Share the biggest messes your children have made in the 5 minutes when your back was turned - £300 voucher to be won!

[EllieMumsnet]

Perhaps you have a child with the potential to be a future 'Banksy' - an artist able to cover a wall in felt-tip graffiti, while you are busy chopping carrot sticks. Or maybe they're more of a Jackson Pollock character - suddenly spraying the entire contents of their bowl across the floor in homage to the painter's splatter artworks? We’ve all been there when unbelievable messes have occurred in the blink of an eye and Carex would love to hear your stories about the biggest messes your children have made.

Here’s what Carex has to say: “Here at Carex we’re all about living life hands on… and sometimes that means getting messy! Luckily we’re here to clean, care and protect with our range of antibacterial hand washes. To keep the family busy this summer you can currently enjoy half price entry to Alton Towers and Sea Life centres with every promotional pack of Carex.”

Did you leave the room for five short minutes only to come back and find they'd somehow got at your prized Chanel lipstick and had liberally applied it not only to their lips, but their cheeks, eyes, hands and hair? What madness made you leave them unsupervised?! Share the unfortunate stories of the times you turned your back and a mess ensued.

Everyone who posts on the thread will be entered into a prize draw to win a £300 voucher of their choice (from a list).

Thanks and good luck
MNHQ

Standard Insight T&Cs apply

Left a tin of yellow emulsion open thinking my toddler was out in the garden with Grandad. Took a tea break and when I returned to my decorating there was paint everywhere. Up the walls on the floor and a trail of yellow footprints leading to a little yellow faced culprit.

our daughter was playing in her bedroom, or so we thought.
couldn't hear her playing so went to investigate.
OMG she was in the bathroom with baby oil and talc all over, her face just looked so innocent.

When my (now 14 year old) son was about 9 months old, I foolishly left him unattended for a couple of minutes, with a few chocolate buttons for company! He was sitting in his high chair in the living room while I went into the kitchen to get a drink. I came back in to find him covered in melted chocolate - it was all over his hands, face, in his hair, his ears, all over his highchair tray, even behind his knees - he'd obviously just squashed them up and rubbed his hands everywhere. It was carnage!

When my daughter was young, i stupidly left a tin of bright pink emulsion lying around and i just 'rested my eyes' for 2 minutes and i bet you can guess what happened...

I walked in to my living room to find my brown sofa now pink, trails of footsteps everywhere and it even made it in to my kitchen on the washing machine and just everywhere!!

I mean i like pink but not that much! xx

I turned my back for 5 minutes and when I came back into my living room my daughter had drawn all over my dining table and living room wall with felt tip pen! Best thing is she signed it with her brothers name! She was only 4 years old!

While I nipped to the bathroom for 5 minutes, my nephew managed to open a 20 litre tub of ready mixed wallpaper paste, empty it all over the bedroom floor and escape without a drop on him. I wish the same could be said for me. I had to clean it up and I looked like a beginner on Dancing On Ice trying to navigate across the floor and clean it up!!

ive had the sudocream treatment from my children but my neice who is now 5 3 yrs ago we were looking after her and her siblings to let mummy and daddy have a break for a few days, first day was fine 2nd day we had a thunder storm so the fridge and electrics went off, found water gushing into the utility room as i was trying to find and stop the leak the youngest got the sudo out and smeared all over the sofa. the walls and the floor and her face. but then went into the kitchen cupboard and got a bag of rice and began mixing it urghhh took ages to clean/

My DD emptied a tub of vaseline and spread it on her face and hair. It's very waterproof and took ages to wash out.

10 litre box of lego. Everywhere. shudder

Decorating hallway. Large ish tub of paint. I go to loo. Perfect storm . New carpet.

I've had the sudocrem problem too - all over the bedroom, had no idea how much mess that can make. Thankfully, touch wood, there has never been any drawing on the wall incidents yet......

Not a bad mess but I was impressed by just what can be used to make a mess- DS wanted a clean paintbrush because he was “cleaning”. Fine thought I, can’t see how that can go wrong, left him to it while I emptied dishwasher.
“I draw snakes! I draw snake!”
Turns out you can make a perfectly good mark on the wall if you press hard enough to get the metal bit of the brah scraping against the paintwork.
Cba to repaint. No one really looks at that bit of wall.

Oh and the other one is endless times where tissues have been shredded, separated into layers, or liberally spread around as snow/playmobil blankets/bandages etc. It did prompt me to switch to a more recycled brand though 🤷‍♀️

When my eldest was 4 he got into my make up bag and painted himself and the bedroom wall with bright red nail varnish.

Way too many to mention but I am currently drying out our kitchen after he flooded it

a whole bottle of baby shampoo on his bedroom carpet and every time i tried to clean it it just created more and more lather i could have cried as it was just as you walked in his room and it was rock hard to touch

While hoovering in one room my daughter managed to empty the flour container onto the kitchen floor. I found her totally engrossed in making patterns in the flour just like we used to on the worktop when she 'helped' me with the baking. How could I be cross? I sat down and joined in with her. Beats doing housework!

a big tub of Sudacrem and a child left alone for five minutes - result was a completely ghostly white toddler, a smeared cot, and a teddy bear with newly white fur!

One toddler + one bottle of suncream - mummy (for probably one whole minute while I was in the next room) = one very suncreamy child and surrounding area. I wanted to add the photo but I can't find it. I didn't know whether to laugh or cry!

My daughter emptied two boxes of panylinerz and stuck them all over herself, the walls and the floor!

feltpen on the sofa

Metanium (that delightful yellow nappy cream) is evil! I still have nightmares. I still have damaged goods ...my son is now 13- he was lucky he lived to be a day over 2. It's a good job I've got a good sense of humour!

We'd gone to visit my mum who was very close to finishing knitting a cardigan for a friend. Mum asked me to change the time on her oven clock so we went into the kitchen leaving a 2 year old destruction machine in the lounge for less than 2 minutes.
I really should have known better.
When Mum & I came back into the lounge, the knitting had been pulled off the needles and he'd figured out that pulling the loose end of the wool made a lovely pile on the floor.
I couldn't apologise enough, and although Mum said it didn't matter.....I could tell by the fixed grin and frantic way she snatched what was left of the knitting, that she was not a happy bunny!

My daughter thought it would be great idea to bring shovels of sand in from the garden, unfortunately she still not that stable walking so it ended up everywhere!

My little boy was drowning and I left the room for a second to open a door and collect the parcel from my postman. In this short space of time my son grabbed a red crayon and he went on a adventure across the whole room making a drowning all over anything that came his way- walls, wardrobes, cot! This time I should of know better- he was drawing right?
The secount time he managed to grab a red lipstic from my cosmetic bag. He eat half of it and the rest smothered all over his face, his clothes and everything around him. He put every nicely away and he came to see me...
OMG I thought he's blinding! After all I was glad that was only a red lipstic so he got of lightly but now I have baby no 2 and goodness me I never leave him alone 😂

Three bottles of nail varnish, painted all over the fridge, kitchen floor, and they clambered up onto the worktops and managed to cover one door of the kitchen cupboard! Done by my wonderful DD, when she was 5! I was utterly gobsmacked! And wanted to cry, as we'd just had the kitchen decorated and had brand new units put in! :)