I have a problem. An addiction. It crops up when I’m stressed. And when I’m relaxed. When I’m upset, and when I’m elated.
I need chocolate. I crave chocolate. I wish I were one of those people who don’t like chocolate. To be honest, though, I was shocked to learn that those people actually exist. I’m still not sure I believe in them.
But I was talking about me. And chocolate.
Continue reading Basking in chocolatey goodness
It takes about 11 hours to drive to my dad’s house. That’s if you don’t have small people who need to stop frequently. We do have such small people, which meant we spent quite a bit more time on the road. In all that time, though, we only had a handful of whiney moments and not a single full-blown meltdown. I can’t take too much credit for that; we’ve been blessed with two extremely good little travelers. I did, however, do a few things to try to make the trip easier on them.
Continue reading Staying sane on the road
Poppy is a bit, shall we say, attached to her “shows.” It’s not unusual for her to ask for “Sesame” or “Easter Beagle” or “Baby Kitty” before she even gets out of bed. I thought I could use this to my advantage in the Battle to Get Poppy to Eat Something Nutritious. So I laid down the gauntlet: “No more shows until you take one bite of fruit.”
That was last Thursday.
The first few days when she asked to watch something I had to remind her, “No fruit, no show.” She responded with fits for about two days, then with “No show.”
While this hasn’t worked exactly as I’d hoped it would, the “no fruit, no show” approach has worked for me. I’d been wanted to cut back on the amount of TV the kids watched, and sticking to the promise/threat I made last week has definitely done that. The television has been on in her presence — it was US Open week, after all — but Poppy hasn’t seen any of her programming in nearly a week. And she’s fine with it. I asked her this morning if she’d like to watch “Sesame Street.” I was prepared to say, “OK then, let’s take a bite of banana!” But it didn’t come to that. She said, “No shows,” and then she went off to play in her room.
That works for me.
Read more Works for Me Wednesday tips and tales at Rocks in My Dryer.