Tough love and Rocket ships

Under construction…

Today is going to be a great day. I just know it I woke up knowing it. Vince woke up super chipper. Eleanor woke up with gooey smiles. Clearly the day is already earmarked to be amazing. Hopefully I haven’t just screwed myself with my overabundance of optimism.

4 weeks into being a stay-at-home-mom and things are slowly starting to improve. Last week was a week of tough love. But that tough love seems to have created a little boy who is determined to listen to me. Hallelujah! I’ll let you in on my secret.

First, it really helps if you go and buy lipstick. And while buying said lipstick, it helps if your mobile child mischievously disappears somewhere in the drugstore and you can find him, which sends you spiraling into a panic while clutching lipstick and a baby. You could also substitute mascara or whatever. Just make sure that it’s something you like and the task is an enjoyable one.

5 minutes later I found him. He had climbed through the bottom of the shopping carts by the front door and wedged himself at the front of the cart storage area. Giggling madly. Nothing will send me straight to rage quicker than that giggle. Seriously, I could not believe how livid I was. A big part of that rage was terror, since I thought he’d run outside or I’d lost him, or some random stranger had taken him. But there was a whole lot of rage there too.

I marched him out to the car (after I bought the lipstick, it was my wedding anniversary after all, and my lips needed to look fab. Priorities…). And we went straight home where I proceeded to deposit baby girl in her swing and grab some garbage bags.

With Vince wailing at me, I marched into his bedroom and bagged up all of his ‘adventure men’ (which is what he calls his stuffed animals). I’m not a total jerk, I kept his 3 favorites and stuck them up on my closet shelf. The rest went out to the garage in bags. And then I sat him down and we had a little chat.

All about how scared Mummy was when he disappeared and how I was scared when I couldn’t find him. About how dangerous it is to run away from Mummy. About how I thought I had lost him. How it made Mummy’s heart hurt to think he was lost. About how I was sad he wasn’t listening to me. And then I explained that all of him ‘adventure men’ went out to the garage because he needed to practice his listening. If he was a good listener, he could pick one of his friends from mummy’s closet. But if he was a bad listener, Mummy would take his friend away until he could listen again.

THIS IS GOLD!!! It’s worked like a charm! He’s listening to me more, he’s being more obedient, his manners have improved and pretty much it’s nipped in the bud the majority of our arguments/disagreements. Obviously a few things sneak through (case in point: Monday), but it’s working. And less of that garbage means more fun stuff!!

And so yesterday we built a rocket ship. I had an enormous box in the garage from Eleanor’s stroller and had earmarked it for this project a while ago. that’s what enormous boxes are for anyways. I know my mother has a picture of me in a cardboard house that she and my father built and decorated. I’m pretty sure everyone did this.

All set for takeoff…

I taped the flaps together to make a peaked roof, cut a door and window into the sides and painted the whole things with a black acrylic paint I had in the garage. I just wanted it to be a uniform colour so Vincent could decorate it to his heart’s content. I even built a control panel and taped it inside.

He went at it for a whole hour, painting and walking about his painting and where his ship was going. And when he was done, we went out for ice cream while it dried. And then it was moved into the house, set up in the living room and is full of ‘adventure men’ and blankets. Vince is having the time of his life, I am thrilled with his manners and enthusiasm, we are both delighted with the rocket ship and life is just super all around!

So today is to be a day of libraries and swimming, I feel confident things are going to go smoothly and am looking forward to ever single second.

xoxo a.m.

(follow me on instagram for rocket ship pictures and other chaos! My user name is jaylando)