I hate being the bad guy!

Being a parent is sometimes no fun at all. I hate getting the kids in trouble. It's nearly as "no fun" for me as for them. But tonight was too much. I know - well I guess I should say I strongly suspect - that Reed has been having lots of screen time in his room when he's not supposed to. I think we are very 'generous' in allowing them two hours of screen time during the days they're home, and usually at least an hour more in the evenings. That's a lot. A lot, I tell you! But I've looked the other way the many times Reed has lied to me about what he's doing, and that's no good for anyone.

Tonight finally decided to call him on it. When I asked what he was doing, he sheepishly admitted (after lying about it) in a whisper mumble that he was having screen time. I was very angry, and had been headed out for a long walk. I decided to go ahead and walk and take that time to cool off and figure out what to do.

He's not happy with the consequences. I made him sign a note saying he understood that because he had screen time when he wasn't supposed to, and more importantly because he lied about it, he was losing his iPod for 2 days. And he has to complete two writing assignments before he can get it back - three paragraphs on lying and 3 paragraphs on what our family's screen time rules are. When I was walking I realized I had to give him a consequence that I knew he'd hate...and writing is it. He is complaining that he doesn't know what to write, can't write 3 paragraphs on those things, etc....I said well that's fine then, you won't get your iPod back on Friday.

Ought to be a fun couple of days. UGH!

Unprecedented

I think I've documented our bath/shower time struggles periodically. We've gotten a lot of "whhhhhyyyyyy do I have to take a shower?" and "but I hate showers!" and even a bunch of "showers are stupid" (take THAT, showers!). We've gotten "But so-and-so says her mom says you shouldn't take showers every day". I guess we've gotten a bit of everything.

But with the new paint job/decorating in the kids' bathroom, Amy doesn't protest anymore. Hallelujah! And Reed has come to accept his showering fate and just takes a shower when he's supposed to. Miracle!

And then this happened last week...the kids had gone to the pool with the babysitter (more on that later), so Reed showered after that. Then when Tod came home, he set Reed up for mowing the lawn (and more on that another time, too). When Reed finished, he came back in and said "Now I have to take another shower!" and...he did! Two showers in one day, neither one 'forced'! I nearly fell over when he said he was taking a second shower.

Edited to add....just a minute after I posted this, Reed got in the shower for the second time that day - I guess that makes it a trend?

(And please for the sake of my sanity, don't mention what might be going on in the shower other than getting clean!)

Here we come, summer!

Yesterday was the last day of school (finally!) and one kid is thrilled (Reed) and one kid (Amy) is a mixture of happy and sad. Seeing how much Reed has grown this school year is pretty crazy! If I measured right, he is 5'6" now, which makes him more than an inch taller than me (much to his delight).

It feels like we will blink and these kids will be off to college....