A few weeks ago, the whole family went shopping at the local mall. At one point, J wanted to do some clothes shopping in a department store, so I took C off to explore while she and N shopped.

We ran around for a bit, and then found ourselves in the bed department. I flopped on my back on one of the beds and gave a big sigh. Sure enough the little guy climbed up and flopped on his back too: “Aaaahhhh”

I smiled over at him and he smiled back – and then I noticed the large spider climbing on his belly.

I sat up quickly and said “Uh-oh! A spider. Hold still!”

He sat up and stayed very still, looking a little scared. I brushed the spider off, and then, to make it a little less scary, said “brush, brush, brush” and pretended to be brushing spiders off his arms and legs as well.

He laughed and we flopped back down on the bed.

Then he sat up and looked at me with a scared (ish) look on his face. “Oh no! A spider!”

“A spider?” I said.

“TWO spiders!” he said.

So I brushed him off while we both said “brush, brush, brush.”

Needless to say, this turned into a game that we played for a fair amount of time. Not a bad game either, I must say. It had spiders, counting, tickling – and strange looks from passersby. What more could you want?

Flash forward to this past weekend, when we were out bed shopping. While we were chatting with the sales lady, he climbed up on a mattress, looked around with a scared expression on his face and said “Oh no! Spiders!”

J and the sales lady looked at him in surprise (and horror), but before they could react I said “How many?”

He nodded happily, “Five Spiders!”

The ladies relaxed and I jumped on the mattress to brush them off – the spiders, not the ladies.