quick change artist

can i just start by saying UGH? i'm having one of those homeschooling mom days where it sucks to have to be the mom & the teacher because both the offspring & the student are getting all over your nerves! there seems to be a lack of cooperation & willingness to obey, no matter what i say. so it's time to stop saying & start doing.

brooke has worn 6 different outfits today. it started with her jammies (does that count as an outfit?) and then changed into a dog suit. then there was the cat suit, rapidly followed by the worm suit. then we had the lion suit & last but not least, a sweat suit. i found the jammies lying in the middle of the kitchen when i came down this morning & the rest of the suits have landed in or around brooke's room and the bathroom. i saw the bedroom & reminded her yet again that it's fine to wear all the stuff you want in a day, but you are required to clean it up. change repeatedly, i don't care, but don't just chuck it all on the floor when you're done with it! and you can't just throw it all into the dirty laundry basket either just so that it's out of sight.

i told her to clean it up. went back a few minutes later ~ not done. said it again, and a few pieces got stuffed into the dress-up box. put her onto yellow (our behavior chart goes from green, yellow, red and that's obviously the first step of discipline), which meant no more tv or computer for the day. then i told her to go into her room & read as part of her school day. she didn't. she found something else to do & then quick grabbed her book when i snuck into her room & busted her not reading. that moved her to red & means that i confiscated her most special stuffed dog (or as she likes to call it, "the most precious piece of my heart.") and she lost her smiley face for yesterday too. and i made her change out of the lion suit & put on the sweat suit.

i came downstairs shortly after that & found her using google to try to find pictures of dogs that look like her most precious fetch doggy, but alas, she's not allowed to use the computer, so now we've reached a place that i don't even have a label for. double red? minus red? i don't know, but she lost another smiley face.

now she wants me to sit & read a book to her so that i can make her feel better, because, you know, she's lost the most precious piece of her heart & doesn't know how to function. i will not. she knows how to read & if the book will make it better, then she needs to read it to herself. i didn't make her bad choices. i didn't throw her clothes on the floor. and it's not my job to soothe her heart right now.

this is one of those days when i wish that for at least a portion of the day i could turn her over to someone else to deal with. let them figure out what to do with her frantic need to change costumes all day. and her opinion that she should get to decide what her school day should look like and what her assignments should be. maybe they have some ideas that i haven't thought of. but then again, no one could love her like i do. no one could be as delighted as i am when she runs into the room in a worm suit asking me to film her while she slithers around the kitchen floor. no one can know how much it means when this kid looks me in the eye & says, "even when you discipline me & make me so mad, i still love you." so i guess it's time for me to go soothe her little aching heart. she did her part by going away & reading the book to herself. now i'll do my part by going up & squishing her with kisses & hugs & thank her for pulling herself back up from the pit of despair. some days that can be really, really hard.