When mom of two India Collins noticed her favorite makeup products mysteriously disappearing, she wasn’t prepared to discover the unlikely culprit: her toddler.

The 33-year-old mother of two from Mississippi first noticed something was wrong when she couldn’t find her MAC Cosmetics “Chestnut” lipliner. After weeks of missing products, the mystery was solved when she spotted her 2-year-old son sneakily slipping an item into a large decorative vase.

When her husband pulled out the tall decorative sticks from the vase to investigate, the family discovered a hidden stash of makeup carefully collected by their little boy, who clearly had an interest in her cosmetics.

“I was in shock,” Collins told Newsweek. “How long had he been the vase bandit? How did we not notice this was his stash spot? A couple of weeks ago my makeup started going missing. I realized my lipliner was gone and started looking all over the house. Then I saw my son put something in the vase, and when we checked, there was an abundance of my makeup.”

In stitches, Collins decided to share the discovery on TikTok, where the short clip quickly went viral, gaining more than 300,000 views and thousands of amused comments.

Internet reacts

The moment struck a chord with fellow parents who know all too well the mischief toddlers can cause.

“I honestly just wanted to let other parents know you’re not alone in the toddler trenches,” Collins said. “And to keep an eye on your makeup! I never thought it would go viral—it was just a funny little video that snowballed into laughter across TikTok.”

In the comments, parents shared their own hilarious toddler moments. “We lost the remote for days—turns out my daughter did the same thing,” said one commenter.

Another wrote: “Little man just thinks mummy’s already so pretty she doesn’t need makeup.”

While some makeup fanatics sympathized with the loss: “Are those Marc Jacobs liners? I’d cry if I found one missing—they’re discontinued!” said one commenter.

This isn’t the first time toddlers have gone viral for their mischievous tendencies. Last year a one-year-old was caught on camera conducting a “jailbreak” with the family’s golden retriever. While earlier this year a dad caught his twin boys taking part in a hilarious mission to climb onto the couch, with one climbing over the other.

Why do toddlers hide objects?

At around 18–24 months of age, toddlers generally begin to grasp object permanence—understanding that objects continue to exist even when they are out of sight.

This often leads to an increase in hiding things, because the child knows that the object still exists and can be retrieved later.

In fact, experts say this behavior is an important step in cognitive development, helping lay the groundwork for memory, problem-solving, and more complex cognitive abilities as children grow.