Little Anarchists

There must be something innate in children that makes them able to sense when Mommy is not feeling up to par. Some little bell starts dinging in their little heads that says, "Wake up, kid, now's your chance!! Let's stay up till 10, eat nothing but cookies, and never have to go potty in the toilet again!!" And then the fun starts. Overthrowing of the home government commences and it's all a mother can do to rouse enough energy to maintain some sort of controlled chaos.

Yesterday was one of those days. I've never meted out so much necessary discipline in one day in my whole time so far as a mother! It started with 3 little kids running out the door as soon as my back was turned and hopping on their bicycles and tricycles to play in the road. Obviously against the rules and they each had their time out. That was followed by outside play time in which they all picked on each other in turns, and after lunch they continued on that strain until nap time.

*sigh* Nap time. Seems more like a pipe dream some days! The girls needed nap time early, so I let Josh stay up and play a computer game while I did laundry. Or attempted laundry. 45 min. later and only 1 load of laundry thrown in, I had spent most of my time going back and forth between the two girls. They were supposed to be sleeping, but instead were busy:

1. Climbing on top of my dresser
2. Bouncing on the beds
3. Throwing themselves against the door in an attempt to protest naptime
4. Pulling out all of the clothes from one of the drawers and emptying a water bottle on top of it
5. Throwing a candle off my dresser and breaking it into many tiny pieces
6. (last but not least) Pooping in the underpants

After that last one I came downstairs in desperate need of some quiet time myself.

And some chocolate.

Josh waylaid me on the way to the kitchen before I could even get to my secret stash and started whining about FOOD. Good grief. You'd think the boy was a bottomless pit. Good heavens, what's he going to be like when he's a teenager?! This was only about an hour after lunch, so that was a no-go on the snack. Instead I sent him upstairs for his quiet time, complete with a new Story Hour tape to listen to and a little bit of busy work - sorting some of his Legos into smaller bins. Little did I know that was going to turn into a 4 hour battle of the wills.

While the kids were upstairs and (somewhat) quiet, I did manage to accomplish something. I took all of the toys out of the toybox and sorted them into piles: junk, donate, keep, and a box of tiny things worth keeping but needing to be further sorted. Then I took the box outside and FINALLY painted it white like I've been meaning to do since I bought it at the goodwill 5 years ago.

Nap time was over way too soon, and while I fixed dinner the kids took full advantage of my distraction and dumped the box of tiny things into the crib, then threw them out of the crib all over the room. And so went my day. They are not usually such terrors, REALLY! lol!

I smile when I think of the new moms with their sweet little babies, believing they have Perfection Achieved in their arms. Soon they will come to know that children are not born perfect and do not have to be intentionally exposed to the corruption of the world in order to be little terrors some days. Nope. In fact, babies are born corrupted, selfish, and believing the world revolves solely around their little wants and needs. It takes a lot of work, a lot of prayers, and a lot of patience to convince them otherwise!