Negotiations with a 31-year Old

Chris may be quite the negotiator (see his last post), but Caleb won't be out done. He has learned the fine art of negotiations at an early age.

We are lucky enough to live about two miles from where Chris works. So he is able to come home for lunch quite often. But when he comes home, Caleb isn't always ready for him to go back to work!

Here is Caleb trying to convince his dad to not go back to work and instead to watch a movie with him.

Not sure what is up with the slapping of his chest. All I know is that I was dying of laughter and had to grab the camera.

So, Caleb started by piling all the shoes that were by the front door onto Chris's lap. I guess figuring that he wouldn't be able to leave with all those shoes on his lap? Then he put the crazy sombrero on his head. After all, who would leave the house with that thing on their head? Then he added a blanket on top of the shoes for good measure. He then resorted to climbing on the red bucket to plead his case, giving such excuses as, "It's too cold outside.... Stay home and sit on the couch and watch a movie. Alright?!?" (As a side note--"cold outside" is 65 degrees--Caleb definitely takes after me as far as temperatures are concerned!)

You have to give him points for creativity and effort.

So who won this negotiation?

What's that? Is that Caleb sitting on Chris's lap with a movie on in the background?!?!

How did he end up convincing him? He flipped on the movie and sat on his lap. Chris got distracted and started watching with him. Ok, so it only worked for like 10 minutes...but all his efforts still got results. :)

(This part TMI--if you're wondering why Caleb is in his birthday suit...well.... We don't usually let him run around like that. But when he needs to go #2, he strips down to absolutely nothing and then he'll go in the bathroom and do his business. Drives me nuts sometimes when I'm trying to hurry. But I guess I shouldn't complain! At least he does his business IN the potty!)