Six Days

Last week I started fretting about having Dermot home with us for SIX WHOLE DAYS. I know the SAHMs are laughing at me, but really, this is different for us. Dermot's daycare was closed W-F, and then we had the three day weekend. I arranged my schedule so that I didn't have to be at school during any of that time, but I still asked Ethan to take one day off of work to give me a break. So I took Wednesday and Friday, Ethan took Thursday and we obviously shared the three day weekend. What did we do? Not much, but that was okay. Wednesday I let Dermot call the shots and he didn't want to do anything but play at home. Fine. So be it. Thursday Ethan and Dermot dropped me off at the train station while I had Mama's day in the big city. They went back to Magiquest and then they went to get cupcakes. Friday I was working on some big plans, but again, Dermot didn't really want to do anything. I finally convinced him to let me walk him to the library. Can you believe that none of us had been to the library yet and we've lived here two years? I finally got a library card. Dermot got several books and two DVDs. He still declared the place boring. What a grumpy kid. I think that he doesn't get the point since most of the books are lined up with just the spine facing out. Since Dermot can't read, he sees a bunch of nothing. I finally drew his eye to the carousels where he could see the book fronts. That helped a little bit. We got some Clifford, a David Shannon book, and some other series I don't remember. Saturday and Monday we did nothing, but Sunday we finally made a trip to the Liberty Science Center. It just reopened last year. It's supposed to be a hands-on science museum, but I think that it's more for older kids. It involved more reading than the Franklin requires. They were really selling the fact that it made the Parents.com top ten list of science museums. We were both shocked that it beat the Franklin in Philly. Both of us prefer that museum. Dermot did get to help during a presentation of "Be a surgeon". He was a circulating nurse and he got to help the surgeon with his gloves, mask, hair net, etc. Dermot loves being in front. He still has the gloves and he likes to pretend that he's doing experiments. At the gift store we bought the coolest things. Dermot got an E Coli virus and I got a mono virus. How cool are these stuffed animal microbes? I am dying for a stuffed brain cell for school.

So we all survived the weekend. Dermot was a little grumpy during a couple of mornings, but for the most part he was very pleasant. We've been "turning up the heat" and dishing out punishment more often than we used to, and I think that's helping, it's just a slow process. I think that Dermot figured that he didn't get in trouble way more often than he did get in trouble and that it was worth the risk to him. So we've had to ramp up punishment quicker than we used to. He used to get a few talkings to, then things taken away and then time out - which is the most feared at our house. Now we try to remember to go through the steps quicker. It would be so much easier if he would just listen to us and follow our directions. Don't all parents think that?