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Friday, July 10, 2009

oh the joys of parenting a toddler

Calvin doesn't really make a great shopping buddy these days. I headed out to Kohl's this week and was constantly taking clothes out of his mouth. Seriously I don't know why he enjoys it so much. He also loved grabbing every shirt sleeve he could reach. I should have known better than to push the stroller through the jewelry section. Mr. Grabby caught this one and sure enough broke it. I was so bummed because I had to buy this ugly necklace. At least it wasn't completely destroyed, he only ripped off two rows of beading. I think it will make a nice dress up necklace for a certain cousin. What do you think?

We've been having a rough week around here, Calvin is testing us big time. Today I was exhausted. We had a great morning he was quite obedient, but due to the sweet little guy only taking a 30 minute nap today we had a rough afternoon. I was working on my VBS room and needed to get some things done, he wanted my attention and I couldn't give it to him and thus major lashing out which occurred the entire time I was working on my room: turning over chairs marking on toys, throwing toys on the ground and the one that makes me really mad: hitting me. Seriously what do you do when a child hits you? At home we just march him to timeout, which is his crib or pack and play, but in public what do you do? We haven't gone the spanking route, and it also seems a little backwards to spank when he's hitting. It's frustrating and hard to see such sin at a young age and we desperately want to train him up by the truths of scripture. But it's so hard, please be praying for me that I would be given the knowledge to know what to do. I also wanted to seek our your opinions, what have you done that has worked? I'd be happy to take any suggestions.


Oh and this evening Marvin mentioned possibly going golfing tomorrow at which I promptly said "No, not this weekend please". Calvin needs some daddy time this weekend, and this mama needs a little break. My sweet husband then said, maybe I can take Calvin to the play place at the mall. I'm looking forward to spending some time digging into the Word in a quiet house. Beautiful!

2 comments:

Amanda said...

Oh my! I can totally empathize with you! Having been through this 3 times already and gearing up to start it all over again, it can be so exhausting!

Of course, every parent has to make their own decision when it comes to spanking. We feel spanking and hitting are 2 totally different things. Hitting is done with an attitude of anger and revenge while spanking is done with an attitude of love. (assuming you aren't spanking him because you are angry but because he disobeyed.)And, trust me, children can tell the difference. At this age it's not so much about discipline as it is about training. We are training them to know what's right and wrong. Oh goodness....I could go on and on!

We were very blessed by a book called "To train up a child" by Michael and Debi Pearl. It's somewhat of a controversial book because it does suggest spanking but then again...so does the Bible!

I hope I am not giving you the impression that we run around spanking our children for every little thing!! I'll keep you in my prayers because I know this stage of his life can be difficult. But, as you well know, what a blessing they are!

Marie said...

I'm sorry Erica. I'm really proud of you for being honest with Marvin about needing his help this weekend. So many of us would have said "FINE! GO GOLF" and then sit stewing when they actually did because they didn't read our minds enough to know not to. :)

I promise to pray for you as I don't really know what advice to give here. Addison isn't a hitter (she's more of a whiner). Celia was a hitter, but since she was not my child, spanking wasn't an option. I just had to look her square in the face and tell her that her behavior was unacceptable. I also had to learn not to try and do too much at bad times of day and give lots of breaks for park time. That was good incentive. That, and the horse at Hyvee. :)