The Best in New Piggy Banks

For a few weeks now our doorway/stair gate has been making a sort of clackety noise when lifted from its hinges and moved into another room. It sounded as though a piece of plastic had broken off inside and was tumbling around.

This evening when I moved it from the bottom of the steps into the kids’ bedroom doorway, it sounded as if someone had been using it as a piggy bank. Except, really, it’s better than a piggy bank because most piggies these days have a plug in the bottom, and the only way to get the money back from the gate is to take a sledgehammer to it. It’s burglarproof.

At first the tinkling confused me, but as I tilted the gate this way and that I suddenly had a vision of Daddy’s spare change spread out on top of the record player. A certain toddler that lives in this house is beginning to show a little ankle at the cuff of his pants which means he is getting taller. Places that were once unreachable are now very reachable indeed.

The combination of pennies and the nice penny-sized slot in the bottom of the gate were apparently too much of a temptation for him. When questioned as to what was causing the delightful chinking sound in the gate he told us with an excited smile that he had stashed pennies in there.

It made me a little sad to tell the boy that what he thought was such an inspired idea shouldn’t be repeated. I suppose Daddy will have to be more mindful of leaving money lying around the house, or the next time the boy may hide the milk and egg money inside the VCR.