The Sandwich Crust Consideration

We have to be careful as parents.  Children want to push and test and see what they can and can't do.   They're all about boundaries.   Or at least they are at three-years-old.   I have a strong suspicion they will continue to be all about boundaries until they're grown and out of the house—and I wouldn't be surprised if they still tried to push boundaries even then.

If you give a child one jelly bean will they be happy?  Yes, they probably will be.   But I would bet a large sum of money that that child will ask for a second jelly bean.   I'd put even odds that the child would ask for a second jelly bean even before finishing the first jelly bean.   They might even ask for a second jelly bean before you've placed the first jelly bean in their hand.  

You have to make a decision in your mind about what you're willing to do and what you're not willing to do and you have to, must do, and without fail, follow your plan.   Unless, that is, if you want your cute little children to become whining, yelling, screaming, tantrum machines.   They're going to do this anyway, but it's how often they do it and to what degree they will go until they realize they're not going to win and give in that you're working on.

If you set a precedent that they can get another jelly bean if they're persistent enough and wear you down with asking, begging and pleading, I can assure you you will get a lot more of the asking, begging and pleading in the future.

Have you been out to a restaurant and seen a child get ready to throw a fit and then the parent says no in a serious but emphatic voice and then seen that child accept the decision and move on to something else and not be upset by it?   Have you seen a child throw a tantrum in a restaurant and watch as the parents give in to whatever the child wants just so he or she will quiet down and not be an embarrassment?   I expect my children do to the former, not the latter.

Point in fact, my children are still learning and we are dealing with a lot of the second scenario right now.   My husband doesn't like our children to make loud noises and disturb other tables around him and I agree, it is rude and inconsiderate.    So, we end up hauling our children outside until they calm down.   (And by children, I am mostly referring to my son, who is very strong-willed and opinionated.)

But we are not giving up.   We don't plan on giving up.   Today my son picked up his hotdog and was horrified that there was black char on part of it.   He declared it yucky and I was afraid he was going to throw it on the floor (which would have been the end of his meal, no matter how hungry he was.)   He was upset and started making this annoying wailing noise he makes when he desperately needs to ingest some calories.    My husband took the hot dog and was about to get the black off when I realized we were at a precedence-setting junction.

I said something and my husband agreed saying, "yes, it's like cutting the crusts off a sandwich." So he handed the hot dog back to my son, telling him if he didn't like the black part, he didn't have to eat it and we could give it to his sister.    My son ate the hot dot.   He stopped complaining about the black char.   Undesirable precedence setting event avoided.

I liked my husband's analogy of the crustless sandwich situation.    The crust doesn't taste that much different than the bulk of the bread, but if you start off cutting off the crusts, you may well find yourself cutting off the crusts for a long, long time to come.

The Big Boy Update:  My son used a urinal today.   I don't go into the men's room with him so I didn't know if he'd ever done so before.  My husband said he's done it once before, and that today was an easy one for him because the urinal went all the way down to the floor.

The Tiny Girl Chronicles:  Ghi Ghi and Gah Gah.   My children have two "friends" they include in their games together sometimes.   These two friends aren't full imaginary friends, but references to people they want to invite places or bring a meal to or perform some sort of medical experiments on.   Their names come up all the time.   My son corrected my pronunciation today so at least I know I've got their names correct now: Ghi Ghi and Gah Gah (not related to the Lady Ga Ga I'm fairly certain.)

Fitness Update:  It may well be that our trainer is trying to get us to pre-burn off all the calories we'll be eating on Thanksgiving.   It was a tough day at the gym.   My neighbor, Uncle Jonathan and I also signed up for another Marathon that's in March of next year.   This one isn't on pavement, which makes me actually interested in doing it.   We've been looking at training schedules today and it looks like we're going to need to get serious about training in less than a month.