Clocked Out...

Tom is home and has taken over parental duties until bedtime and I have completely zoned out, clocked out, QUIT.

Today? Well, these are the days that try moms' souls...

Interestingly enough, it started out with me at Labcorp killing the glucose testing hour with this book. "Spirited child" is the new politically correct term for "difficult child". Heh. Yeah. After reading most of the book, I'm not convinced Ben is 100% "spirited", but he IS intense, VERY opinionated, VERY persistent and stubborn and he IS quite the challenge at times. At any rate, the book has good advice that parents of pretty much any type of child would find useful... Annnnyway...

Fast forward to Gymboree. He wanted to go in underwear, which I had no problem with because he has been completely accident-free for almost an entire week. He also reliably tells us when he needs to go now, so I had a certain amount of trust that he'd stay dry. A half-hour into the class, the teacher brought him out with wet pants. ?!? I changed his outfit and sent him back in. He was back out ten minutes later all in a panic because he had to poop and wanted a diaper. (which he has also not done in a week) So I had to put him in a diaper, wait for him to do his business and then put him back in underwear. Okay, whatever... potty training woes/setbacks are to be expected, especially when kids are having fun and are distracted. But then came the rest of the day...

Home. (no, there was no nap, please... naps are SO 2006!) He was contentedly playing in the living room so I took the opportunity to collapse onto the couch and check my email. A few minutes later, I realized it was too quiet, I looked up and he was emptying an ENTIRE SIPPY CUP OF ORANGE JUICE onto the white carpet. !?!?!? I blew my top. He got a timeout and a smack on the behind because really... WHAT WAS HE THINKING?!?!?

Then, shortly thereafter, he wandered into the kitchen and started smacking the crap out of the Leapfrog magnets on the fridge, sending them flying everywhere. I asked him to stop? He told me, "No." and knocked three more off. ?!?!? (he is normally a really good listener!) Another timeout.

Fast-forward to dinner. It turned into the battle of the century, all because he didn't want to eat a scrambled egg. (for no particular reason other than he was feeling contrary, I promise you) We ended up having to pull a Nanny 9-1-1 and start taking away toys. He lost his entire collection of Star Wars figures until tomorrow morning and we STILL only got two bites of egg into him. No, I don't force him to eat when he isn't hungry... but he kept requesting other things (noodles, chocolate, waffles), so I KNEW he was hungry. He just decided he was anti-egg tonight.

And the whining.. make it stop. Someone? Please? I think bedtime will be sooner than later tonight. And tomorrow? I hope it brings my regular, non-pod-child back. He's an energetic handful, but he's not usually THIS tiring...