Escaping the Compound

Imagine it's 6:15am on a sleep-in type of Saturday morning and your house alarm starts screaming. You jump out of bed and run to the back door to turn it off and your spouse not far behind trying to wake up and figure out what set it off.  You run back into the bedroom and looked out the back window to see if someone had tried to open the garage door and instead you see your small preschool age son sneaking past the neighbors car down the alley. You feel totally lost like you've entered the twilight zone, emotions flood through your veins. This was my sunny summer sleep-in Saturday morning.

I threw open the window and yelled at Gavin to get back in the house. Shannon still trying to wake up and figure out what was going on. We got Gavin back inside and man was he in trouble. Our "four-teen" year old had just snuck out of the house and got caught red handed. We didn't think we'd have to deal with this so soon. That boy had nearly perfected his escape, but thanks to an alarm system we caught him. His room was dark, door was ajar just as we had left it the night before. He had quietly closed the door without us hearing a thing. He had even gotten dressed before sneaking out. When asked where he thought he was going he answered, "To Connie and Doug's." Connie and Doug are our neighbors and landlords.  He apparently felt the need to bother them at 6:15am because he gets spoiled at their house like they're his grandparents, video games and unhealthy treats. Thankfully I wake up a tad faster than Shannon in the morning and looked out the window at just the right time.

Forever more we will have an alarm system in each home that he will not have the code to so there will be no chance of escape at night when he decides he has had enough sleep and would rather be elsewhere. And you wonder why I only have one kid people. This one is smart enough to even keep two pretty smart parents guessing and he's only four.

If you are wondering what his punishment was: Two weeks of no video games and two weeks of no fishing. Seriously? This type of punishment at four?