It’s not often that I am proud of my mad babysitting skills. But today, today I impressed myself.

The Tibbles were sitting on my lap and we were singing songs. We had already run through “Wheels on the Bus” and “Ten Little Monkeys” and after about fourteen rounds of “Who stole the cookie from the cookie jar” I grew tired of that song and started in on a new song.

“Five green and speckled frogs, sat on a speckled log, eating some most delicious bugs. . . ” I started to sing.
Nolan to covered his ears and screeched. “NOOOOOOO. I hate that one.”
“But I love it,” I said. And I do. I like how the song grows faster with each green speckled frog that jumps into the pool where it was nice and cool. I love the yum, yum.
“Frogs stink,” Nolan said.
Liam shook his head in agreement.
“What do you want to sing?” I asked
“Let’s sing about bats,” Nolan said.
“Yay bats!” Liam said. “Me like bats.”

I scanned the deepest, darkest recesses of my brain and only came up with the Batman smells jingle bells song, which I quickly vetoed. I am not ready to talk Christmas.

Then, out of nowhere, I started singing:
“Five brown and speckled bats hung in a deep, dark cave eating some most delicious bugs . . .”
The Tibbles started rubbing their tummies in unison. “Yum, Yum.”
I continued singing. “One flew out in the night, where stars were shining bright, and then there were four brown speckled bats.”
“Glub, glub,” the Tibbles said, which was fine with me because I had no idea what kind of screech a bat flying into the night would make.

Once we finished singing the song I proclaimed myself the smartest babysitter ever. Neither of The Tibbles were impressed. But I still am.