Category Archives: Kids

The Auditory Washer

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Today AM asked me if a favorite shirt was clean, and I responded with, “It is being washed as we speak.” A few minutes later AM said,”So it will be clean when we stop talking?” I totally didn’t get it and said, “No, it will be clean when the washer stops.” She said, “But you said it would be clean when we were done talking.” I said, “No, I said….” Then it clicked. I had said that the shirt was being washed “as we speak”, which to her meant that when we stopped speaking it would be clean. Isn’t the English language so confusing? Especially for a 6 year old!!

Headless trucks

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Yesterday, when I arrived to pick L up from work, AM had an interesting question. She said, “Mommy, why do those trucks stick their heads in a hole?” She had me completely boggled until I looked over at the warehouse where many large trucks had backed up to drop off a load. They had detached the truck fronts from the trailors, so to young eyes, it looked like they had pulled their fronts up into the building! It was really weird to get this new perspective on it. If I didn’t know any better, I might have thought the same thing!

Interesting how what we know in our minds sometimes keeps us from seeing things from a different perspective. Anyway, I explained to her what had happened and told her she would have to watch a truck back up and detach sometime. She probably will not fully understand until she sees it for herself. Maybe I’ll try to draw her a picture to illustrate. Nah! She won’t be able to tell what the picture is of! She would probably re-draw my picture and make it look better!! Oh well! Maybe I’ll try drawing it anyway. Her ability to draw it better might be good for me!

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Phillip’s Phun

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Hey, these titles could get fun!! Anyway, here is something cute Phillip did. He put a stuffed bunny in his shirt and said he was going to have a baby like mommy. After a few minutees, he pulled the bunny out, and said, “I took my baby out!” Then he turned to me and said, “Mommy, take your baby out!” I tried to tell him that I could not take the baby out, but I think he just thought I was no “phun.” After a few minutes, he gave up on the idea and stuffed the bunny back in his shirt.

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Peter’s Ponderings

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That title sounds like a daily newspaper heading or something! Anyway, it’s been a while since I put anything on here!! That can be due to the fact that I was working on my last projects and finals, and now I’M DONE WITH SCHOOL!!!!!

Okay, back to the title. P seems to be at that age where cute things just come out of his mouth. Here are two of his recent ponderings:

As we were leaving K-Mart on Wednesday, we stopped at the door to put our coats on. When we were about done P stepped on the door pad, which opened the door. He stood there a minute without moving, so the door began to close. P said, “No, door, no!! Don’t close” I then stepped on the automatic pad, the door opened, and we walked through. We weren’t quite out of the doorway when P called back, “Thank you, door!”

As we were riding in the car that same day, AM was asking P if she could play with a toy Peter was playing with. He refused every time she asked (which was about every 3 seconds). So I suggested to AM that she stop asking him for awhile. When she asked why, I said “Because if you give him a little time, he might change his mind.” She seemed satisfied with that answer, but it was obvious that Peter was not when he said, “NO!! I want to keep my mind!”

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Update

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Just a short little update about AM’s punishment. It has been over now for a week. She has been able to use everything she did not have access to for a while due to her bullying. I am happy to say that the grounding seemed to work!! Not only has she stopped hitting, but she has stopped yelling, and her whole personality seems to have changed for the better. She plays with her brothers rather than at them, if that makes sense. She allows them to make the rules sometimes (although she still may alter them a bit), and she does not yell like she’s in pain every time something doesn’t go her way! I am thoroughly pleased!!

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Phones Mean Noise!!

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What is it about talking on the phone that causes children to go haywire? The kids can be perfectly content and playing in their room…until I dial a phone number. Then their little radar detectors go off, and they all flock to the living room!

I don’t have a clue how they can tell from down the hall that Mommy is on the phone, but they come faster then than when I call them to the living room!! Maybe I should pick up the phone and pretend to talk every time I want them to come quickly. Nope, it probably wouldn’t work because their radar detectors wouldn’t go off! Oh well!

Maybe I should always have something in mind that I need done. Then when they come into the living room, I can say, “Hey, I’m so glad you came in here. The floor needs swept.” If I kept that up, it would eventually get to the point where when they came into the room, I could just point at the job to be done without saying a word, and they’d get busy (yeah right!!) 🙂 It is more likely that they’ll walk in the room, see me on the phone, and tiptoe back to their room as fast as their little legs will carry them. Either way I get a peaceful phone conversation! I’ll have to experiment and see if it works.

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Nose digging

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More cuteness from my 3 year old. He has a cold and had a crusty nose (I know it’s gross – and I don’t mean big) I knew he was a little uncomfortable as I cleaned it with tissue. Wouldn’t you be if someone else was cleaning your nose? I guess he was more uncomfortable than I thought because he said, “Mommy, that was my teeth!” Evidently he thought I was digging deep!!

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Movie Motive

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It is interesting that I am writing about a movie experience including AM, since she can’t watch them right now, but evidently she remembered something from a movie she watched a while back.
I just caught AM shaking her fist in front of P’s face out of frustration at him. I told her not to ever do it again and that shaking her fist in someone’s face is part of being a bully. Then I asked her if anybody had ever shaken their fist at her, wondering where she learned it. She said “no,” so I asked her where she had seen it. She said she had seen a “bad guy” doing it on a movie. I started to tell her that she didn’t need to watch movies like that b/c they taught her bad stuff. But instead, I said, “You saw a bad guy do it, right?” She nodded. I asked her if she wanted to be like a bad guy, and she said no. I told her that if she doesn’t want to be like a bad guy, she doesn’t need to do things she sees bad guys do. I think that impacted her more than anything else I could have done. I actually thought to do something that would teach her to discern right from wrong instead of protecting her to keep her from wrong! Of course, we will still monitor what she watches b/c there are some things 5 year olds do not need to see or hear! (and some times good guys do things they shouldn’t). More later, I’m sure!! 🙂

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Whose Learning the Lesson Here?

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AM is in the midst of her first grounding. She has been fast becoming a bully, and we have been very unsuccessful in getting her to stop hitting, pushing, yelling, and other things that go under the bully category. We decided to make her go a week without TV (which she watches very little of anyway) to remind her not to hit or push others. Yet she kept hitting and pushing, so we extended the restriction to no TV and no computer priveleges (which is what she had been doing when the boys watched a movie). That did not seem to be enough, so we took away toys. That sounds harsh upon first hearing it, but if you think about it, we took away the things that children in the past didn’t have access to anyway.

Anna is really beginning to use her imagination more and is able to keep herself entertained without toys, computer, or TV! It is interesting that we only disciplined her for hitting and pushing, yet her tone and whole manner is more kind (most of the time) than it was before. She is also more willing to help around the house, probably to fight off boredom. I think she is really learning from this. Hopefully it will stick when she finally gets those priveleges back. In a way, I can’t wait until she has access to them again.

Honestly, it is almost as hard on me to stick with the discipline as it is for her, but she and I are both learning so much that, deep down, I am glad this is happening. It makes me wonder if it wouldn’t be good for every child to have to take a brief time off from modern entertainment just to learn some of the lessons that AM is being forced to learn (hopefully). I will probably post more on this topic as it is a big part of every day.

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