Naptime Blogging, Love & Logic and the Cute Kid

I seriously cannot get down anything coherent during these naptimes. I think I get all frazzled and nervous that I'll spend too much time uploading photos or whatever (hence no photos lately... not that we're not taking many!) that I'll miss out on the other stuff I have to get done during naptime.

Which brings me to the question... What do you guys do during naptime?

When naptimes were two (oh glorious days!), I refinished furniture, watched DVR'ed Bachelor episodes, cleaned, caught up on phonecalls to people I have neglected... but with one nap that is totally unpredictable at times? I am finding myself doing the dishes from lunch, dinner prepping a bit, reading blogs, returning emails, paying bills, eating lunch... and then it's over. Just. like. that.

So here goes nothing. I'm planning to blog more about stuff. General life and maybe a few photos a day. Just enough to meet the 5-10 minutes of blog time before I have to get on with the rest of that list before the little person wakes and dictates the rest of our day's schedule.

Here's a quick update about parenting this week. And then a photo if you're totally bored of my parenting chit-chat.

- I received a question about getting B to say please. I model it a lot in my own words to him, but when he says up, I immediately say please right after. I won't pick him up until he says it. He'll say up over and over again and I'll say please until he does. Then he gets picked up. I realize not all kids work that way. And Benjamin typically doesn't for most things before he's on the floor tantrum throwing. But this seems to work for us right now. Ask me next week. Hah.

- Love & Logic is going well. Not that he's a better behaved kiddo (as we still get hit and bit regularly), but we are practicing love, empathy, "calm down time" immediately following an incident like hitting, and most notably, we're offering him lots of choices. The philosophy (in short) is that if you offer your child choices that are both favorable to you, there are less no/yes responses, less breakdowns, and more ownership and pride on their part because you are allowing them a say. We ask him questions all day long from trivial things to important ones. Examples:

Would you like a muffin or toast for breakfast? (show both so he can point)
Would you like butter or peanut butter on your waffle? (he chose PB)
Would you like to go to the park over there near the school or the little green one? (pointing)
Would you rather put on your shoes before going outside or stay inside? (notice there is no option to not wear shoes outside as he originally wanted...both options meet our needs, too)

- Offering him choices at mealtime have somewhat helped my very picky eater to become less of a pill during that time and actually eat a bit more from both options we select for him.

- While he is still young and language development is picking up (while rapidly, but slow by way of communication), this has been successful for us. It's also a lot more fun parenting, just like the book boasts. Not that it's the be-all book to parenting, but since I mentioned we were reading it in the last post, I wanted to follow up.

- He still hits a lot when he's trying to communicate that he does not want to do what we are doing. We calmly tell him that he has chosen to hit and that hitting hurts people. We do not hit and because he made the choice, he will need time alone for a minute. Using love and empathy so he doesn't hit "fight or flight", we try to reason with him that way. Follow-through is key.

There's more, but I don't want to type the whole book out (seems like I did!).

Demonstrating how to pick raspberries properly. Pick and eat immediately.
Photo taken about a week ago when my mom came to visit (we got a date night without the third wheel!). More pictures to come...

p.s. My kid has another cold. Like honestly. You think it was the stylus pen he sucked on at the Target checkout the other day? (egad!) Frustrating, but at 2:00 a.m., I sat in bed holding my 18-month old as he was sound asleep for 30 minutes... before I laid him next to me and he rolled over and started talking to his dad. He got the eviction notice then. But that 30 minutes of baby drool on my chest and his little body draped across me? Magical.