I'm bored...

Periodically I am longing to hear this statement expressed by my children as in this home as we are not allowed to be bored. Correction, we are not allowed to say aloud that we are bored because in a household this size there should never be a reason to be bored.

So if someone in this family, states that they are bored there is a host of extra chores just itching to be completed by a bored child. So everynow and then, when that list becomes exceptionally long I lay in wait, like the cop in a speed trap, the spider in her web, ready to pounce on the first child who sighs and then unthinkingly says: "I'm bored, there's nothing to do here."

It is amusing to see the reaction of an older, more wiley and experienced child hear a younger sibling say this for the first time that they are old enough for that chore list - about 6 years old in this house.

Some will jump up and hush the child looking around to see if their younger sibling has been over heard.

"Shh - you are NOT bored!"

"Am too!"

"Psst come here, let me explain why you are not bored!"

Or, then there is the adult child who is home for a visit who overhears this mis-statement and with eyes twinking begins to regale the bored child with tales of the endless chores they faced the day they mistakenly said that they were bored.

However, a new twist has arisen. Today as we were doing normal everyday chores after breakfast, Anna who is 13, informed me that she had a new plan for when she is... bored!

"I was thinking that instead of lying around on the couch or wishing I could use the computer when I'm... bored, I could bake, learn new recipees and such."

"And clean up after your baking?" I asked nervously.

"Oh yes - of course!" she replied enthusiastically.

And so now I have another reason to hope for boredom to prevail in our home; a room full of boxes to be unpacked on my list of chores for the bored, and an empty cookie jar!

Any ideas how I could perhaps entrap a child into saying they are bored?