It’s too quiet!
Beware The Sound of Silence!
Children make a lot of noise. They make sad noises when they cry. They make annoying noises when they argue with each other. They make happy sounds when they are playing. They make giggly sounds when they are laughing. There are good sounds and bad sounds, but there is one sound that is scarier than them all: The sound of silence.
If a child is making no sound at all, it's time to get worried. Chances are they are getting into something they shouldn't be getting into, and they don't want you to find out about it.
When my kids are being absolutely quiet, it might mean they have snuck into the pantry and are eating cereal right out of the box. (Or the floor, which is where a lot of the cereal ends up.)
When my kids are being absolutely quiet, it might mean that they have snuck into my room, climbed onto my bed, grabbed the remote, and tried to order Netflix. (My youngest is not yet two years old, but he consistently tries to get us signed up for Netflix.)(Meanwhile, my three-year-old likes to push buttons on the remote while yelling, "Come on, Elmo!" At our house, we call this "Elmo roulette.")
When my kids are being absolutely quiet, it might mean they have grabbed a crayon and/or marker and are redecorating our refrigerator.
When my kids are being absolutely quiet, it might mean they might have snuck away to the cat food dish, where they will eat the cat food and/or splash in the cat water.
When my kids are being absolutely quiet, it might mean they have ventured off to the bathroom, where they are (very quietly) unrolling every last square of the toilet paper.
When my kids are being absolutely quiet, it might mean that they've wandered into the kitchen to turn off the dishwasher in the middle of a cycle. (Yes, it has a "Child Lock" feature. Unfortunately, the only one of us who has figured out how to use the "Child Lock" is the child under the age of two.)
Having said all of this, there are rare occasions when the silence is good. Every once in a while, when my kids are being quiet, it might mean they have grabbed a book and are reading.
And, on the rarest of occasions, when my kids are being quiet, it might mean they have curled up with a blanket and are taking a nap. That's when the silence is golden!
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