We had the weekend of weekends. On Friday, yes accounts get lazy in the off season and I am lucky enough to be one that works only 4 days a week, we worked. OK, so only Lineman worked, I was watching The Baby and pretending to do housework. The Baby had a doctor's appointment at which time he developed a strange rash, thank goodness we were there when we discovered it. No problems, all is well and the rash is gone. Then we got to spend time driving to get Thing 2, seeing my wonderful in-laws, no really I do love them very much, and seeing some friends and their little girl. It was a wonderful, though tiring day.
On Friday Thing 2 got in trouble for being rude, when his Meemaw scolded him he told us when he was 23 and we were old he was going to beat us up.... wait what? Who is this child and why does he think he can talk to us that way? He got in more trouble and as any self respecting parent would, we were so very ashamed we loaded up the kids and high tailed it out of there. How did we raise this beautiful boy with such a sharp mind to be so disrespectful and violent? Oh heck no. On the long drive home we proceeded to lecture them about the importance of respect for elders. Most of which was tuned out because they are children and lectures in dark cars are of course, unproductive. We are silly and thought we may have reached them.
Saturday brought lots of work. The landscape project that would never end actually got finished, save for actually planting in the beautiful flower beds. The children shoveled lots of dirt, my nephew came over to play, the children whined and finally we got to zone out.
Sunday we had lots of fun planned. As always the fun lasted for a little while before attitudes deteriorated as did the fun. We went back to Meemaw's house since she has some acreage and decided a Nerf war was a great idea, and in our defense for a while it was a lot of fun. Us against the big kids, then the big kids split to their respective parents. All was going pretty well until Papa joined our merry band. Nerf darts flew the rules were simple. No head shots, and since Lineman and I are color blind, the big kids had to help us find our ammo. Easy right? Wrong, they didn't want to help causing the game to start to become a true battle of the minds. Then Thing 2 started making up rules to his advantage, normal kid stuff not a big deal, we would remind him that his rules were not how we were playing. Everything was settled, not. Finally he shot Thing 1 in the face, I'm sure by accident, but he was being a total brat about it. Apologize and lets get back to having fun. That was not happening. There was an argument. They got in trouble and the fun was over.
Thing 1 is highly emotional. He is also ridiculously strong for a 9 year old but we call him a gentle giant. He never hurts people even when he is getting attacked because he doesn't know his own strength. Yay for us until he finds out just how strong he is. Gulp! His feelings get hurt pretty easily and he is not a fan of being picked on. Thing 2 is ridiculously smart but he doesn't have much muscle. He tricks his brother into thinking he is stronger to avoid getting beaten into a pulp. The problem is Thing 2 has an attitude. He is not a fan of authority and though I understand this viewpoint I can't help but wonder where it comes from.
Each person has a language that gets through to them. For Thing 1 I have to yell, usually very loudly, before he will listen. With Thing 2 yelling only serves to piss him off. Do I know this? Yes. Can I control my angry voice even with this information? No. Parenting fail. I know.
Sunday after the Nerf war was a fun family gathering complete with slip N' slide and pinata. We got home about an hour before bedtime. The children played on electronics after a day of good old fashion fun and we put The Baby to bed because nap time never really happened and he needed to sleep. And we REALLY needed him to sleep. When bed time came I called the things. No answer. I called again, no answer. I counted, Thing 1 whose bedroom is furthest away reported for duty all wide eyed and innocent looking. Thing 2 ignored. I told Thing 1 to tell Thing 2 he was grounded. This was a scare tactic and maybe ill advised but I needed him to come within normal voice range as not to wake The Baby. When he finally emerged from his lair he was pissed. Slamming Lineman's IPad down. Lineman had had enough. He got Thing 2, who loves his dad and actually listens to him, to understand that slamming an electronic will only get you in trouble and then he really did get grounded, but he couldn't stop there. He had to use that smart mouth of his. This ended in a 20 minute lecture, grounding from electronics and a promise of full disclosure to his mother who he spends the weeks with.
Lineman had a very long talk with him during the "tucking" process and I can only hope that next time I see him Thing 2 will have done a 180 in the attitude department. Because if not I think he might be acquainting himself with a life without electronics, *gasp* how will he ever live? We are like so unfair.
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