What to do with a boy?
I think I am insane. Last night I was planning out a whole big cooking class co-op idea. Then I woke up and decided I didn’t have the time or energy for something like that. In my planning it only would have gone on for 6-8 weeks, but still. Who has the time?
Instead, I talked to the people at Romp ‘n Roll about their cooking class. I decided it is much too young for Erik (ages 2.5-5 in one big class? No.).
Tomorrow we have a (free) private karate lesson, then I suppose we’ll get the hard sell about enrolling. I think it is the best option of all our choices (and believe me, in this area we have choices out the wazoo). Erik is desperate for a dance class, but every single place I’ve called said I am welcome to enroll him but he’ll be the only boy. I don’t want to be gender biased and all that, but I don’t think he would really enjoy a class full of girls. I’ve talked to him about it and he says he wants a boy dance class. Guess that’s not gonna happen.
We had a very long afternoon today. Elsa was hysterical, something that really hasn’t happened before, and Erik and I are both pretty worn out. He kept telling me to get the baby away from him because he was tired of listening to the screaming. He doesn’t remember that he screamed like that every single day for hours and hours.
The worst was that she would get even more upset when I would try to nurse her. When I hear a crying baby my inclination is to stick a nipple in their mouth. That would always calm Erik down, at least briefly. Basically, she hasn’t eaten since noon. Not like she’s going to starve. Yesterday I had a lady ask me if she was 9 months. She weighed more than this ladies tiny little one year old.
She finally fell asleep, so hopefully she will be happier when she wakes up.
Erik is getting back into a peeing of the pants mode. It makes me crazy. I think I’m going to try Beck’s idea of randomly checking is pants throughout the day and giving him a reward if they are dry/on. I don’t know though. As I said before, I have a really hard time with reward systems. I can’t stand the whining for a sticker and the manipulation. Make no mistake about it, Erik is one manipulative little guy. He is sweet and fun and smart, but he can play the system like the best little con man in the world. The rule would have to be that he gets a point taken away if he asks for a point. Not sure how well that would really work, though. I was thinking about giving him points or quarters with a goal of working up to a new Wii game. Not that I want him to have another game, but it would certainly motivate him.
Either that, or I’ll just send him to time out every time he pees his pants. I know you aren’t supposed to punish kids for potty issues, but it sure is tempting when you know the problem is that they refuse to stop what they are doing and go when they need to go.
My fantasy book forum is supposed to be reading a book by a self-published author. The author offered to send us all free books and some people voted for him. I guess the rest of us should have gotten together and made a plan to all vote on the same book. With the exception of my friend Jolene, I refuse to read self-published books. I know there are probably excellent ones out there, but the ones that I’ve read? Hoo boy. They make me want to poke my eyes out. It’s hard to break into publishing, but there’s a reason people want to read books that have been vetted by a professional book editor.
I got my copy of the book and don’t see how we are going to do a book club with it. I read the first three paragraphs and don’t think I can read more. I was hoping it wouldn’t be too awful since the guy can write a nice forum post, but it is just terrible. And how do you totally bash it when you know the author is going to be reading the conversation? I try not to be that big of a bitch, but I can’t think of anything good to say. It’s painful.
bethany actually said,
August 2, 2010 @ 3:17 pm
Oh man, Annalie used to do that thing where she just REFUSED to stop what she was doing long enough to pee. It led to a lot of OMG-gotta-pee-right-NOW-NOW-NOW moments where she’d have to run to the bathroom or have an accident. And yes, it led to some accidents, which was really annoying when I knew it was preventable. But—full confession—I used to do the same thing when I was a kid, until well past the age where I should have known better. So I was also a little sympathetic. I just got into the habit of marching her to the bathroom every couple hours or so, and when she complained about it I would tell her, “We only have to do this till you’ve learned to go to the bathroom on your own.” It did involve some power struggles, which sucked, but at least she stopped having accidents eventually. Maybe if you set a timer for two hours? Made it a new rule that he has to pee before every meal and every time you leave the house?
Sorry if this is advice you don’t want. I was just trying to come up with an alternative to the rewards! Do you think if you did something like, for every day he doesn’t wet his pants he gets a sticker and X stickers leads to a reward, that would work better? Less pestering for rewards that way, but it requires a longer view that he may or may not be capable of yet.
I hope Elsa woke up in a better mood!