Females Need Quality Time

Hey y'all,

We have been experiencing the "terrible two's" in the worst way over the last couple of months. Mason and Katie can't seem to look at each other without squalling. Mason does his fair share of instigating; but the emotional and over-the-top mess is Katie. We have tried spankings, time-outs, talking-to's, ignoring, and instructing in kindness. Nothing is working. I used to be able to talk to her and calm her down. Now she screams over the top of me, tries to hit or kick me, tells me "NO!", argues with me why she can't be sweet, slams her door if she gets sent to her room (or if she sends herself). Just a general all-around mess; and it has been only escalating for weeks now. I'm at the end of my rope.

Then a wise friend of mine shared something on Facebook about the minutes in a child's day that count the most.

Clearly this advice also presses the importance of physical contact with our children, and I am definitely lacking in that area, as well. Baby steps.

My kids are not yet school-age; but it struck me that I could still practice the "first 3 minutes" rule. As a simple experiment (I was at the end of my rope, remember?) I promised myself that the next morning (Friday), no matter what I was in the middle of, when Katie woke up I would purposely stop what I was doing, grab a book (or several) and sit and read with her immediately. Reading is her favorite thing to do with any adult.

Katie doesn't really wake up in the morning at a consistent time anymore. I try to get the most important and non-baby-friendly chores done before the kids require my attention; but it rarely goes as planned. So, I end up pausing briefly to rush her through the motions of getting dressed and getting strapped down for breakfast in the mornings, complete with the entertainment of tv, so I can get back to my agenda. 

Friday morning, I was in the middle of cleaning my bathroom when she woke up at 6am. Ugh. However, I remembered my promise/experiment and immediately washed my hands, hung up my apron, and snagged a book from the living room shelf. It was warmer that morning, so we went to the back porch swing and watched the dawn break. We read our story and talked about the colors as the sky changed and we welcomed the morning together.

WHAT A DIFFERENCE IT MADE. I got 0 lip from her for the rest of the entire day! There were maybe two or three tiffs between her and Mason all day! And none of them escalated anywhere close to the level they had been for the last several weeks!!

I've tried this "method" twice more since then (Saturday morning and this morning) and it has had an amazing impact on our relationship as well as her relationship with everybody around her!

New topic: Skye has been beating up Joey. I mean to a pulp. He looks awful. She won't even let him eat. She even backed him into a corner and was so terrifying that my poor blind horse fought his way through the fence and out into the street last week. A neighbor, a guy from the fire department, and my father in law were trying to get my attention around 6:45am last Monday morning for this reason. sigh. I've reached my limit with the mare, too, and quickly posted her for sale. 

I already wrote about how I put her on the lunge line and sent her around until the attitude was worked out of her system because she went after Joey pretty good while I was out there last week. She was like a brand new horse and they stayed best friends through the next day.

But just to be sure, I tried it again the next afternoon. She gave me a little lip, but nothing like the day before; and Joey had a new friend for another 24 hours. 

I have gone out and lunged her everyday for the last four days; except on Sunday. While my mother in law had the kids, Skye and I went on a nice long trail ride. We had so much fun, and I haven't seen her go after Joey since Thursday. They stand together so nicely now. 

New topic: My birthday was last Tuesday. Jacob had been talking about taking me out for a nice dinner for weeks; but of course he works on Tuesdays; thus, I didn't count on it.

Thus, he got home way early and I hadn't even so much as showered. The kids and I had just gone about our day as usual. I rushed to put on a dress of some kind and make my face and hair somewhat decent while the kids clawed around me wondering when their babysitter would be arriving.

With fussy kids and greasy hair at the end of the day, I proceeded to stress out and naturally think I was too ugly to go out for my birthday. #girllogic

By the time my mother in law arrived after work to pick up the kids for dinner, I had slammed the bathroom door shut and was crying on the floor saying, "I don't know why we thought this was going to work! I'm so ugly! We should get the kids from her and just treat it as a normal night! I don't deserve a birthday dinner!"

Jacob basically had to drag me to the car and make me go. I'm so glad he did. I stared grumpily out the car window and didn't talk to him besides a few growls all the way to Olive Garden. 

By the end of dinner, I was talking and laughing and flipping my greasy hair like we were on our first date (except I did wash my hair for that one). He asked me what else I would wanna do since it was still early in the evening and we went and signed up for my first gym membership. We had our first gym date the following Sunday and I'm in love (with both him and working out). <3 

Turns out, girls need quality time in order to thrive. And in the words of Casting Crowns: we were made to thrive. 

So, if you've got a female in your life who is raising some cane, try spending a little one-on-one time with her -- even if it's yourself.