The fallout of dealing with sabotage

I hate being sabotaged by dear husband.

I truly know he doesn't mean it, but man, it sucks when he does it.

For the last two days, dear husband has been working from home. In darling daughter's mind, it is the weekend. But it clearly isn't as he has his office door closed, listening in on an conference call as he participates in a training session. Unless it is a statutory holiday, I don't like dear husband being home from Monday to Friday, between the hours of 8 a.m. and 4 p.m. He disrupts our flow of energy as well as our routine.

Since darling daughter is only 19 months, she doesn't understand why her father can't play with her. Darling daughter's new favourite activity is to sit on the bottom of the steps leading upstairs. But the way our house is laid out, it is hard to police her unless you are standing right there, watching her so she doesn't decide to climb upstairs. I try to distract her from stairs sitting with other activities, because quite frankly, I can't stand in one spot all day, watching her sit on the stairs. And if I let her, she'd sit on the stairs all day.

When dear husband came down for lunch today, what does he do? He allows her to sit on the stairs. He encourages it by rearranging the baby gates in the house to prevent her from bolting upstairs. Great, I think to myself. When he goes upstairs, shuts the door to the office and taps back into his conference call, I've got the task of explaining to a 19-month old why she can't sit on the stairs. And guess what? She doesn't like hearing the word no all that much.

Me: You know what? You are sabotaging me. You are a saboteur.

Dear husband: Sorry, but you know how she can press my buttons. I can't say no.

Me: You are worse than a house of cards on a windy day. You collapse too quickly. Stop sabotaging me.

Luckily for me, nap time starts at 12:30 p.m. I had dear husband rearrange the baby gates in hopes darling daughter doesn't get it in her head this afternoon that she needs to sit on the stairs. And if that fails, we'll be going on a long, extended walk this afternoon.

Ah, dealing with the fallout of sabotage isn't all that fun. But at least I will get some exercise out of it.