Little Monsters

I usually try to keep personal stuff off of my blog.  I’ll post a bit about the weather or our health, but generally speaking I look at this blog as the face of my business and I don’t want to put things here that aren’t business related.  I think maybe that habit of mine needs to change just a wee bit now and again because designing is such a personal thing for me.  My real family and real life and  affect what happens with my designing, so maybe its ok to talk about it here once in awhile.

Today parenting has me down.  I have four AMAZING WONDERFUL children.  They are bright, talented, loving.  Well, at least most of the time.  Today they are mixing like oil and water.  Except that there are four of them, so I really need oil and water and two other things that don’t mix with either oil or water to have the perfect analogy.  I am an hour late for work because they could not stop screaming at each other or hitting each other this morning.  I don’t know where these little monsters came from.  I don’t recognize them as my kids.  And I’m not sure what happened.

I decided I would turn the whole morning around and called for a pow wow.  I sat them in a circle and ordered suggested that we go around the circle and say something that was special about each person.  Goo, who is three, was all about that.  She is always all about whatever I suggest since she is my Number One Fan.  Kay was right there with me, too.  And even Tiger, who is as sweet as pie but has developed the nastiest screaming habit EVER lately, was on board.  But not the DMan.  He sat there staring daggers at me.

If looks could kill, I’d be dead.

I chose to take the higher ground and ignore the looks of death.  I figured he’d get in to the spirit and the day would be saved.  No such luck. 

The girls very enthusiastically praised one another’s strengths.  DMan made halfhearted attempts for Goo and Tiger but by the time we got to special things about Kay he out and out said that there isn’t anything special about her.  And of course I reacted by telling him I was sick of his awful attitude and he had better think of something.  Maybe not my finest moment.

So I laid out a new law – until they can treat one another with kindness they have lost the privilege of screen time.  Heaven help me, I’m not sure how I’ll survive without letting them spend a little time in front of the screen each day but darned if I will let the older ones constantly put everyone else down as though that is a perfectly ok thing to do. 

It isn’t. 

And like it or not, its DMan who sets the tone for the rest of them and so he must adjust his attitude and lead the way into …. well, whatever comes after this.  He taught Tiger to boss the younger girls around and yell at them and I won’t have the younger ones following this same pattern. 

I know that I expect a lot from him.  I’m an oldest of four too and I know that sometimes expectations are too high.  But the ones who come after him are following his example and I cannot, cannot, cannot, have his example be that its ok to constantly belittle your sisters.  Kay doesn’t think he even likes her.  Not ever.  Definitely not ok and it breaks my heart.

I wish I knew what to do.  I did not save the day with my powwow.  If anything, DMan, Tiger and I are all MORE upset than we were before we sat down.  The girl at daycare made a joke about my being late when I dropped them off and I burst into tears.

Tell me it gets better.  And if you know the secret to fostering love among children and teaching them to treasure one another’s strengths rather than beating one another down I am all ears.