Life's Little Annoyances

Yesterday was a very frustrating day for me, and then for DH. My DD woke up in a mood that is best described as "ornery", and it only went downhill from there. She's going to be three in a few months and she has started having major attitude problems--a sign of her continuing desire for independence. However, this is very difficult for me to deal with, as DS is teething and cruising, and thus requires near constant supervision. Any time I have to punish DD with a time-out as opposed to a spanking (which only works in certain circumstances, thus the need to escalate to time-out), I have to supervise it because her attitude results in banging the walls repeatedly or throwing things during time-out in her room, neither of which is acceptable behavior in this house. So I have to supervise while DS cries in the other room, usually from the confinement of his exersaucer because I can't trust that he's not going to hurt himself if I leave him to cruise around at will.

To be fair to DD & DS, the morning went well enough, with trips to two different grocery stores for this week's Grocery Game deals. DD was quite helpful at one of the stores, and scanned some of the cans herself and put the coupons in the slot by herself. This is a big thing for her recently, doing things by herself--she has to dress herself, brush her own hair, put on her own shoes and socks, and in general prove that she CAN do things alone. It's very cute and I try to let her do things her own way, including leaving it alone if she puts on her pants backwards. Independence is a good thing, and is the whole point of growing up.

However, when she wants to balance on the arm of a chair, or play with the bird's toys or close the bird's cage, or climb up onto her stepstool to reach forbidden items like candy...well, those independent behaviors have to be nipped in the bud (especially before the bird nips her). This is what she was attempting to do repeatedly yesterday afternoon, and it drove me crazy. She refused to stop when I told her too. She was also being bratty toward her brother, taking toys away from him and then attempting to mow him down with a push walker that she's been told is not her toy, but belongs to her brother. Stern & calm rebukes and spankings did nothing to dent her behavior, and I had to put her in time-out three times yesterday before she finally calmed down for a brief period before her daddy got home.

In the meantime, DS was clinging to me for dear life when I wasn't disciplining his sister, probably due to the combination of enforced confinement and hearing his sister screaming and crying about her punishment. He refused to play independently, and was quite grabby and demanding comfort nursing which was NOT very comfortable for me, as he preferred to chew instead of eat! Arrrghh. Yep, that's a good combination--trying to train a nursing child not to bite/chew when he's already a bit upset and clingy. Yep, good times.

So DH got home and I fled the house to run a Christmas errand. I brought DS with me to the bookstore because he's quite manageable on errands and I knew DH was tired. Apparently while I was gone, DD had more misbehavior and time-out. Instead of the comfort food & tea we had planned for dinner, DD ate cereal with chocolate milk, I fed DS some butternut squash that he was very indifferent about (throwing half of it out because he stopped eating it). And we gave both of them baths, because DS smeared squash all over himself and DD had graffiti'ed her leg with a pen. I had to let DS cry for a bit before he settled down and got serious about going to sleep, and DD kept with the theme of the rest of the day and whined during her bedtime routine. DH & I collapsed onto the couch and ate a motley assortment of snack foods & toaster waffles for dinner...yum.

And to top it off, we watched a British car show where they came to the States, bought 3 cars for under $1000 each, and then proceeded to take a road trip with the intention of provoking rural yokels into attacking or arresting them by writing offensive slogans all over their cars. And then they wondered why they were nearly attacked and had rocks thrown at them! Then we were treated to sanctimonious attitudes about the wreckage from Katrina that was still visible to them as they drove through New Orleans a year later. The comment was, "How is it that the wealthiest country in the world hasn't fixed this? How do people in America sleep in their beds at night, knowing this is still here?" GRRRRRR!!! How sanctimonious and ignorant can you get??? I was so irritated, it was the perfect end to an irritating day. DH had to stop me when I started talking back to the TV--"Well for a start a lot of the residents don't live there any more, they took their compensation from the government and now live in Texas or Alabama or other states...and why the heck do you find it surprising that when you deliberately try to provoke rural yokels into attacking you in the Deep South that they actually WERE offended and were GOING to attack you???"

So DH turned off the TV and we went to bed. Is it any wonder that Europeans have a bad impression of America? I'm still miffed, as you can tell.

Yes, a bad day all around. Hopefully today will be better.