Well that didn't last long did it? Between illness taking over our house (TOO MUCH SNOT AND PUKE!) and some other pretty serious shit, things got crazy and blogging took a backseat.
The one thing that did happen that got me thinking while I was busy trying to survive the last week was this:
Yup. That's My Little Guy crying after he dumped an entire box of Rice Krispies out on the floor. It was the mega box too.
You can see the trail, where he started to dump them, freaked out that they were all coming out and ran while carrying the open box upside down.
He cried when he realized what happened (as you can see in the pic). He was very upset. I'm guessing it was because a) he knew he just made a GIANT mess and b) he loves food more than anything and knew all this glorious food was wasted.
What did I do?
I laughed.
And then of course took the picture and posted it on facebook because, well, I thought it was hilarious. And you know, parenting.
After we swept it up (Rice Krispies are very easily cleaned up), I was laughing about it again, and I thought to myself that laughing about it is kinda a weird reaction. I imagine most other parents would be kinda pissed (would you? I don't know, I mean, I really only know my reaction since I'm not you). I thought it was hilarious.
And then I thought, hey, that makes me a pretty good mom right? I mean, patience as a parent is something I'm sure we all struggle with - especially when it comes to giant unnecessary messes. How we react in moments like this when one of our kids does something unintentionally and causes a giant mess says a lot about us as parents, at least in my opinion.
For me, it shows how far I feel I've come. There was a time I would have probably lost my shit and yelled and screamed and been pissed about the mess. I am Polish and OCD after all. But realizing that a lot of the "bad" stuff my kids do is totally not on purpose, and that they don't WANT to make me mad has changed how I think about and react to a lot of stuff. They're just kids, and young ones at that. They make messes. It's what they do. They test our patience, it's what they do. If they didn't, they wouldn't be kids.
My Little Guy was just trying to get himself some cereal. That's awesome. He's only 19 months, but he knew what he wanted, knew where he it was, and went to get it on his own. That's the kind of independence we encourage in these parts.
He didn't know that if he held the box upside down it would open and pour out. He didn't mean to do that (just look at him - clearly he's not pleased with the situation).
Getting mad at him wouldn't help anything. It would only make him MORE upset, and then I'd be upset too, and then no one's having a good time.
Laughing helped him calm down, and realize that I'm not upset with him. I snuggled him up and told him I knew it was an accident and it's ok, we'll just clean it up. Which we did. He and My Big Guy helped me sweep up all the Rice Krispies (bless my Polish OCD children who enjoy helping me clean), and we all moved on with our lives.
In retrospect, I'm pretty damn proud of myself for laughing at the situation instead of getting mad. I'm proud that I've grown as a parent. I'm proud that my patience has developed to this point. I'm proud to be a good mommy.
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