Living the 'sweet' life

I often feel that I’m an overly strict mother, so today I made a point of making fun for my kids. I let them watch more tv then I would normally allow, we had lemonade to drink for lunch (gasp!) and a cookie for afternoon snack. I also gave more warnings than usual before sending to timeout and picked up toys during naptime instead of insisting they do it before going to bed.

Interestingly, I didn’t find that my kids were much happier today than when Nazi-mom is in charge. I have long prescribed to the fact that kids crave structure & discipline. I suppose that this unplanned experiment proves my hypothesis. While it was easier for me to say yes to the ‘treats’, I paid for it later with cranky kids and lots of tantrums this afternoon.

Regardless, I stuck with my plan and tried not to become too cranky or quick to punish. Daddy coming home a bit early helped – especially since he took them downstairs to roughhouse – giving me a few minutes of peace and quiet with the baby (I actually had a chance to knit a bit --- a new endeavor that I’m sure you’ll hear more about).  We rounded out our ‘sweet’ day with dinner out and a treat at a local sweet shop. Surprisingly, everyone went down without much argument – maybe they understood that they were lucky today and knew not to push their luck?

 (at Schneider’s Sweet Shop in Bellvue, KY).

Lessons I learned today:

·         Giving kids everything they want does not make them more well-behaved or happier than when they live by grown-up rules.

·         Whoever coined the phrase ‘TGIF’ knew what they were talking about.

·         Single parents deserve a LOT of credit!