The Brattons

We are officially halfway moved. That means all of our stuff is packed away in a transportable storage device and ready to meet us once we figure out where we are going. Meanwhile we are house-sitting/squatting on the east side. Daniel is pretty excited to have some sort of normal routine that doesn't involve the sound of packing tape. He wasn't a fan of the packing process. Or of our parenting-while-packing techniques.

The "Wait Right Here" Technique. Set the sleeping baby on the floor (because his bed, swing, and every other option have been packed) and quick pack as much as you can before he wakes up. This gives you about 4 1/2 minutes.

The Beanie Baby Technique. This is for those children who can't for the life of them keep a pacifier in their mouth. Prop it in with a bean bag dog and you're good to go for as long as 10 minutes!

The "All I Have Left to Entertain You With is a Permanent Marker and Some Cardboard Boxes" Technique. Behold the beautiful artwork your mother has created. This is good for 45 minutes. Not bad.

And last but definitely not least, this is what I like to call the River Song Technique. The name will probably only make sense to Dr Who fans, but it got me 2 solid hours of packing. "Are you my Mummy?"

I should clarify that we do spend plenty of actually decent time interacting with our child. We just needed a little something to get us through the packing. Something that got us a little less of this:
And a little more of this:
And this:
And it worked. And now I will read him lots of stories and play with him so he will remember that I am his mother. And that the stick figure is not.