Gaston/ fire alarm update

A few of you have been asking for updates about my oldest son, code name: Gaston, because there’s no one as burly and brawny and he’s got biceps to spare.

Let me tell all of you women who don’t have children yet—having boys is not something for the faint hearted. Boys do not think like we do. And they enjoy destroying things. Sometimes it is just better not to know what they’re doing.

Like the time when Gaston was in third grade and he told me he got in trouble for doing back flips off the swings. While they were moving.

Me: Why in the world did you do that?
Him: The other kids always want me to do it. They think it’s neat.
Me: realizing that this is something he’s done many times Aaah!

Another example is when his scout leader told me, “Do you know that Gaston can climb all the way up a lamp post?”

Double Aaah! I didn’t need to know that.

Another thing boys like is playing with fire.

Here is a picture of Gaston and his friend T-man igniting something with a Bunsen burner. (I didn’t take this picture; T-man’s parents did. They have all boys so they’re used to this sort of thing.)

So the other day while I was typing away, I heard a ruckus downstairs and words like “Fire” and “extinguisher” being thrown around by Gaston and my husband.

These are not words you really want to hear as you’re busy typing. By the time I reached downstairs it was completely filled with smoke.
It turns out Gaston was cooking up a smoke bomb on the stovetop. Apparently some part of the recipe requires you to caramelize sugar. Unfortunately Gaston caramelized it to the point that it turned into an inferno, effectively setting off the smoke bomb in my kitchen.

Here is a picture we took a few minutes afterwards in the living room. We had to open all the windows and completely air out the downstairs.

And despite the fact that we replaced the smoke detector the last time we had a “caramelizing issue” in the kitchen, the alarm still didn’t go off.

That’s good to know, right?