O.k. so, he looks innocent enough, but it is deceiving. I can hardly believe it myself, but behind those sweet eyes and charming smile, there is a little devil in there somewhere that shows his face every once-in-a-while and when he does oh boy watch out! Ever since Luke was little, he has had a difficult time channeling his anger, remember when he put all of our Christmas goodies in the fish tank, or cut up a bunch of money or spilled nail polish (bright red) on our brand new carpet? Or how about the time he took everything out of our storage closet and emptied them and smeared them on our upstairs carpet and hallway (lotions, shampoos, rubbing alcohol etc.) Well, as of late, as he gets bigger, so does the destruction in our home. We have a few more holes where we didn't plan on having them, and very creative art work on our walls that I wish was on paper instead, but what do you do?
This weekend, there was something in the air....all of my boys caught it and as a result, they were all grounded on Monday. Sunday mornings are hard enough to get the kids ready and on time for church. Well, Luke woke up on the wrong side of the bed for some reason and had to go to his room to think about his temper tantrum. I always get a bit nervous to discipline him because I know that I will pay for it in some way or another. So, he was upstairs, and very quiet, so I went up to check on him. I didn't notice anything right away, so we talked about his behavior and then he was able to come out and join the family.
We all arrived to church (early...a miracle in and of itself) and we got seated in the middle of the chapel and all was going well until Luke "accidently" hit Ben in the facewhen he was pulling a lid off of a pen and his hand slipped and as a result ended up on Bens cheek. Well, Ben didn't see what had happened and thought Luke was smacking him in the face for no reason, and decided that the best thing to do would be to punch Luke back in the face with his fist! Now, here we are in the MIDDLE of the chapel and my boys are in a fist fight! After church, we came home and I was really tired. I went upstairs and everyone had calmed down, and was watching T.V. I laid down in bed and turned on a show, Ben came upstairs to watch it with Dan and me. After a while, I asked Ben to check on the other boys downstairs, he came back in and said,"Mom, you don't want to even go down there." I asked why and he told me there was water EVERYWHERE. I went down to find that my whole kitchen floor and T.V. room was soaking in water. My boys thought that it would be fun to have a water fight INSIDE the house. They took latex gloves and filled them with water and chucked them at each other. My carpet was soaking in water, you know, the kind of wet that when you step on the carpet, your foot sinks into it and a couple inches of water come over the top of your foot! And to top it off, there was a pile of pretzels that were now soggy under one of the chairs. (Amazing how food gets in the T.V. room when we have a rule that there is to be no food anywhere but in the kitchen.) I was not a happy camper.
Monday comes around and everyone was in trouble. I go to put on my favorite sweat pants and notice that someone had taken scissors to them. I then looked around and noticed that he (Luke) had taken my haircutting scissors and cut up a few other things too. I went into his room and found that he had thrown a bunch of things outside from his window! Now, I know why he was so quiet in time out Sunday morning, he was pretty busy.
Later that day we had to go to the store and get new shoes for a couple of the boys. While we were there, Luke asks if he could get a treat, I said "no" and didn't think much of it. We get home and I see that Luke is playing with something in his pocket---I ask to see what it is and he slowly brings out his hand with a piece of candy in it. I about died! So, I told him we were going to have to go back and pay for it with his own money. We go upstairs and get out his piggybank and I was amazed to see how much money he actually had. I asked him how he got so much money, he revealed that he had been getting it from his brothers and from our change drawer! WHAT? After we had another discussion about stealing....we took some of the money (probably Joshs) and went back to the store. On the way down I was explaining how when people take things that are not theirs, sometimes the police come and take people to jail. Stealing is serious and that he would be very lucky if they decided not to call the police. I was hoping that this would scare him enough to think about what the concequences would be. We get to the store hoping I had prepped him enough that he would be a little scared. We get to the counter and the clerk (a 17 yr old skater-dude) is behind the counter and we tell him what happened and that we want to pay for the candy, and he replys "Thats o.k. dude, it will be a $1.53." and laughs. Luke thought that what he had done must have been kindof "cute" so he starts to smile and giggle. GREAT! Blew that one too.
What am I doing wrong as a parent? I feel that everything I do gets turned around somehow and my really brilliant speeches, lessons and talks are not sinking in as I would think that they should.
Ever had "One of those weekends" where one thing after another seems to happen and nothing goes as planned and no one listens? Well, that was my weekend. I write about it not to label my child(ren) as NAUGHTY, but more as a therapy and definately as a journal, so that in 20 years (and it may take that long) I can look back and laugh. I know that I will miss these days because, Luke may be cutting up clothing now, but in 10 years it may be worse:)
