I told my daughter the tripod in the corner would eat her up if she did not finish her puzzle. She now fears it.
I am a bad, bad, mommy. I was under the influence of Where the Wild Things Are and it was late. I told just after that I had been lying and that at worst it would fall on her or pinch her fingers and it did not matter if she finished her puzzle or not. She still looks over to it fearfully once in a while. I think I caught her trying to bait it.
When I was younger my step-cousins (sons of my step-mother’s brother) would often visit. My dad had this funny looking ornament which was a bit like treebeard. My step-cousin (who was much younger than me) was terrified of it, and I remember being puzzled as to what could possibly be so scary about it.
Oh and slightly more on-topic. My sister in law told my 8 year old niece that she will be packing her bags and leaving home the day of her 16th birthday :eek:
Not as a threat but as a joke, which somehow makes it worse :eek: :eek:
You should dress up the tripod with some clothing and put a “hello my name is” sticker on it with the name, 'Trippy, the killer tripod".
Do you refer to it as “The Tripod, source of eldritch horror!” in your daughter’s presence?
After your daughter has gone to sleep, do you put The Tripod next to her bed, so that if she awakens in the middle of the night the first thing she’ll see is The Tripod, looming over her?
Do you take your daughter’s dollies and put scraps of their clothing on The Tripod, as if It has consumed the dolls?
Do you write “TRIPOD WATCHES YOU” with your finger on the dry bathroom mirror so that when your daughter is being bathed, the steam reveals the writing?
All of these activities I would describe as “Bad Mommy” actions - what you did doesn’t count for much.
Dang - I should have had kids… I’ve got all these cool ideas, and no-one to try them on… 
I was in a drug store once, and this man was there with 2 little boys. They were begging him for candy, and he kept saying no, but they kept asking. Finally he pointed to the TV screen attached to the closed-circuit cameras.
"See that? You’re on TV. " The boys said that yes, they could see themselves. “Well,” he said. “Mommy can see you right now and she’ll get mad if I buy you candy.”
They didn’t ask again.
You can use this to your parenting advantage, you know…
You should periodically move the tripod around the house, into ever so slightly more menacing locations. Of course, you never let on that you know about this, and flatly dismiss any questions about the tripod with a ‘pshaw!’ or whatever your equivalent is.
Whenever the child misbehaves, arrange for the tripod to be in a threatening position, but NEVER let the kid see you do it. When they’re really bad, put it in their partly opened closet or something, with just the leg poking out.
And always deny, deny, deny.
You will find this a valuable tool in controlling and modifiying your child’s behavior.
No, I am not a parent, nor do I ever intend to become one. Good thing, too. Do not taunt Happy Fun Ball.
I told my (then) three year old brother that the sun was evil and wanted to kill him. He would then get scared and cover his eyes with his hands. 'Twas funny.
I usually avoid lying to my daughter. I was weak this once. She will be the one picking out my old age home after all. I can’t imagine lying to her telling her that I could tell something I could not. She would test! This all started because it fell down when no one was near it. It startled her and I made up that lie.
I don’t have to move the tripod around, someone else aready has been. I had asked that it be moved out of sight, and it was. It is back now, and I have noticed it moved since it was first back in sight.
Once, we noticed that the heating pad was blinking, which means that it had been left on and turned itself off. I told her that I could tell that it had been on because of the blinking light and that made me think she had been playing with it. She ran over to it and looked at the blinking light. She was visibly distressed until I reset it so it was not blinking. I don’t think she has played with it since, at least not without turining it off afterward, which is really the goal. We don’t want it left on.
I think she might be plotting against the tripod. I would not be terribly surprised if she takes it on one day.
I told my 7 year old niece I would take her to Frontier City, a local amusemant park. Instead, I took her to an abondoned warehouse that had just burned down (I saw it on the news.)
“Oh no!” I said. “Looks like Frontier City has burned down.”
She wouldn’t stop crying so I took her back to her home.
Yeah, so I stole it…
I never intentionally lie to children. But you know that censor in your head that stops you from saying really awful and inappropriate things, even if they’re really, really funny in your head?
Mine forgot to go off once.
I have a bugaboo about people telling kids that babies grow inside their mommies’ “tummies”. Um, no, they don’t. That would be gross. They grow inside uteruses. (Uteri?)
So one day I was sitting around a campfire with my friend Megan, who was very pregnant. VERY pregnant. I swear, she was about 11 1/2 months pregnant, or so it felt at the time. This little girl, maybe three years old, stood in front of us and started staring at Megan’s huge distended abdomen. Now, I don’t know who this little girl belonged to or why she was unattended around our campfire. But after about 2 minutes, Megan said to her, “There’s a baby in my tummy!” Not a word from the little girl, just a wide-eyed stare. She looked from Megan to me to Megan and finally rested on me.
“That’s 'cause she ate it.” I said sagely.
The poor thing took one last look at Megan and ran away. I never saw her again.
:smack:
Lots of fun with the little brother…the sibling closest to him in age is 8 years older, with 2 others older than that.
One of my favorites was when we convinced him that he was the only person in the world with a crack in his butt. He was maybe 3 or 4 at the time.
You know that “tummy” can mean belly or abdomen, so it’s essentially correct to say that babies grow inside their mothers’ tummies. It’s not as specific as uterus or womb, but it’s hardly “gross”.
The worst one I’ve personally seen is the one told by a childhood friend of mine who went out and got knocked up. She is a middle child, brilliant herself but lazy and stuck in between two anal retentive ultra high achievers (I must admit, her siblings are awful). Having a baby was the only way she could trump them, I guess.
Anyhow, she’s telling the kid that his father is dead. He’s not involved in the kid’s life (which is how she wants it), but he’s alive and well and would know where to find them if he were so inclined.
Going to be an interesting scene if he starts feeling guilty someday and shows up when the kid is 14 or so.
Get her some John Christopher books.
Which is why it’s a bugaboo, not a righteous crusade. It’s just “obvious” to me that “tummy” is a diminutive of sTOMach, and in our house (both the one I grew up in and the one I’m head of household of) we use correct anatomical terms for everything. I haven’t paid thousands of dollars to take anatomy classes and end up with my kids not to knowing where their scapulas are.[/hijack] 
Mine are in the drawer with all the other cooking utensils.
Well, it wasn’t a lie, really, but my former housemate’s child - a.k.a. The Monster - was terrified of the vacuum cleaner. It turned on, and she started screaming. And we never once vacuumed her. Honest!
So, after a few months of this, the vacuum became known as “The Spawn of Satan[sup]tm[/sup]”.
And what about the adults who tell little children if they are bad they will go to the hot fiery place and burn and burn and burn.
That’s always seemed potentially scarring.
No, silly, they are in the dresser drawer next to the rosaries.
Mine had white satin ribbon… 