The Yaya Meter: A Simple Hack to Tire Out Energetic Kids

Sometimes when I was babysitting and the kids were being wild, I'd whip out this.

Sometimes when I was babysitting and the kids were being wild, I'd whip out this. And this might look like a tape measure to you, but it's not. This is a yaya meter. And how it works is you touch it to the kid and you pull back to measure how many yaya's they have. What is a yaya? A yaya is what my mom would call me and my brother's extra energy. It's just like you've got pent up yayas in you, you know? And I'd measure how many yayas they had, and I'd say, oh, my gosh, that is so many yayas. How many do you think you could get out in 30 seconds? And then they'd have to do some sort of crazy dance or jump around or jump like a frog or like run up and down the stairs, do anything to try to get some yayas out. And then they'd come back and I'd measure again. I'd say, wow, about five yas. But there's so more. You still got to do it. And you just do this until they're exhausted, okay? They think it's hilarious. I think it's so much fun. If you don't have a tape measure, you can use anything. You could use, like an old remote. Just tell them it's a yaya meter and you make the numbers up. But kids love the challenge. They love to see the progress. They love a timer, and you get to sit on the couch while they burn up a bunch of energy. Okay?