rootbeer is evil - the sequel

We've had quite the night tonight. Family night is usually somewhat "exciting" at our home, but something happened tonight that had me chuckling amidst the chaos. Over a year ago I wrote the following in my blog:


"Root beer extract is evil. My 10 year old son has been pestering me to buy some so that he can make a homemade root beer recipe he found in a book. I finally remembered to search for it at the supermarket and was floored by the expense! But, I said to myself, “Self, this boy doesn’t ask for much. This is something that he really wants to do, and even though the beverage will probably taste like a dead animal soaked in sugar water, let’s humor the boy and give him this experience.” I bought the stuff.
"After the small bottle of extract sat on my counter for a few days, my two-year-old discovered he could reach it. Of course, you know where this is leading. Let’s pretend we’re two. “Gee, I wonder if I can get this open. Oh, it screws this way! (Twist, twist…) What’s that smell? Hmmm, what would happen if I shook it?” Yeah, I happened upon the scene just after the deed was done.
"Again, root beer extract is evil. It is thicker than I thought it would be, splatters exceptionally well, is very dark and CONCENTRATED. The perpetrator didn’t appear to have that much on him, but he managed to turn the bath water a sickly brown. One swipe of my floor with a wet washcloth would require quite a bit of running water to get the rag ready to swipe again. The stuff just didn’t rinse out. And, to top it off, root beer extract dries quickly. All those beautiful little droplets on my floor, oven, cupboards, etc. suddenly required a fair amount of elbow grease. Chalk it up to another great moment in the chronicles of the Flandro family.
"So, if you have a curious and/or adventurous child with a penchant for root beer…you’ve been warned!"


Fast forward to tonight. My eldest son brought home a 2 liter of rootbeer from an activity a few nights ago. We opened it last night and put what was left in the fridge. It was about 1/2 full. Tonight, after all the adventure of family night was over, I heard some screeching in the kitchen and ran to discover that the same child discussed above (now three years old) had taken the root beer from the fridge, opened it and somehow came to the conclusion that it was a good idea to dump it out on his little sister's head. Thus the screeching. I'm beginning to see a theme here. I don't think it's terribly reasonable to ban the stuff from our home, but I'm considering it!!