Scissors

So - I have always kind of laughed at people whose toddlers have managed to hack off a chunk of their own hair.

First of all, I generally don't let either of my kids near scissors. For any reason. At all. Even when supervised.

(Which is probably why Sam was just a bit behind most of his classmates at preschool this year in the cutting department.)

Secondly, should one actually let preschool children near scissors, why in the world would they ever be unsupervised for long enough to cut into anything other than paper?

However, we were at playgroup on Monday where a mom had a craft that involved cutting and both of my children were super excited to be able to cut. I even had a chance to sit and talk for more than 3 minutes uninterrupted because Sadie just sat on my lap cutting paper after paper into shreds.

So, that afternoon I got out our child-safe scissors that were stored high on a shelf and let them go to town.

It was divine.

I thought I had found my new secret weapon for entertaining them.

The next morning they were right back at it, which was very nice considering I was on hold with the Sears installation department for 30 minutes (trying to find out why the new dishwasher Joe bought that had a delivery date of 4/20 on the receipt wasn't actually going to be at my house on 4/20). However, as soon as I actually got a live human on the phone the kids started fighting over the scissors and had to be put in their rooms screaming their heads off while I tried to sort out my dishwasher dilemma.

And so there were no scissors the rest of the day.

Why do they always ruin it!?

Then this morning I thought I would give them another chance. Sam wanted to make a "project" to take to his preschool teacher on his first day back, so I set them both at the kitchen table with paper and scissors, reminding them that if anyone even though about fighting over anything with the scissors near them they would both be back up in their rooms - for a long time - alone - while I sat in the hallway eating ice cream.

(Just kidding about the ice cream.)

All was good. I got the kitchen cleaned up (well - other than the confetti on the floor) and ran upstairs for literally 30 seconds to grab a pair of socks for Sam. As I came down I thought I heard Sam say something about hair, but didn't really pay much attention.

Until I saw this.


I guess I only told them not to fight about the scissors. I never specified they were only to be used on paper.

Good thing we had haircuts scheduled for this afternoon anyway.