I know E. can’t technically read yet, but it’s the only way to explain the way she’s been messing with me lately.

Consider:

You might recall the disaster involving my dad’s Syracuse sweatpants for Christmas. For those of who are lucky enough to share my weakened memory power these days, I’ll give you a quick recap: Dad worst person in the world to shop for; hates everything I think of; inexplicably, the only present he’s ever liked is a pair of Syracuse sweatpants I bought him in a moment of desperation my senior year of college; I buy him a new pair about every two or three years; bought this year’s, and the pants were way too long; ordered new pair rather than exchanging via mail in interest in saving time and gave the big pair to DadJovi; the new pair arrived the day before I left for Pa., just barely making it here.

It was an angst-ridden time. I suppose DadJovi and I must have discussed it, but frankly, I don’t remember doing it in front of E.

So imagine my surprise when on our first night in Pa., as I’m unpacking upstairs, I hear her telling her Pappy this tale:

“Mommy ordered you Syracuse pants for Christmas but they were too big. So she gave them to my Daddy and now you’re not getting any.”

WTF? Big mouth. The joke was on her, though — I DID have a pair for him. Still.

Since then, I’ve definitely watched what I say about people in front of her. If that’s the only thing she reported to my dad and stepmom over the holidays, well, I was in good shape.

This week, though, her Messing With Mommy campaign took an even more sinister turn.

The day after I shared with you all the traumatic event that left me terrified of snakes for life, she came home with an art project she was particularly proud of — a painted snake.

As if that wasn’t enough, she demanded that I be the one to carry it from school to the car and then into the house. And then she had the balls to insist that we hang it up in her room.

Thankfully it’s not an exact true-to-life representation of a snake but the way it curls around her headboard is just lifelike enough to still freak me out as I try to read to her at night. It also doesn’t help that she loves to make snake hissing noises and point the thing at me.

Yup, she’s totally reading my blog.

Have your kids ever ratted you out to someone? Or do you remember ever spilling any of your parents’ secrets to others? I’m totally doomed right?