Last week I was concerned over the amount of sweet snacks the kids were eating. It seems as if I was being an overly cautious parent because seventy-one percent of you said giving them a few snacks a day isn't going to do any harm. Only fourteen percent thought we should not give the kids any sweet snacks at all to which our kids would like to respond with a loud "phhbbbt" and an innocent smack to the groin.
We'll probably continue to give the kids a few sweet snacks each day. They enjoy arrowroot cookies and Gerber cereal bars. They also enjoy eating Splenda straight out of the yellow packets and cotton candy. Thankfully we don't have to take them to a dentist until they're three!
**********
This past weekend, we were at Costco buying our usual list of items such as diapers, fruit, and super absorbent maxipads. While in the stroller, Andrew kept on putting his shoe in his mouth. Although the shoe was only slightly dirty with animal fecal matter, I did not want him to get into the habit of putting it into his mouth. So I lowered his legs and told Andrew, "No." Andrew stared at me with eyes that said, "You think that's going to stop me?" and he did it again. I once again lowered his leg, and told Andrew more sternly, "No!" This time Andrew looked at me with disdain, lowered his eyebrows and probably thought, "Boy, my dad's an idiot!"
But when he put his shoe in his mouth for the third time, I lowered his leg and then turned his head towards my face. I lowered my body so I was looking straight into his eyes and firmly said, "Andrew. I said NO!" And instead of dismissing me, Andrew just looked into my eyes and bawled.
Great! I turned into one of those a-hole parents who make their kids cry at the mall. But did I do an a-hole move or did I do the right thing? Is Andrew and Emma too young to understand or do we need to start to be firm with our discipline? Or did you just open up another browser window and looking up the number for social services?
No comments:
Post a Comment