A little about me...I have two children, one in pre-school and one in kindergarten. They are only one year apart. The first couple of years were REALLY hard, but things have gotten easier. But I had a not awesome childhood, with a mom from an even worse childhood, so while I'm glad she wasn't as cruel to me as her parents were to her, I'd like to keep upping the bar.
I'll start with a description of the goal I had for today, how it went, and then discuss tomorrow's goal. Today's was to say 5 positive things for every negative thing I say. This seemed more feasible than my usual goal of saying no negative things all day, which usually gets derailed first thing in the morning when my daughter wants to wear a sundress and rain boots when it's 30 degrees and sunny out.
So, I tried my 5 things. I'm pretty lenient with myself for what counts as 5 things--I made small talk with them on the way from school to gymnastics and gave myself 2 points. We did kids night at a local restaurant for dinner and I worked with them on their projects and gave myself a point there. Oh, and I didn't loose my cool at all this morning on the way to school (always a goal), so I'll give myself a point there. And then.... I was cleaning up while they were in the bath and came back to find they had spilled a ton of water over the side of the tub. Got on to them and told them to get out now (minus 1). They play with these little lego type toys in the bath, and my son wanted to keep the ones he had made together instead of putting them away. Fine. But then my daughter starts taking them apart. I tell her not too, she does it anyway. Totally loose it. Then my son totally looses it. I tell him to knock it off; it's just legos and he can build it again tomorrow. Do you see where this is going? I yell at my daugter, demanding to know why she took it apart after I told her not to. Why? Why?! Crying. Both of them are crying and in their towels at this point. I walk away for a couple of minutes so I don't say anything else stupid. Fortuantely, I am married to a pretty great guy, so he steps up to the plate with my daughter and I eventually get my son, who is now crying on the ground still just in his towel. ( minus 4).
I calm down and read them a story (+1), then do a silly dance before I leave the room to the tune of veggie tales on their night time CD. (+1)
Total for the day: +1. Oh wait, it's supposed to be a 5-1 ratio. Ummm....I got 5-25. I hate math.
Yeah. We'll try that tip again later.
Okay. Tomorrow's goal is from Conciousparenting.com on their facebook page (I recommend "liking" it, then their helpful daily tips will show up in your feed.
"Children need lots of encouragement. Imagine a football game where everyone sat quietly until a touchdown was made. We need to encourage our children like we do a team attempting to get two yards for a first down!
Power pack your encouragement with useable information, so your child knows exactly what he/she did that was helpful!
Here is some language and examples to get you started:
Look at you! You put on your shirt and now you are stepping into your pants so you can finish getting dressed. Way to go!
(Child's name), you are putting the Legos in the bin. You are doing it!
You started clearing the table all by yourself. That was helpful!"
So tomorrow that's what I'm going to work on. Praising them for getting ready in the morning, praising them for getting undressed and in the bath, praising them for working at school.
Honestly, it sounds lame, but since I have a hard time coming up with 5 positive things to say during the day to make up for my negatives, so maybe this'll up my points.
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