It's amazing how much I get accomplished when I am forced to stay home. My minivan and I are locked in a battle of wills. I insist that it lasts until next spring. It keeps showing me how little control I have in this plan. I suppose this is just what I deserve, as all the problems seem to stem from the side of the car I ran into a telephone pole during the ice storm last winter.

On the other hand, I'm pretty much unpacked. Of course the downside of that is that ALL the toys are now unpacked and spread throughout the house. Batman was quite literally cooling his heels in the fridge this morning.

I've always known that the time would come when my children would recognize my authoritative count down, in a firm voice and emphatic hand gestures for what it is, a bluff. I don't ever know what I'm going to do. Mac used to hop to at the sound of "five", in recent months he's been dawdling until two, but he still gets going. I don't know if it's because X-Man has never seen the consequences of failing to respond to my most serious counting, or if it's because X-Man doesn't understand how counting works or if it's because he's X-Man, but he called my bluff.

Now part of being pretty much unpacked is that I've actually moved still packed totes from the living room to my freshly insulated attic. In doing so, I made sure to leave all the baby items and maternity wear near the front, because my maternity clothes, despite my warning to the father figure, ended up in the back of the storage unit and we all saw how THAT turned out. Anyway, there were many trips in and out of the attic.

Before I was taken hostage by my car, I still had to get three kids to four soccer practices (no this isn't common core math, Baby's practices with two teams) so the tote moving and organizing was a work in progress. Mac was generally unnerved by the existence of the attic. X-Man was smitten but generally content to sit outside the door and observe mom. At  least the first day. By day two, the awesomeness of the attic had reached an undeniable level and so he just had to explore. Barefooted of course.

I caught him sneaking in. I'm a fairly decent reader of two year olds, as I was heading out for the next load, I could see the wheels turning in his head. He waited for me to leave, or so he thought. So I put on my firm voice and said "X-Man come out." He did not. So I upped the ante "X-Man, five, four.. .." thump thump thump, and there was X-Man. Well at least down to his torso. He leaned out of the attic, looked at me, cocked his head and disappeared again.

Well, huh. I guess I'll keep counting. I walked over and met his gaze. He firmly planted himself. "Why aren't you wearing pants?" Seriously I turn my back for two minutes. " Three. Two." Extra emphatic hand gestures to indicate the dire situation he was in. At this point, X-Man looked at me and raised one eyebrow. Well now all the firmness of the voice won't account for anything if I crack up now. "One." Eyebrow still raised. Bluff called.

"Well now X-Man, mommy's going to have to take you out of the attic." Boy did I show him. That's my story and I'm sticking to it.