Anticipation and Discipline

I am in a great mood this morning!  We had a really fun family weekend packed with soccer games and birthday parties, as well as time at Railroad Park riding bikes and scooters with Grandmom.  The kids were well-behaved the vast majority of the weekend with little fighting between Ward and Ann Park which is so nice (more on that later).  Sam has been struggling with a cold so he was more on the whiny/I-want-momma-all-the-time side, but it was okay.

But I am so excited for later this week because I get to see BOTH of my sisters as well as BOTH of my new nephews.  Still can't believe I have not met Billy and he is 5 months old (and a happy, happy baby) and I can't wait to just hold Liam, who by all accounts is an angel.  Both of their families are heading to Grey Rocks for a long Easter weekend.  We have to be in Birmingham over the weekend, but the kids are out of school Thursday, Friday and Monday for Easter so I am going to take them down on Thursday morning and come home Friday night.  I hate that Ted can't come, but I understand that he can't leave work since we are going on a big family vacation in May. 

Back to the fighting reference though - Ward and Ann Park have been fighting like cats and dogs and just generally not treating each other well.  I went back to my trusting parenting guide by John Rosemond (The Well-Behaved Child) and found a system that I thought I would give a try.  And it is working.  Here is what I did.  I sat them both down and told them that, as I knew, that the fighting had to stop. I told them that I knew that there would sometimes be conflict (as they are not expected to get along all the time!), but that they did not need to scream, yell, stomp, snatch, or come running to mom and dad every time they got in a disagreement. The three of us then wrote down the following three rules about fighting, entitled "DO NOT DISTURB THE FAMILY PEACE":  (1) Keep conflict to yourself.  Do not bother anyone else with your conflicts (i.e. I don't want to hear you yelling, stomping, etc.);  (2) No tattling; and (3) No pushing, shoving, pinching, snatching, touching. 

And how do I enforce those rules?  Well, they each have an envelope with 5 tickets in it.  Each time they break one of the above rules, I get a ticket.  No warnings, just give me a ticket. (And if Ward comes to tattle, Ann Park has to give me a ticket too beacuse they are BOTH disturning the family peace, even though Ward was the tattler).  If they lose 5 tickets in one day, they have to go to their room for the rest of the day (they can come out and eat dinner with the family) and go to bed early.  When in their room, they may read or draw/write.  They may not play with legos (Ward) or Barbies, babies (Ann Park). You should have seen their eyes when I told them that.  And they know that I mean business.

So far we have not gone to the room yet.  Yesterday I had 4 tickets from both by lunch and they were angels the rest of the day.  It will happen.  I am sure of it.  And it won't be pretty.  But it will be effective.