watching clothes wash.

When a couple of the kids asked about the washing machine last week, I didn’t think much of it when I let them climb on top and have a look.

I was surprised when they spent the next twenty minutes watching it do what it does best–wash clothes. It sounds similar to watching paint dry.

I was even more surprised when Zen Yaw came in days later and ran straight to the washer. “Kelli! Kelli! Come, come! Water! Water! Go!”

He started banging on the side of the washer. I told him I didn’t need to wash clothes–I’d just finished a load, and we’re still so-so on the water situation. I didn’t want to push it.

“We’re not washing clothes right now.”
“YES! WATER! GO!”
“No, we’ll wash tomorrow.”
“No. Now.”
“Tomorrow.”
“No.”
“…Tomorrow.”
“No.”

I let him turn it off and on a few times, “On, off, on off…”; open and close the lid, “Open, close, open, close.” We had a little language practice for both of us, but no clothes were washed.

Until this morning, when he arrived at the door to say hello and I asked if he wanted to wash clothes.

“WASH! WATER, WATER, WATER!”

His older cousin wasn’t quite as excited, but enough to join him and spend thirty minutes of summer watching the clothes spin. I talked them through how to start it, where I put the soap, and what buttons to push. We got out a snack of fish, a headlamp, and then we watched the clothes spin.

For thirty minutes.

It’s probably the cutest thing I’ve seen in a long time. Each time the cycle changed, it made a sing-song noise, or anything changed, he’d give a loud, “Oh?” with big eyes. He loved watching it spin and telling me when water was coming in.

Towards the end I had to go make Flour & Flower deliveries. He left begrudgingly, took of the headlamp begrudgingly, but accepted the fish as a peace offering. When I returned four hours later, he ran in the house and went straight to the washer.

“Water! Water!”
“It’s finished. The water is gone!”
“It’s not finished.”
“Yes, it is. Finished washing.”
“It’s not finished.”

So that’s the newest thing on the block! My neighbors are the cutest.