I think one of my worst nightmares would be to have a job on the cleaning crew at at packing peanuts factory. Seriously. There should be a special place in hell for the guy (I know it was a guy) who invented – accidentally or intentionally – these murderously annoying things.
Early this afternoon, I gathered the kids in the basement and told them that we needed to do a quick clean up. The girl next door is coming over to babysit tonight (no… we’re not doing anything romantic or exciting – we have parent/teacher conferences). The kids, excited about having fresh prey in the near future, happily cleaned up the clutter.
Glad to have that chore out of the way, I left them to shower (finally) and do some laundry.
A little later, Lukie came up to tell me that they were doing something really exciting (!) in the basement. I was only half listening, but he said something about beauty and about snow. I thought that maybe they were coloring their new castle (made with boxes from the furnace), but Luke told me, no, they didn’t have any colors down there. So, I assumed that they’d gotten into the new printer paper Dan bought yesterday and were tearing it up or something. Ugh. I took a deep breath, pushed the thought away and continued with my chores.
Mid-laundry, Luke found me again and begged me to come down to the basement to see their beautiful project.
(Keep in mind that this picture was taken after it was halfway cleaned up!)
The Christmas lights I could handle. The &%$#@! packing peanuts made me want to burst into tears.
I have only one stash of the evil things. They were in a very large box protecting the wreath my grandmother made using tin can lids. Thankfully, as my sister mentioned, there were no trails of blood to go along with the trails of peanuts. How no one managed to slice part of themselves open, I can’t imagine. Still, that barely put a dent in my dismay. The basement, the castle, the children were COVERED in styrofoam. And, of course the kids weren’t content to use the peanuts as they were. No. They had to break them up into itty bitty teeny tiny pieces (the more to look like real snow, Mom!)
I’m sure I’ll still be picking off the pieces of styrofoam while discussing my children’s progress with their teachers tonight.
4 responses so far ↓
1 Maggie // Nov 9, 2009 at 11:48 pm
They get an A for creativity, don’t they?
2 Gwen // Nov 10, 2009 at 9:31 am
Luckily we have evidence that they know how to vacuum.
3 Stephanie // Nov 14, 2009 at 6:48 pm
It’s the static electricity build up that makes them so hellacious. They stick to everthing. You try to get them in a container and they stick to your hands. They stick to the vacuum canister. To everything. I too hate those freaking things.
4 Fun with T.P. // Nov 19, 2009 at 9:51 pm
[...] I ended my conversation and headed down stairs. Thankfully, the damage was non-existent, but the mess wasn’t. There were rolls of toilet paper EVERYwhere. Lucky for us, the rolls come individually wrapped, so the mess wasn’t what it could have been. (And no one will have to worry about dust or dirt on their butts when using it later.) There were, however, a few rolls that had been opened and tossed about, creating yet another snowstorm in the basement. [...]
Leave a Comment