Leila and I were in The Reject Shop today and saw those cheap voice-changing microphones they make for kids. She wanted one, so I bought two – one for her and one for Finn, in different colours.
This seemed like a simple and effective plan: A microphone for each child, identical in every way, except that Finn’s is blue and green and Leila’s is pink and yellow. No chance of confusing which is whose and no reason to fight over them. At 2 bucks each, a cheap and cheerful afternoon’s fun with little to no risk. Or so I thought.
I went outside to bring some washing in and left the kids happily yelling (aka ‘singing’) at each other through their mikes. As I was coming in with the first armful of stuff I spied Leila crouched on the ground while Finn attempted to put the fake bit of cable hanging out the bottom of his mike into her ear. I was suitably horrified and made a big deal of telling both of them that we never, ever put things in other people’s ears (except their hearing aids, of course …). Finn accepted this cheerfully enough and then promptly attempted to insert the same bit of cable into his own ear, past his hearing aid mould. I cut the pieces of cable off both mikes and went back outside.
After a couple of minutes I could hear Leila crying so came back in to see what was going in. When I got there she had her mike, but was still upset. I asked her what was wrong. “Finn took my microphone and gave it back when he saw you coming.” (The clothesline is outside her bedroom window) I bet Finn is starting to regret the days when he used to complain that Leila couldn’t talk …
I asked him why he took Leila’s microphone. “Because I wanted it.” I didn’t bother to ask why because the answer would only have annoyed me. Instead I sternly told him that there was absolutely no reason for him to take his sister’s microphone and that if I saw him with it again he would lose his own, along with his Lego. An over-reaction, perhaps, but necessary to make the point I thought.
I went back to what I was doing, only to find them a few minutes later, playing sword fights with the microphones … I suppose it was too much to expect they’d just use them to sing through.
