Perhaps I should start learning how to pray

He broke the umbrella right after he finished lying beneath it.


I haven't posted for a while because of lack of time and also because Henry hasn't done anything cute worth writing about for some time. Lately he's been nothing but painful. The day time naps seem to be coming a thing of the past and as a result he's usually screeching and climbing the furniture like a feral cat by 4PM. He is going to bed earlier but not by much and a couple of evenings has even just gone and taken himself off there after his bath. I'll be getting his dinner ready and turn around and he will have disappeared into his bed and be fast asleep. That's a bonus I guess but the lead up to that is enough to test the strength of anyone's parenting skills.

The thing is that he knows when he's been naughty and sometimes will even just send himself to the naughty corner where he stays until he thinks he's been there long enough and comes to me looking all forlorn and says "sorry Mama".

I've just made a trip to the supermarket and took Henry with me. He and I are both tired today and both very cranky as a result. He seemed to sense that there was a limit to how much bad behaviour I was willing to accept today and was ever so patient with me. He even stayed close to me instead of running up and down the aisles as he usually does. I'd promised him a matchbox car if he behaved and so as we edged ever closer to that aisle, which he knows intimately, he started to show signs of becoming resltess. I stopped moving and gave him the glare. He immediately calmed down. Once we got to the cars he was only willing to look at the $13 box of five but the deal I'd made with him was for 1 car only. He wasn't happy with that and refused to even look at the offerings I placed before him. He started to scream and I started to walk away. He turned to follow me and said "no worries mum, I don't need a car". It was at that moment that I knew that most of the following through on most of the consequences I set had paid off. He even remained relatively calm until we got out of there and into the parking lot where he somehow thinks he will never get hit by a passing car.

Now I am going to clean up the yoghurt he's spilled all over the floor and hang the load of washing in the machine, wash the dishes, prepare the marinade for the meat that is to go in tonight's currt...and then...there's never much point wishing that after all that there'll be time to rest because....because life isn't like that.