your old gas bill. I set up Ruby on the kitchen table (she sits on it, not at it) and give her the glue, some scissors, some popsicle sticks, a few odds and ends and some paper. She uses way too much glue and tries to mix paint with glue and pours glue into the paint water, but whatever. She's discovering, and she stays at it for an hour at a time.

Let 'Em Help You Clean

When it's time to clean, Ruby wants to help. Sometimes that's good, and sometimes that just means she wants to follow me around and make little messes in my wake. If it's the latter, I offer her a cleaning rag and the spray bottle full of water with 5 drops of tea tree essential oil. I always tell her to go easy on the spray, but she never listens. By the time she's wiped down all the lower kitchen cupboards and the fronts of the appliances, the bottle is pretty much empty, and there's a little river of water on the floor in front of the cupboards. When we're done, I throw down a towel and clean up the water with my feet, scrubbing as I go to get the wayward grime up as well. In this case, her mess turns into a cleaning tool.

Play Dress Up

Ruby is only now discovering dressing up. She never went through the whole princess thing or wanting to wear girly dresses or anything pink. Her favorite outfit since I can remember has been her black skinny jeans and her Batman shirt (Thanks, Mom!) She calls it her "awesome outfit." But recently, she's been caring about her appearance more. She's learning a lot from her big sister about clothes and about "getting ready." And that's what I call "dress up." I'll say, "Ruby, we're going to go to the store later. Why don't you start getting ready?" And she's on it. I filled an old detangler bottle with water, and she uses it to comb her hair. For fifteen straight minutes. Then, she brushes her teeth, which takes another 10 minutes. She spends a ton of time putting on her "makeup," which is some old crap I gave her, along with a clean mascara wand and some old lipstick that's really pale. No matter that she looks like a clown when she's done. We're probably not going to the store after all, and it'll come off in the shower later. Speaking of which:

Take a Play Shower

Whenever we can't find a kitchen utensil, we look in the shower. I know, gross, right? But that's pretty much where we keep our measuring cups and spatulas and whatever else keeps Ruby in the shower for at least a half hour. She loves taking showers, pouring water from container to container and finally over her head. She likes getting all soapy and making soup with her drippings and the like. I end up with a clean kid AND a good chunk of time to write an article or two. The shower floor is always covered with filled containers that turn cold and gross. I need to stay more on top of that mess. Out of sight, out of mind, I guess.