Easiest

Well, lucky for me these past few days have been pretty eventful free (that never happens)! Its been a pretty easy couple of weeks for Amie and I. I have found that When Amie comes to me and wants to color or play in the snow that is when I make her pick up her toys, and it is working great so far. "So far" being the key word. Any day now she could change her mind and decide that playing in the snow or coloring is not very import and and give up on it entirely. When that happens I'm not sure what I will do. You see at one point threatening to taking away baby and barbie worked, for a week. She would do anything I asked her to do, it was a miracle! The heavens opened, sun beans came blasting down and angels sang sweet sweet songs of joy and happiness. Then one day she just stopped caring, until it was nap/bed time that is. Then it was down right important that she have her babies and Barbie. With out them its like she's sleeping so sweetly not a care in the world, then all of a sudden BAM she realises at 2am that she doesn't have her barbie and baby and wakes up screaming and crying for them. Yeah I could just say "tough luck you lost them" but that would be way to inconvenient for me. Once again there is the doing what is easiest for mom and not necessarily best for child. ARRG! Thus I stumbled upon my waiting plan, and like I said works like a charm... so far.

I'd like to think that I have an unfair advantage being a mom. You see I taught preschool for like 6 and 1/2 years, not to mention the years of training that I have on top of that. I have come into motherhood armed and dangerous! I know through experience how I do and DON'T want my daughter to act. I know the mistakes that parents make that really have no idea what in the hell they are doing. Or just want to do what is easiest. When you almost cut your finger off, easiest acts as a temporary band aid. It feels good now but eventually with out stitches you'll just bleed through, then get an infection, then your finger has to get amputated. Nobody wants that. Same thing goes with children. When a behavior occurs doing what is easiest temporarily covers the real problem. Before you know it you child's behavior has escalated so far beyond the point of "what the hell do I do now??" to "I'm going to drop my child of on the side of the road and leave!". Even I have those moments where I don't know what I am doing, or thought that I was doing the right thing and have found out later that it wasn't. We learn from our mistakes. How can we progress with out making mistakes and learning from them?? We just hope and pray that our mistakes aren't severe enough to cause real damage and traumatise the child forever. The majority of the time they're not. Thank goodness!

Make a mistake - Learn - Evolve - Move on!