Bella's sad spider

Tonight, Annabelle was running laps around the living room, approx 10:40 pm. She says, "i gotta do some runnin, so I can go to sleep". When the kids are overly hyper, we take them to the park or the Jardin or just outside so they can "run off some energy" and sleep easier. Apparently she is picking up on this technique.

So, I know she is going to be difficult to get to bed. We're on my bed and I tell her "one minute of laying in Mommy's bed and then we're off to your bed." This buys me some time to get her to calm down. Only she's not calming down. She's hanging from my neck. She's climbing on the bookshelf. She's jumping on my bed. After the 3rd time that I tell her to lay down, she picks up her mini-doodle pro, and starts coloring.

She holds up a picture of a spider, only it has a frown face. She never draws frown faces. In her saddest voice, she says, "Mama, this is a spider. He is sad because he thinks you aren't gonna give him ni-night kisses."

Ooooh...she nailed me. She saw a weak spot and went for it. I cuddled her in my bed, for longer than one minute, smooched her with plenty of ni-night kisses (and the spider too) and getting her to bed took about 15 seconds after that. It's so much easier on me when I am patient...why don't I remember this every night? She is a wonderful teacher. Below is a picture of the sad spider...I couldn't resist.

posted by mindi11 @ 3/24/2005 01:42:00 AM