ALL THE TOYS ARE MINE!

My son and daughter were having a difficult time playing together yesterday.   For instance, my son laid out some pillows on the floor to make a letter X and play some game involving the floor being water so you had to step on the pillows.   His sister liked the game, but then she decided she wanted to hold one of the pillows.   An argument ensued.

My daughter wanted to play with the sit-on train and because she wanted it, suddenly her brother wanted it too.   The train breaks into two pieces, the engine, and the car (on which you can sit).  I broke it apart saying they could each have one half.   Angry yells followed.  

Imagine about three more episodes of the game, "No One Gets Along" over the next ten minutes and someone named Mommy lost her temper.   I did that iYell thing again, declaring that since they couldn't share the toys, I had decided all the toys were mine.   Every single toy.    They couldn't play with or even touch any of the toys on that floor because they were all mine.

What they could do is go upstairs, where the majority of the toys are.   They could walk right up there and have fun with all those other toys.   Did they budge?  No.  Did they complain?  Then a funny thing happened: my son decided to make sure his sister knew the toys were mine and that she couldn't touch them (she was eating some yogurt and was over it by then).  

I told my son if he was willing to share with me, that I would share my toys with him since he had calmed down and was using his quiet voice.   He protested, "no mommy, they're your toys."   "Okay", I said, let me know if you'd like to share my toys and I'll consider it."

Later that day and again today, I reminded the children that if they weren't able to share, all the toys would be mine again; did they remember when that happened?   They did, and things seemed to be more harmonious for a while after those reminders.

The Big Boy Update:  Kinstructions.  My son was helping me with some toys and puzzles yesterday.  We were cleaning out the closet.  He found one game, opened it up and told me, "mom, here are the kinstructions."   He wanted me to read them and teach him how to play.

The Tiny Girl Chronicles:   Lin-num-maid.    That's the phonetic pronunciation of how my daughter says, 'lemonade'.  She can said certain sounds just fine, but I think she likes to say them the way she wants to anyway.

Fitness Update:  My trainer asked me if I was doing okay today, as in could I hack it, could I manage it, was I going to make it through the workout.   I know, it's been a while, I told him.   If I passed out, I'd just pick up on the next round, I told him.