Wrong side of the bed

Today was apparently a shift change, and Noah's turn to wake up on the wrong side of the bed. Levi had the day off. Today's shift began at 6 AM. At 1:39, Paige emailed me the following picture and description:

So after more than an hour in time out (closer to an hour and a half) Noah fell asleep, rather than apologize to me. Waking at 6 is not the best for this child. He had tantrum that I washed his hands after lunch claiming " I want peanut butter all over my hands!" I warned him to calm down or he would go to time out and he responded by spanking me. As I carried him to the chair he attempted several times to bite me. I buckled him in. YUP! On Nanny 911 you spend an hour returning the child to the chair and then they are cured. I think the nanny must be watching the other children and feeding a screaming infant during that pivotal hour. So he was buckled in. I returned and asked him to apologize often, and he refused. He was more upset that he was missing Barney in the other room than being buckled in. He hopped in the chair across the floor several times to try to see the TV over the bottom stairs. I moved him back and he would wail again. Adding new threats of having to pee and poop. I told him he would have to sit in it until he was done with time out and said sorry. (He never did pee or poop) After a loooonnnnng time I took Luke upstairs and put him to bed. When I returned all was quiet. Ella had taken pity on him and had covered the poor boy up with his blankie and he promptly feel asleep. I unbuckled him and carried him up to bed. He is sleeping now. Never did get an apology from him. Hopefully sleep will help his mood.

Followed this afternoon by a meltdown because his pizza was too hot, then too cold, then he wanted a second piece before the first piece was finished.

Then during bathtime, he splashed and stomped around in the tub after I warned him not too. He had to sit on the bathmat for a timeout. Instead of just telling me he was sorry, he claimed "I don't know the words!" and "I need mommy to tell me the words!" He ended up sitting on the bathmat for the rest of bathtime, and was severely disappointed when the bath was over and "I didn't get clean enough!" Then he sat on the bathmat as the other kids went to the room to hear mommy read stories. He again started threatening that he had to go to the bathroom. I told him he could go as soon as he told me he was sorry. He claimed that "I have to get out of timeout or my poopy will just POP right out!" During one of the two minute timeout stretches, his wailing suddenly went quiet. I found him perched up on the toilet, doing his business. Then back into timeout.

He never did apologize, and ended up going to bed without the usual bedtime stories. Then he spent the next hour in bed crying and carrying on a mostly one way conversation with himself...

[for the proper effect, read this out loud, in a high pitched three year old wail, through sobs and sniffles...]

"This is daddy's house and he is the boss, but I don't want a boss in my house. Mommy always comes back because she loves us, but I don't like daddy, but he loves us." (Mommy had run out to the store.)

Noah: "I don't like bosses in my house!"
Levi: "They are bad bosses." [Said in Levi's characteristic mumble, more like "Dey are bad both-es"]

"I don't like to hit daddy, cause then he puts me in timeout, and timeout isn't fun!"

There were more priceless jewels of wisdom from the bedroom, but I forgot them before I could write them down. I was trying hard to muffle my chuckling though.


Who ever invented the term "terrible twos" apparently gave their kids up for adoption soon after, because the "threes" are an order of magnitude worse...