"Oh my gosh"

November 22, 2011 5:13 AM

Flour Children (SLYT)

Via: ABC / NPR.

posted by zarq (80 comments total)

Bwahahahahaha
posted by rebent at 5:18 AM on November 22, 2011

Those kids are totally baked.
posted by Fizz at 5:21 AM on November 22, 2011 [5 favorites]

Yes, I think he's a little too young to be babysitting his brother while you go out for a few margaritas with the girls. But hey, you were looking for an opportunity to ditch that chintzy furniture that Aunt Betty left you, so maybe now's the time.
posted by le morte de bea arthur at 5:23 AM on November 22, 2011

Bet this lady pulled one of those "I ate all your Halloween candy!" pranks on these little revenge seekers.
posted by orme at 5:26 AM on November 22, 2011 [2 favorites]

OMG that little convict trying to put the flour sack on his head. :D

"See? See? See? See?"
posted by rahnefan at 5:30 AM on November 22, 2011 [6 favorites]

Yes, I think he's a little too young to be babysitting his brother while you go out for a few margaritas with the girls.

According to the description, that occurred in the time that it took mommy to go to the bathroom. Call it fifteen minutes at the most.

Three-year olds man. I'm tellin' ya.
posted by valkyryn at 5:32 AM on November 22, 2011 [11 favorites]

Oh, my gosh. (x 1,000 )
posted by Benny Andajetz at 5:39 AM on November 22, 2011 [1 favorite]

Oh my gosh.
posted by beaucoupkevin at 5:40 AM on November 22, 2011

I like how the little one is dressed as a convict.
posted by Elly Vortex at 5:59 AM on November 22, 2011 [2 favorites]

Ah, the luxury of laughing at other people's children.

If this happened chez kinnakeet, those little heads would be mounted on pikes as a warning to other children.
posted by kinnakeet at 6:00 AM on November 22, 2011 [6 favorites]

While I'm really impressed at her calm demeanour in reaction to this mess, I can't help but think that if she were just a smidge more strict, this would never have happened. They don't even sem to realise that this kind of behaviour is not acceptable! wtf?

I can't say I would be so kind. I would not flip out, but I'd definitely be letting my kids know how angry I am and making them help me clean it up immediately.

Then again, it's entirely possible that she saved her real reaction for off-camera.
posted by sunshinesky at 6:00 AM on November 22, 2011 [1 favorite]

oh my gosh.
posted by tomswift at 6:01 AM on November 22, 2011

sunshinesky... on the other hand, i'm impressed by the way she handled it. Those toddlers did nothing wrong, they played with flour, just like they are allowed to play with sand in the sand box and finger paint at the paint table... She handled it well.

I guess she could of whipped off the belt and beat them for a while, but they probably would have pulled the video off youtube, maybe...maybe not
posted by tomswift at 6:04 AM on November 22, 2011 [2 favorites]

This is hilarious, but I'm convinced it's staged. That's easily 2-4 bags of flour sprinkled uniformly by an adult onto places the kids would have not easily reached... the window frame of the door? She's also strangely not that angry at the kids. I call shenanigans.
posted by joinks at 6:04 AM on November 22, 2011 [19 favorites]

give those little assholes some chocolate and butter to play with, then wander about exclaiming "oh, my ganache"
posted by kitchenrat at 6:06 AM on November 22, 2011 [6 favorites]

While I'm really impressed at her calm demeanour in reaction to this mess

I think she was still in a state of shock.

This is hilarious, but I'm convinced it's staged

Its certainly possible, but a 3 year old could easily sling a nearly empty bag around with enough force to get flour to the ceiling. Until you have kids of your own it is really difficult to appreciate the feats of destruction they can pull off.
posted by TedW at 6:07 AM on November 22, 2011 [6 favorites]

onto places the kids would have not easily reached

It's simple - you put your hand into the flour, then squeeze it into a fist with all your might, then throw the compressed flour projectile and it flies like a real snowball and even sticks to a wall like one... but I'm giving away too much.
posted by hat_eater at 6:14 AM on November 22, 2011 [5 favorites]

tomswift, I absolutely respect that she reacted better than I would have, and you are right, it was a pretty innocent incident, and she is likely still in shock. I know for large messes I just sort of put my head down and deal with it instead of blowing my top right away.

I just feel like kids need to learn a little respect for their home and possessions. If it were my house, there would definitely be some kind of hell to pay. It might take me a day to think up an appropriate punishment though. Probably something to do with temporary confiscation of prized items- they obviously take their home for granted. Of course, that's probably not age appropriate. Man parenting sucks, I can't say what I'd do, but... again, I doubt I would be so kind.

What ever happened to raising children with a grain of fear? It took one tiny crayon incident for me to learn the value of property.
posted by sunshinesky at 6:14 AM on November 22, 2011 [1 favorite]

Hate to say this, but I agree it feels staged. The flour is so uniformly distributed in the otherwise pristine living room. Seems like the little guys would have gotten the kitchen (where the flour was) or instead gleefully blizzarded the entire house, depositing drifts of flour in every room. Cute kids, tho.
posted by mochapickle at 6:22 AM on November 22, 2011 [3 favorites]

"What ever happened to raising children with a grain of fear?"

we learned that it didn't accomplish what we thought it did?
posted by tomswift at 6:22 AM on November 22, 2011 [5 favorites]

The ABC link in the post gives a little background information as well as expressing some skepticism. The mother does say the children were given "a nice talking to" later, which could be a euphemism for all sorts of consequences She also says she may never buy flour again.

On the other hand, I have created a similar mess when doing a project involving a lot of sheetrock mud and sanding, and it really wouldn't take that long to get it all up with a shop-vac (just don't let it get wet).
posted by TedW at 6:23 AM on November 22, 2011

for those who think it's staged... really? someone's going to throw flour all over what appears to be pretty good furniture, a flat screen TV, family photos, etc.. just for the youtube yucks it will bring? I don't think someone that stupid would be able to operate a cell phone video camera.
posted by tomswift at 6:24 AM on November 22, 2011

someone's going to throw flour all over what appears to be pretty good furniture, a flat screen TV, family photos, etc.. just for the youtube yucks it will bring?

People have done a lot more than that just to get a million YouTube views.
posted by joinks at 6:28 AM on November 22, 2011 [2 favorites]

See shopvac. See also: Balloon Boy.
posted by mochapickle at 6:29 AM on November 22, 2011

Absolutely the kids could have done this on their own just by throwing the flour around. Kids possess amazing destructive powers adults can only dream of. When my little brother was six he managed to get a 4" x 4" piece of brownie stuck to a ten foot ceiling just by tossing it up there while no one was looking. (This is the same kid who set our house on fire while being left alone in the fenced backyard for ten minutes -- he found a next-door neighbor's discarded lighter tossed over the fence and decided to do an experiment to see what happens when you set a yard waste bag full of dried leaves on fire. And YES, my mother did in fact teach her kids discipline, and yes, my brother had been told not to play with fire. My brother has never been one to take voices of authority, or for that matter, the potential consequences of curiosity, very seriously.)

Anyway those kids are much too young to really understand the consequences of tossing around some flour, or fathom how much work it would be to clean that mess up. Every family has a crazy story like this for a reason -- kids 3 and under just don't know that much about the world and their learning strategy is pretty much, "Hmm, what does this do?"

You can't prepare for every possible weird thing a kid that age will think of to do. I don't see what the mother could have told the kids ahead of time that would have prevented this, except for maybe "Don't touch anything in the kitchen ever."
posted by BlueJae at 6:31 AM on November 22, 2011 [3 favorites]

Cocaine is a helluva drug.
posted by stormpooper at 6:32 AM on November 22, 2011 [7 favorites]

This is hilarious, but I'm convinced it's staged.

Umm... Clearly you haven't spent time around your friendly neighborhood toddlers lately. Pretty much everyone who has will tell you that this is depressingly plausible.
posted by valkyryn at 6:35 AM on November 22, 2011 [2 favorites]

What's the matter, Mommy?
posted by gwint at 6:39 AM on November 22, 2011

Clearly you haven't spent time around your friendly neighborhood toddlers lately. Pretty much everyone who has will tell you that this is depressingly plausible.

My son completed an incredible multimedia mural with markers and crayons in our guest bathroom just last week.

Anyway, we can go back and forth on this for a while. I'm calling Errol Morris.
posted by joinks at 6:41 AM on November 22, 2011 [2 favorites]

Mommy was not feeling well and had to stay in the bathroom longer than usual

I'm not sure if it's intentional but this sounds like such a euphemism
posted by rollick at 6:42 AM on November 22, 2011

Cocaine is a helluva drug.

One of the NPR commenters was reminded of Tony Montana's house
posted by TedW at 6:42 AM on November 22, 2011 [1 favorite]

What about those internet meme kids that painted the floor of the living room white? Don't have a link handy, but they also seemed to think that they'd be praised for the improvement. One Thanksgiving long ago, my then 4 year old niece proudly opened the back door of the house to show us the porch, stairs, and a good part of the yard. She'd provided a snowy landscape for us. Done quite meticulously, using flour and a sifter.
posted by StickyCarpet at 6:48 AM on November 22, 2011 [4 favorites]

I agree that kids can be more destructive than you imagine. And I also agree that you can throw flour farther than you might expect. But...look at the couch backs. Evenly spaced "drops" of flour? Like someone took a handful, dropped it on the couch back, moved over a foot and did it again? I'm not quite ready to call shenanigans, but it certainly caught my eye.

I also agree that you can probably get that much flour out of a 5 lb page. Flour is very fine. What I find harder to believe that that two toddlers could spread it so evenly. Why isn't there a huge amount in one room and then tracks into the rest of the house with dustings? It really looks like someone carried a bag around and took fistfuls out, evenly distributing it.

Which could have been kids. But 5 lbs is heavy even for a 3 year old. It all seems a little suspicious.
posted by DU at 7:09 AM on November 22, 2011 [3 favorites]

I don't see what the mother could have told the kids ahead of time that would have prevented this, except for maybe "Don't touch anything in the kitchen ever."

"You'll have to be in the playpen for a few minutes while I pee."
posted by DU at 7:11 AM on November 22, 2011 [1 favorite]

I don't know if the event itself was staged, but the video itself doesn't pass my "why were you filming this?" test. I mean, you walk out of the bathroom, see flour in the hallway, and before you even go see if your kids are okay you start filming on your cellphone?

(Maybe that's why she's so calm...the initial shock of seeing everything is over, now she's gone back to film herself talking to the kids.)
posted by Ian A.T. at 7:11 AM on November 22, 2011 [5 favorites]

Which could have been kids. But 5 lbs is heavy even for a 3 year old. It all seems a little suspicious.

I sort of assumed two things. First, they were emptying the bag as they moved down the hall, a bit at a time, which would make it lighter as they went. Second, they actually did spend some time evenly distributing it before mom showed up on the scene. You can actually seem them spreading it around. I think their actual goal was to cover as much exposed surface area as they could.

There was method to their madness. The method was also madness, but whatever.
posted by valkyryn at 7:11 AM on November 22, 2011 [2 favorites]

You know that stuff janitors put on the floor at school? If that process works in reverse, throwing up might not be a bad solution.
posted by gnomeloaf at 7:22 AM on November 22, 2011

DU: ""You'll have to be in the playpen for a few minutes while I pee.""

This was a three year old and a one year old.

Playpens are generally rated for 25-30lbs max and have an upper suggested age limit of 24 months.

A three year old usually weighs 30 to 40 pounds. A one year old child typically weighs around 25 lbs.

Depending on the design of the unit, if you put two children in a your average playpen (a pack and play) that weigh a total of say, 55-60lbs in a playpen, one of three things might happen:

1) The bottom (made of a piece of suspended cloth with a cushion on top) would rip.
2) The bottom would sag to the ground and the kids would fall against each other. (Note: This used to happen to my twin one year olds when they were placed in a pack and play playpen together before they were even 20lbs each.)
3) The three year old would attempt to climb out and upend it, possibly causing injury.

If you're talking about a fenced in play yard like this one, most three year olds can either climb or break out of one that's free standing rather easily.
posted by zarq at 7:27 AM on November 22, 2011 [2 favorites]

I suspect it was done by the guy on the grassy knoll, there's no way those kids could have hit the living room from the window of the book depository.
posted by tomswift at 7:41 AM on November 22, 2011 [2 favorites]

Is this what you were thinking of, stickycarpet? Now that would have been hell to clean up
posted by TedW at 7:51 AM on November 22, 2011 [1 favorite]

Even with kids twice that age, if nature detains me for 15 minutes, I know to expect trouble. Maybe not an entire house of flour, but still. I think maybe they don't self-govern like they used to.
posted by rahnefan at 7:53 AM on November 22, 2011

You know, I used to value my privacy in the bathroom... actually I still like to lock the doors, but not when I'm alone with kids, not even when they are glued to the telly. I HAVE to know what's going on.
posted by hat_eater at 7:57 AM on November 22, 2011

In the last few weeks, my two-year-old has dumped both a box of cereal and a bag of chips on our couch, took all of the cards and change out of my wallet (and was tossing them gleefully in the air when I walked in), eaten one bite out of every piece of fruit in our fruit bowl (including unpeeled oranges - she told me later those were yucky), and poured several spoonfuls of milk out of her brother's cup and onto the enormous salad I had just made for supper. Some of this was done with the four-year-old's assistance, but mostly she did it on her own, very quickly, while I was in the other room. Sometimes she does these things while I'm even in the room with her but distracted. I'm fairly certain she had to actually climb up onto the kitchen counter to get to the bag of chips, which makes me very nervous, since that's a new trick that opens up the possibility for all kinds of new mischief. Even if a playpen were sturdy enough to safely hold her, she would climb out of it in seconds. Never underestimate the speed and creative destructive power of a small child. I have no doubt that this is real, and it has made me consider putting locks on a few more kitchen cabinets before it happens to me too.
posted by Dojie at 7:59 AM on November 22, 2011 [6 favorites]

This reminds of some of the things which I remember being spanked for. What do those parents who won't spank do in such a situation? A timeout hardly seems to have sufficient deterrent gravity for something which looks like it would be this much fun.
posted by bukvich at 7:59 AM on November 22, 2011

Are her pants completely covered in flour at 1:45?
posted by peeedro at 8:02 AM on November 22, 2011 [2 favorites]

DU: But 5 lbs is heavy even for a 3 year old.

Bullshit on that. My son at age three could lift his 7 year old sister. Five pounds would have been nothing to him.

Is it real? I'm inclined to think so. Covering the top of the couch? Hop along the couch making it snow and it will get covered. The amount of chaos deliverable by toddlers is astounding even when you're in the same room just tying the other child's shoelace.

There have been days when, I swear, my children worked as an efficient team to methodically break my spirit.

I admire her restraint in not swearing.
posted by plinth at 8:05 AM on November 22, 2011 [2 favorites]

So I suppose it's still totally not "good parenting" to abandon heedless children in the wilderness?
posted by everichon at 8:15 AM on November 22, 2011 [1 favorite]

There is a famous story of my cousin, aged around 4, telling his 2-year-old brother while they were supposed to be sleeping in the family camper, "I'm going to destroy everything from here to there." His parents intervened before he could act on whatever that plan entailed. Having seen some of his handiwork on other occasions, I don't doubt this video at all.
posted by me3dia at 8:20 AM on November 22, 2011

"I don't know if the event itself was staged, but the video itself doesn't pass my "why were you filming this?" test. I mean, you walk out of the bathroom, see flour in the hallway, and before you even go see if your kids are okay you start filming on your cellphone? "

Oh, I've approached my toddler's bedroom, seen corners of evidence from the doorway, and gone back for the phone camera before going in all the way and letting him see me. Grandma wants evidence of her grandchildren's revenge, and the pictures are cuter when they're surprised mid-catastrophe than when you catch them and THEN go get the camera.

I have to say, even when it's my own kids, that kind of thing makes me laugh and groan, not yell. I try not to laugh where they can see me, but what's the point of yelling? They get lots of parental attention for having made a mess and that's a reward. And the house is covered in flour/wipes/pee either way. I usually say, "Oh dear, what a mess!" and enlist the mess-making two-year-old in at least the pretense of help. Because when we have messes, they have to be cleaned up. I make plenty of messes, and I don't yell at myself about them, I just clean them up. So when the toddler makes a mess -- even a catastrophic one -- I don't bother yelling, I just enlist him in the cleanup. He went through a phase of shaking his sippy cup everywhere so everything was constantly coated in milk, and I just put a basket of rags within his reach and after two weeks he was running over to get his own rag and wipe it up, and since he got no exciting reaction from mom the game got boring. Now he wipes up his brother's spit up because he's a good wiper-upper. (Although I have to come back later and touch it up a bit.)

Peeing on everything is proving a more difficult game to destroy, however.

(We do have rules, like "pee goes in diapers and potties, not on the floor" but even toddlers who know the rules have trouble following them. He frequently recites me the rule as he's breaking it -- this morning was "DO NOT TIP OVER THE ROCKING CHAIR -- Mommy, I falled over the chair on me!" I got there two seconds too late. That one wins a trip to the naughty corner, but it's really not worth yelling if nobody's bleeding.)
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 8:24 AM on November 22, 2011 [9 favorites]

I say staged too. The dribbles of flour on the lamp shade, the angles at where it is on the pictures, all too high for toddlers and not really an even 'dusting' like would happen if the bag was slung around. Flour on her pants. And the house doesn't seem right to me. With 2 boys that active, wouldn't there be more toys or kid stuff? Books, shoes, mess (under the flour). Just a hunch but I'm not buying it. I think 2 kids could do it but it'd would take a few solid minutes and I'd hope that the mom would have an ear out for shenanigans that caused all this mess and would intervene.
posted by pearlybob at 8:24 AM on November 22, 2011 [1 favorite]

I'm gonna go with staged. All of the reactions are just too bizarre. First, I find it hard to believe that even at that age they haven't figured out, in that perfectly preserved 1992 living room, no less, that they get in trouble when they make a mess. Second, she doesn't take the explicit opportunity to tell her kid what's wrong when he asks. This can be written off as... strange parenting, but there's more. It's not that difficult to clean up. She doesn't know what to do? She's going to throw up? Please. Get a broom and a vacuum. It'll take 15 minutes.

Actually, I just looked at their channel. It's real, and she's just way too nice and easily overwhelmed.
posted by cmoj at 8:29 AM on November 22, 2011 [1 favorite]

"abandon heedless children in the wilderness?"... yeah, and then we have to deal with the feral toddler problem..no thanks...

"The dribbles of flour on the lamp shade, the angles at where it is on the pictures..."... heh, I'm gonna produce CSI:Metafilter! Who's in?
posted by tomswift at 8:30 AM on November 22, 2011 [2 favorites]

As a consequence of me posting about it, he tipped over the chair AGAIN while I was nursing his brother.
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 8:33 AM on November 22, 2011

Come to think of it, my guy is pretty quiet.....BRB
posted by pearlybob at 8:34 AM on November 22, 2011 [5 favorites]

> CSI:Metafilter

This reminds me of the guy at the OJ trial testifying about the patterns of blood drips on the gloves and socks. Henry Lee blood splatter analyst.
posted by bukvich at 8:36 AM on November 22, 2011

Kids this age are basically supervillains, capable of incredible feats of willpower and creativity. They are not only capable of wrecking a home, they possess a keen sense of exactly what to target -- that which is most valuable to an adult becomes that which is most fun to mess with. The attraction is completely innocent and benevolent in their eyes -- they just can't help being evil, lost as they are in this orgy of simultaneous construction and deconstruction.

Just ask any housecat.
posted by swift at 9:20 AM on November 22, 2011 [3 favorites]

This was a three year old and a one year old.

Playpens are generally rated for 25-30lbs max and have an upper suggested age limit of 24 months.

A three year old usually weighs 30 to 40 pounds. A one year old child typically weighs around 25 lbs.

Not a foldup. The kind where you put a fence around an area in your living room. You don't have to tell me how to take care of simul-toddlers. I've had *three* at once.

(And an average three year old does not weigh 30-40 lbs. I've got two *6* year olds who are just over 40 now.)
posted by DU at 9:26 AM on November 22, 2011 [1 favorite]

If you're talking about a fenced in play yard like this one, most three year olds can either climb or break out of one that's free standing rather easily.

And having known a number of 3 year olds, I call BS on the "most" here.
posted by DU at 9:28 AM on November 22, 2011

Average height and weight chart.
posted by cmoj at 9:32 AM on November 22, 2011 [1 favorite]

This video actually made me want children.

I'd be right down there playing with them in it before it got cleaned up. Come on, you know that looks fun as hell.
posted by Malice at 9:42 AM on November 22, 2011 [3 favorites]

So now I'm curious. Let's say I'm just Some Dude. I don't have a blog with adsense ads, I'm not a Social Media Asshole or SEO Douche, and I don't have an amway franchise or whatever the MLM people do these days. Aside from a pat on the back for being internet popular, what would I get back from having a youtube video with 1,000,000 views? I mean in monetary or other advantages to my life terms. Does youtube automatically share money with me?
posted by maxwelton at 9:50 AM on November 22, 2011

DU: "Not a foldup. The kind where you put a fence around an area in your living room. You don't have to tell me how to take care of simul-toddlers. I've had *three* at once.

I'm currently raising two at once.

Fencing an area off in one's living room is fine if needed. But if you've toddler-proofed a home it's not always necessary. My house has no gates or barriers anymore, and my kids have full access to our kitchen. We have protective knobs on the stove to prevent them from turning on the gas, but other than that there's no need. (Well, sorta. See the last paragraph on this comment.)

I would not assume that a parent would think it necessary if their kids aren't prone to wrecking the place.

Then again, it's a whole different ballgame when you have a one year old with a three year old, I'm sure.

DU: " (And an average three year old does not weigh 30-40 lbs. I've got two *6* year olds who are just over 40 now.)"

To add a note to the height and weight chart kindly posted by cmoj, both my kids are approximately 36 pounds each and 37" high and they'll be turning 4 in February.

Oh, and in theory my son would have no problem lifting and swinging a five pound bag of flour. I'm not sure my daughter could though. But I attempted making challah bread with them this weekend and they made a HUGE mess with just a few teaspoonfuls of flour. I can only imagine what they'd do if given access to five pounds of it.
posted by zarq at 9:58 AM on November 22, 2011

maxwelton: what would I get back from having a youtube video with 1,000,000 views? I mean in monetary or other advantages to my life terms. Does youtube automatically share money with me?

Don't disregard Internet Fame, especially when that extends into TV appearances. And there's YouTube "partner program" - aka make some money with ads over your videos.

But I'm going with Eyebrows McGee:

Oh, I've approached my toddler's bedroom, seen corners of evidence from the doorway, and gone back for the phone camera before going in all the way and letting him see me. Grandma wants evidence of her grandchildren's revenge, and the pictures are cuter when they're surprised mid-catastrophe than when you catch them and THEN go get the camera.

Also, the video presentation made me think two things: 1) as cmoj pointed out: she's just way too nice and easily overwhelmed, and 2) watching life through a viewfinder removes you from the reality. I remember seeing/reading an interview with a war correspondent videographer who, when asked how he dealt with the dangerous situations he entered, said he felt like he was watching it from a remote location while looking through his camera. In my own tame life, I feel that when I'm trying to compose a photo, looking at the world with one eye closed and the other framed by the viewfinder.

As a wee light thief, the worst I did was making a web of black thread around our dining room furniture. I used most of a bobbin of thread and went around and around the chair and table legs. I look forward to the adventures of/with my own junior light thief. I'll be sure to have the vacuum, mop and whatever else handy.
posted by filthy light thief at 10:06 AM on November 22, 2011 [1 favorite]

Parent of a three year old and a one year old here. My boys delight in dumping things out and spreading the contents all over the place. If I'm lucky it's a bin of blocks or the tub of dinosaurs. If I'm unlucky it's a box of cereal or a colander full of freshly washed berries.

I have no doubt that, presented with the opportunity, my two would think a five pound bag of flour was the awesomest new thing ever.

The three year old can climb out of/over any safety enclosure. There's no point.

Just yesterday I was particularly, uh, indisposed in the bathroom, and weighing the pros and cons of letting them stay with me, which they wanted, and kicking them out for a little privacy. I feel like I dodged a bullet here.
posted by ambrosia at 10:08 AM on November 22, 2011 [1 favorite]

filthy light thief: " As a wee light thief, the worst I did was making a web of black thread around our dining room furniture. I used most of a bobbin of thread and went around and around the chair and table legs. I look forward to the adventures of/with my own junior light thief. I'll be sure to have the vacuum, mop and whatever else handy."

Heh.

My father was the tooth fairy. I know this because I booby trapped my room to catch her and caught hell instead.

So.... I had figured out that the tooth fairy was one of my parents, but not which one. Snuck into my father's study after being tucked in and grabbed a ball of twine, which I looped and crisscrossed around the feet/legs of every piece of furniture in my room a few inches above the floor.

My father had multiple sclerosis and walked with a cane at the time. At some point in the late evening after I had fallen asleep, he opened the door to my room, stepped inside, tripped and fell flat on his face, dragging several pieces of furniture on top of himself in the process. Oops.

Sadly, he didn't react as calmly as the mom in this video. (I was probably lucky he didn’t kill me with his bare hands -- I did get a spanking.)

Every time my kids act up, my mom chuckles and says, "Karma's a bitch, huh?"
posted by zarq at 10:19 AM on November 22, 2011 [4 favorites]

I was responsible for looking after a 3 year old yesterday for a few hours, and I can assure all of the doubters above that the video is completely within the realm of the possible. In my experience with my own 4 kids, the amount of mischief created is the square of the number of children present: 2 kids cause 4 times the pandemonium, 3 kids create a 9x disaster, etc.
posted by Daddy-O at 10:27 AM on November 22, 2011

The best part of this video is that I don't have children.
posted by BitterOldPunk at 10:41 AM on November 22, 2011 [10 favorites]

OK here is where I get to tell the story of my greatest act of three year old destruction that I can remember. Our next door neighbor had a large flower bed full of geraniums. I would estimate around forty plants. They were all in bloom. With a stick I whacked down every single one of those plants in less than a minute. It was glorious.

I'm sure I got spanked a few other times but that one hurt like a sonofabitch and it is the one time that really stands out.
posted by bukvich at 10:45 AM on November 22, 2011

I realize that one most likely does not have candles burning in a house with a 1- and 3-year-old, but my first worry was the possibility of fire/explosion from candles/pilot lights plus flour in the air.
posted by Mister Moofoo at 11:08 AM on November 22, 2011

these babies are bad babies, and this is precisely why we need baby prisons.
posted by elizardbits at 11:51 AM on November 22, 2011 [12 favorites]

If they had a border collie, you would have seen the same thing. Trust me!!!
posted by stormpooper at 12:05 PM on November 22, 2011

These inventive youngsters are performing a psychological experiment on Mom. It's difficult for us to see their conclusions because this is just one trial among many. But they know how to make her say, "Oh my gosh."
posted by Jode at 12:51 PM on November 22, 2011

Well on the bright side, at least it's not feces!
posted by cazoo at 1:18 PM on November 22, 2011 [5 favorites]

Of course you film this kind of stuff. I don't have video, but I have pictures of The Boys' experiments in "Let's see if this egg is hard boiled! (x2)", "Look, mom, I have chocolate all over - not really, it's all food coloring!", and "MUD".

You know you'll laugh later, especially when it's time for The Girl to visit for the first time.

This is the naked baby picture of the 21st century.
posted by lysdexic at 2:21 PM on November 22, 2011 [1 favorite]

cazoo: Well on the bright side, at least it's not feces!

Yeah, this is tame. Before I turned two - still in diapers - I managed to climb out of my bed, remove my dirty diaper and paint my room with it - walls, ceiling, furniture, carpet, self from head to toe (face and hair included).

My mom's reaction was similar to, if considerably more emotional than, that of the mom in this video. She called my dad at work, sobbing. Substitute 'oh my gosh' from video with my dad's first name and a healthy dose of tearful desperation, and you've got the picture.
posted by syzygy at 3:20 PM on November 22, 2011

What's the matter, Mommy?
posted by gwint at 9:39 AM on November 22 [+] [!]

Yeah, that was hilarious. The kid didn't even get that all the omigoshing had anything at all to do with the mess. I'm in the "not staged" camp.
posted by thinkpiece at 4:13 PM on November 22, 2011

Even if this was staged (I don't believe it was), those kids are fully capable of doing that much damage.

My oldest brother, when he was three years old, got a hold of a stick of lipstick when our mother was otherwise engaged. He totally trashed a bathroom in about five minutes. There are photos of said bathroom and brother with lipstick from one end to the other. I won't get into the many times our various homes were in danger of being burnt to the ground due to various kids left without supervision and with lots of fire making items left casually around.

Kids are sneaky, fast and evil. Do not ever underestimate what they can do.
posted by deborah at 7:21 PM on November 22, 2011

LOL
posted by mike3k at 7:42 PM on November 22, 2011

Follow-up article.
posted by Dojie at 6:12 PM on November 23, 2011

So over the Thanksgiving holiday my mother-in-law was visiting, and this video came up in conversation. She'd already seen it, and said to mr. ambrosia "you know, you did something like this when you were three. You got into the kitchen, and dumped a big bag of flour all over. But only after you had gotten into the cooking oil, and had dumped a half-gallon jug of vegetable oil all over the floor. Then you poured flour all over the place. It was such a mess."

The things you learn.
posted by ambrosia at 2:20 PM on November 30, 2011