We had a parenting teaching moment today. We've had to do this before, but the children were younger and they didn't understand as well as they do now. Today, my daughter got a lesson.
We got in the car and she was hungry. I had food for them because most of the items at the Indian buffet we were going to would be a little on the spicy side for them. That, and they're not going to get much value out of the cost of the buffet. I told my daughter she could have her apple sauce when she got her shoes on and got in the car. She was mad. She was pitching a fit, but eventually got in the car.
On this particular day, my son was in a good mood. It seems like it's one child or the other that's not holding it together, but not both. The one that's not as hungry, upset, angry or having strong feelings about <insert random thing> sees it all happening and decides (maybe) to be the perfect child while the other one loses it.
So we go down the road and I explain to my daughter that her apple sauce is available but that the, "snack" as she's calling it, is for lunch and she will get it when we sit down. Her brother eats his apple sauce squirt thing quietly while my daughter loudly refuses and screams, yells, kicks the back of the passenger seat and wails.
I warn her I will pull the car over if she doesn't calm down and use her quiet voice. It continues. I pull in to a neighborhood that turns out to have no on-street parking and hope the slowing of the car will help or maybe the rolling down of the window will make things better. Neither helps. So I drive off and pull in at the next driveway, into a rest home.
I whip into a parking spot, get out, walk around and pull her out of her car seat. I take her and unceremoniously drop her on the grassy area away from the parking area. I tell her when she's calm and quiet, I will come get her. I turn around, walk back and get in the car. Uncle Jonathan, my son and I have a nice time chatting while my daughter screams and has a fit on the grass outside (where we can see here and she is safe).
I come and get her when she's quiet, explaining she needs shoes on to go to the restaurant. I'm putting her in the car and putting on her shoes and she rips off the first one when I move to the second shoe, so out of the car seat she goes and back onto the grass I place her, leaving her with her shoes and telling her when she is calm and has her shoes on, we can go to lunch.
I come back a few minutes later as she's getting her shoes on, this time bringing a cracker because this was tough on her and she was mostly throwing a tantrum because she was hungry. However, she knew exactly what she was doing because when I stopped the car and came around to open her door the first time, she immediately said, "I'm quiet mom."
She took the cookie and was calm and quiet the remainder of the trip to the restaurant. I am hopeful this is one of those lessons you don't have to repeat. She certainly didn't like it at the time.
The Big Boy Update: My son watched some Transformer shows with his Uncle Jonathan this morning. There is a version of the show that is made for younger children that is much cut down on violence. When we went to lunch my son was telling his sister how he was, "Octopus Prime" and how he was also a firetruck transformer.
The Tiny Girl Chronicles: My daughter wanted a granola bar today. She usually is easy going, but today was a challenging day for her (see above). She sat down to eat the bar and suddenly from across the room I heard, "I broke my granola bar. Uh oh. I broke it!" <wailing ensued>
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