When It Gets Too Quiet in the House, Don't Assume the Worst

The other day, I was cleaning the kitchen after breakfast.  The boys had been playing in the living room, zooming matchbox cars around and then crashing them in the windowsills (don't even ask me how many times a year I have to repaint the trim!).  Suddenly, I noticed that it was blissfully quiet -- a "sound" that is both good and bad.  Every mother of small children craves it, yet she fears it, too.  "What in Heaven's name are the boys up to?"  I have discovered them doing many things at moments like these in the past:  Matthew's recent facination with the toilet combined with his newfound ability to open doors (oh, man!) has created no shortage of excitement.  Also, his new favorite activity:  deleting programs off of the family computer.  Timothy is getting much better now that he's older; he's also good at "alerting" me to Matthew's actions.

But I digress. 

So, with the (blessed) silence registering in my brain, I turned on my heel to go find the kids.  As I approached their room and still did not hear any sounds, I started to wonder if somehow they had escaped outside without my noticing.  I poked my head around the corner and felt my heart squeeze as I saw this:

Oh, thank you, Lord, for these precious book-loving babies!