But he Started It!

OK put your pitch forks down, readers. The copied auction was pulled by Ebay. Remind me to never cross you guys. You can be scary! LOL!

Oops! I'm sorry I forgot to say that the Fox19 interview will be this Monday morning at 8:40 a.m. Eastern time.

Several readers have suggested that I put a button on my blog enabling people to donate to my Paypal account. I just don't feel right doing this. I'd rather you save your money to buy a copy of my book. ;) But it did get me thinking that it would be a great idea to put a button on here for anyone interested in donating to a charity. I've written St. Jude's Children's Hospital to see if they have a program that will let people donate directly to them through my blog. I'd also like to put one on for breast cancer. If anyone knows of a good organization for breast cancer who may participate in such a program, please let me know.

And yes, the "supposeably" comment was from Friends. I love Friends. And Seinfeld. And Everybody Loves Raymond. My brain is full of stupid quotes from these shows. It's sad really. I should download some of that useless information to the recycling bin and free up a little more memory.

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I was all set to write about Picking and Choosing Your Battles today. I had it all written in my mind. Then the kids woke up. Everything has been a battle today. It's largely my fault because I have been spending entirely too much time online this week. Can't imagine why! The kids are desperate for attention. The full extent of this fact hit me (literally) when my son whipped a baseball across the room (yes, IN the house) and it smacked me in the ankle. I lost my cool and yelled, "What are you doing?! Use your head! You just threw a baseball at me!"
He replied with a defensive, "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to hit you. I was aiming for Aj," as if this made it all ok somehow.
"Oh well, as long as you weren't aiming for me." I rolled my eyes so much I thought they might get stuck at the back of my head.

Then began the whole "He Started It" conversation. If you have one child, you can skip this part. If you have more than one then you know what I'm talking about. Now, I personally don't get involved in this particular discussion. In my opinion there is no way to figure just who started it. It'll make your head spin trying to sort it out especially if you have a quiet instigator. I have one of those. The kind of kid who can't walk down the hall without reaching out and swiping at the sibling he passes. 'What? Who me? What did I do? I was just walking down the hall!'

In my house (except in the very rare, obvious case) both parties get in trouble when something like this happens despite who may or may not have "started it". In fact, it's the one who retaliates, who usually upsets me the most. I always tell them, "If one of your siblings hits you, you need to come tell me. Do not hit them back. That won't solve the problem and it will get you in trouble too."

Of course, I suppose I'm partly to blame when they turn vigilante and take vengeance upon themselves. Despite my wonderful, wise instruction to inform me when they've been wronged, I must admit that there have been a time or two or a hundred when my child has done just that, but to no avail.

CHILD: Moooom! So and so hit me.
ME: Are you bleeding?
CHILD: No.
ME: Are there any bones protruding from your skin?
CHILD: No.
ME: Then go work it out yourself!

Yes, I know I'm not being consistent and I'm sending mixed messages and that's really not the best parenting. However, after hearing....

She poked me!
He won't give me my doll back
She just dumped out my cereal
Make her stop going in my room
Why do I have to share a room with them? They're messing up my stuff!
But I don't wanna watch Diego! It's a baby show!
But I don't wanna watch Drake and Josh! I wanna watch my Barbie movie.
He's bugging me!
She's looking at me!
He won't give me a turn!
I want to play with it now!

.....five hundred million times, you get a little tired of playing referee, thus the "work it out yourself!" comment. It's not such a bad thing to let them work it out themselves sometimes. I think it's important to learn skills that will help you compromise, work as a team, and get along with people who irritate you. I mean, one day they might just have a boss who they don't especially like. They won't be able to just dump coffee out on his desk or give him a wedgie. They'll have to find a way to cope and get along for the sake of their job.

Hmmm, one would think I had a point with all this. (I'm going to blame it on lack of sleep.) I guess my point is - we want to teach our children how to get along with others. We want to show them right from wrong. We want them to grow up to be well-adjusted, good people. Sometimes we just want them to make it another year! And this job called parenting is rewarding, fulfilling, exciting, and almost always HARD.