Thursday, January 15, 2009

oh brother...


Lately we are going through a rough patch. Sometimes Ollie can be the sweetest big brother. Helping Max up and down the bunk bed ladder, reading him books, and sharing his snacks, when max has already gobbled up all his own. But.... We also are having a problem with biting.... still, and now we have added hitting, and just plain being mean. Telling max he can't play with him, banning him from the top bunk in the bedroom, and taking whatever max has, and running the other way. Not nice.


On Monday I had a horrible day, the boys were on the last leg of recovery from a week of colds. I didn't want to check them into the gym, because max still had a cough, but desperately needed a break. B worked 70 hours last week, and is working a 70 hour week this week. My normal back-up, aunt jo, stayed far away from our house, she didn't want to catch the lovely bug we had. So it was me and the boys, cranky and sick all week.
By Tuesday morning, when we had successfully made it all night with no sick symptoms, we loaded up and were off to the gym... yeah... an hour and a half alone.... After I worked out I went to get the boys out of the daycare, ollie was in time out, seems he didn't want max to play in the kitchen. So he hit him with a toy soup pot. Nice... this is the first time Ollie has gotten in trouble, Max has been kicked out of freddy's playland, but that is another post completely. So Ollie got a stern talking to at the gym, with two twenty something daycare workers looking on, it felt kind of weird, it was the first time I have to discipline ollie in that kind of environment. Anyway, I loaded the boys up after making ollie apologize to everyone involved, and headed home for a quick little break.
We than re-loaded up happy and with a snack and headed to freddys, I had a ton of grocery shopping and love freddy's playland. I checked the boys in and got started in the produce aisle. I got a half cart full of veggies before I got called back to the playland. In all our time going to playland, Ollie has never had a problem. That day he thought that biting Max was a great idea. I love the freddy playland employees, they are all these super cute grandma types, my favorite is Imogene, who was working that day. She handed me Max, crying big crocodile tears, as Ollie was sitting in a chair in time out. She told me what happened and that Ollie had actually held his bite on max's hand while she was trying to stop him. I wonder if it was a deer in the headlights kind of thing, like he knew what he was doing was really bad, and he knew he was going to get in trouble, so he just froze.
Imogene and I discussed what would be best, I take Max with me to finish shopping? Or I check Ollie out, you can't play after being bad! Imogene was hilarious, both boys wanted to come with me, well Ollie had to, max just wanted to come along because ollie was coming with me... Imogene in a hushed voice said "mom, he really needs a spanking, he bit him hard." which I totally agree! and "how are you going to shop with both of them." My reply, " probably the way you did with your kids, before they had a playland, it won't kill me."
The punishment in this house for biting is, you go to time out, and you get a spanking. It kills me to spank the boys, I am cool with the swatting of the butt (not really spanking) when it is an immediate reaction, like when their misbehaving and the little spank is a last resort. not many of those happen around here. But the go to time out, and wait for mom to come in and spank your butt thing killllsss me.

So I put Ollie in the childs seat in the cart, that was part of the punishment, no walking around fun at the grocery store, you sit, you get buckled, and you be quiet. Max was a great little helper and by the end was sitting in the big part of the cart with all the groceries. Through the store we had many conversations that went like this....
Ollie: "You don't have to spank me, look I am being a good boy."
Mom: "You are a good boy, but you made a bad decision, you bit max, when we get home you have to get spanked."
Ollie: "but I am being good."
this went round and round, with him smiling, being charming and funny... little manipulator.
When we got home, we ate lunch, I got max down for a nap, and than me and ollie had a sit down. I had to explain that I didn't like to spank him, but he had bitten max, and that has to be punished. He squirmed around but I got the spanks in. He cried, big crocodile tears, and than looked at me, with big eyes and said "that didn't hurt very much"
WHAT......
I replied... "do you want me to try again"

He said No of course, we hugged and cuddled, read a book and he went down for a nap.

What a day, with many more to follow, what did I get myself into.
Wednesday we had a great day, we hung out in the morning, we rode bikes, and went to the zoo for lunch... We sat and ate lunch at the polar bears. There really was'nt many people at the zoo, and all the animals were out, probably soaking up as much of the sun as they could, just like us. The Polar bears were out, playing and swimming. What a perfect place for lunch, I sat the boys on the bench in front of the huge plate glass underwater windows, we all watched as the giant polar bear swam in circles right in front of us. It was awesome! We also spent quite a bit of time at the sea lions, they were putting on quite a beautiful show too...

We saw all the animals we wanted to see, we even got to watch some huge construction equipment at work, half of our zoo is torn up, which was perfect for my two little men. we had a gorgeous bright sunny day, and no kid melt downs... now that is how I would like all my days to go....




1 comments:

Tiffany said...

Sounds like you've got your hands full right now. Just remember, this too shall pass. I hate the spanking thing to, but sometimes that's what it takes to get the point across =( Never fun though. And B working so much is hard on family also. I know, D works ALOT too (and I'm at home with no car). Mommyhood is great but not easy. Wouldn't change anything though!