April Fools

I've said before that Jonah is "enthusiastic." I'd try to come up with some other words to describe him, but vocabulary does not exist that better illustrates this little boy. Everything is fun. Everything is exciting. Everything is an adventure. Not a bad trait to have (although by 4:00 PM, even after having had a 3 hour break from him, it starts to wear on you).

So this morning, as with every morning, I was woken up by a beaming six-year old ready to tackle the world. Only today, instead of saying, "Mom, I'm awake. What can I do?" he said, "Mom, I'm awake. And I want breakfast."

I was prepared for this. Its April 1st.

Yesterday afternoon he made a big production of bringing me a carton of eggs, going on and on about how he wanted eggs for breakfast the next day but that I had to use the eggs that had an "x" written on them (a detail punctuated by a suspicious snicker in between each word). It was the same exact exchange we had had on March 31st the year before. And the year before that.

I rolled out of bed, dragged myself down the hall and pulled a frying pan out of the cupboard. I set it on the stove, not even bothering to turn it on knowing where we were headed, and decided to drag it out a bit this year for fun. I asked if he wanted toast and slowly began fussing with the twist tie on the bread bag.

*He started to fidget.*

I pulled a piece of bread out of the bag and placed it in the toaster, stopping to adjust my bedtime ponytail for theatrical impact.

*The fidgeting turned into small hops.*

I turned the toaster on, opened a drawer and started rifling through it, looking for a spatula.

*The small hops became larger jumps and his arms began to flail.*

I pretended to look for some non-stick spray and made a comment about maybe making some juice to go with his breakfast.

*Full-body convulsions were now accompanied by small, irrepressible snorts as if he was moments away from having an aneurysm.*

"THE EGGS! CRACK THE EGGS!!!"

I dramatically gave the eggs a smack on the counter top, and before I could even comment on the fact that they were hard boiled eggs, Jonah was rolling on the floor, gasping for breath in between guffaws.

"I got you Mom! I got you! April Fools! I got you so good!"


"You sure did! Hard boiled eggs! That's a good one, buddy!" (Again.) "I had NO idea!" (Year three, now? I guess if it works, why change?)


So we had hard boiled eggs for breakfast. While he was in the shower, I took all of Jonah's clothes out of his dresser and replaced them with Sam's clothes. If I thought he enjoyed his little breakfast hoax, it was nothing compared to being the recipient of a prank. As I watched him dripping with water in the middle of his room, I seriously considered throwing a towel under him to protect the carpet in case the delirious laughter led to loss of bladder control.


He's one easy kid to please.


So now we're conspiring, trying to decide how to punk his dad tonight.

I'm thinking maybe we'll just have eggs for dinner...but only the one's with an "x" on them.