"I just can't pencil anything else in right now..."

Madelyn's to-do list for this week:

• Make mama crazy at the post office while in line for 45 minutes. Run around, climb on stuff, sprawl all over the dirty floors, and when she tries to stop me, scream, kick and flail so wildly that everyone stares and frowns.
• Following the post office, go to Target, demand a pretzel and cheese from the snack bar. Whine incessantly. Settle for a container of cherry puffs. Spill said puffs all over the middle of the aisle. Cry self to sleep in back of shopping cart.
• Inadvertently dump popcorn, Pringles and a yogurt drink onto the carpet and/or couch while eating snacks.
• Later, upon discovering a swarm of tiny ants on a lone shard of Pringle on the floor, shout, "That's MY chip!", dismiss the ants, and eat what's left of it. Yum!
  
• Insist on playing with a cup of water and medicine syringe. Have fun for 2 minutes before the whole cup of water sloshes down my front and all over the chair cushion.
• Find a bag of marshmallows and eat them for lunch.

• Tear up a bunch of tissues, find the camera, and then take a picture of my handiwork.

• Empty an entire shelf of my books onto the floor. Tell mama, "I reading!", but she won't buy it.

• Shimmy up on top of the counter to raid the juice boxes (at least 12 different times).

• Get inspired watching The Jungle Book and decide to be Mowgli. Create own monkey ruins in living room and make-believe I can live like an animal. Wait...mama already calls me a monkey sometimes. I'm on my way!!
• Fail to become inspired by Elmo's Potty Time, however.
  

• Read Calvin & Hobbes book to brush up on new ways to get mama's attention.
• Get into the medicine cabinet and festoon self with Hello Kitty and Little Einstein band-aids. Refuse to take them off even when they are only clinging on by a worn corner.
• Grab a pretty looking card that has been addressed and stamped. Think it's for me, and when mama says no, hide it in the laundry hamper and sit back while she turns the whole house upside-down looking for it. She'll find it the next day, don't worry!
• Uproot the little plastic plants inside the fish tank.
  
• Secretly change the tension setting on mama's sewing machine, (which she can never remember how to get back to normal) causing her to have to redo a hem OVER and OVER, utter oaths under her breath, and finally give up for the night.
• Make mama realize that I am her kindred spirit when I say, "I want chocolate" and hum along to her favorite Angels and Airwaves songs. She'll say she loves me after all!