Pie at 2 am is fine if you wear gray socks.

Today I got an opening glimpse of what the teenage years will be like for Gretchen, my very strong minded, sassy mouthed 7 year old. I pick her up from her friend's house, and now all of a sudden everything in her room is "so last week." Yeah sure. Want to know what's so last week? The headache I have had since becoming a mother. Now it's come to my attention that this child is not only getting ready for the teenage years, but she's also getting ready for the marriage/motherhood years. Hence her putting her 3 year old sister in time out. A year ago she wanted a bunk bed. So, a bunk bed was bought, and painted, with love, by her father. Today after leaving her friend's house I hear her in her room complaining that she wants a bed on the floor. This wonderful top bunk that she has dubbed her "office space" is now last week's newspaper. Useless. One night over a friend's house and I get stuck with a menacing side show version of an HGTV program. "The room is too small." "These curtains are too long and white for this small room." "Why do I have to share my room with a 3 year old?" The simple answers of "Well because it's her room, too" just don't seem to connect with the enigma that is a 7 year old girl's brain.  So here we are at 4:30 in the afternoon, with a child who insisted 4 hours ago to redo her room, because the room like this just isn't serving its purpose. Apparently this room has so much potential to be unlocked and discovered that this child decided to take it all apart. Now hey, I'm all for inspiration and taking matters into your own hands, but now we have a 7 year old who is done with this project, because a new project has come to mind. Apparently this project involves markers, a big piece of paper, and an image of what she would look like as a mermaid eating a cheeseburg. And now what is to become of this bedroom project and the 7 year old redecorator from hell? The bedroom will be finished by the mature and smart parent and the 7 year old will now try to "Picasso" up a mermaid eating a cheeseburg picture. And at some point tonight the house will resume into a less hostile environment. And the 7 year old who threatened her brother with her hand out and the following quote "See this hand? You will feel it one day", will hopefully passout from designer's remorse. Throughout the day and evening this place is a madhouse. A zoo. This house, that is used by other neighbors as a threat of "if you don't behave I will send you to THAT house over there." But at 2 am, while wearing my nice and quiet gray socks, I can get away with peace and pie.