The moral of the story is...

I am a positive person. Partly because of my loving upbringing and the paths I've chosen for myself, but mostly I believe it is because whenever I meet someone with a positive mental attitude I seem to be inextricably drawn to them. Those people have always made me want to become a better person just by their sheer example and energy. In striving to be the best I can be, the best secret I've found to maintaining your PMA is finding a way to change the things you're not OK with and being OK with the things you can't change. It's really that simple. Now, considering my positivity, I'm now finding it difficult to make this confession; I've been a little stressed out lately.

Before I explain my conundrum let me just point out that the stress has had nothing to do with contractors jack hammering my basement slab for two weeks to install a flow valve and subsequent re-jackhammering because the first two jobs weren't done right. Nor does it have anything to do with my washing machine breaking last night when my laundry was already hitting critical mass because of the jackhammering and rejack...well you get it. Nor does it have anything to do with the GI bug that is stinging the stomachs me and all of those that I love this week. Nor does it have anything to do with my writers block...a-ha, things are looking up already. 

No, the reason I am stressed is because of the toddler/dog dichotomy developing in our once peaceful home. Here's how it works. I get Niko into a calm submissive state and he is happily laying on the living room floor with his beloved Bully bone. Elijah is carefully extracting a 24 ounce bottle of blue Gatorade from Amelia's hands which is full and just recently opened. The screaming ensues. Niko runs to little Meelee and licks her face as if her tears were composed of beef jerky. The licking causes her to scream ever so more intensely and the dog's tail wags even faster, ad infinitum. Dad pulls out a large wad of his hair, chuckles, and crumples to the floor shaking. 

So as with most crises situations, I did what any normal human should do and calmly went to the library. After reading up on toddler psychology it became apparent to me what I was doing wrong. Since I am a sharing individual, I will share with you my findings and solution.   

The first point you must understand is her screaming is not because she wants something but rather because she wants you to know that she wants it. "What difference does that make?" you might ask- if you were a total jerk. Well, smarty pants, it actually makes all the difference when dealing with meltdown situations. Once you realize she is crying not because of a toy she wants or a place she wants to go, but rather because she wants you to pay heed to her desire and hopefully deliver on it, you will be better equipped to respond appropriately. A lot of parents will surely retort with the conventional wisdom of toddler cries being an indicator of insufficient TLC (which could be the case or could very well be the opposite) while, in actually, giving her the TLC she craves in response to cries will only exacerbate the problem you are trying to address. You need to wait and give her the love and attention she wants only after she has rationalized the fact that screaming and crying will not get her her way. Only then will you get her to start vocalizing in a civilized manner about what she wants from you and then you can go ahead and heap all the toys and ponies you want to on her as she is now completely problem free and will remain that way until she is twenty-five. Nope, not really... just making sure you are still paying attention. 

My solution, when she wants your attention in regard to something but can only vocalize it in ear splitting monkey screams; smile while calmly telling her that you will talk to her whenever she's ready and go to another part of the room focussing your attention elsewhere. If it's too hard to listen to her, feel free to walk in the other room. Do not be tempted to reason with her to get her calmed down, it may work to appease her this time, but you are doing nothing to address the real problem of the child's ill communication skillz. When she has finally stopped crying after five hours or so, you can sit down and talk about what she wants even though you already know exactly what it is, which is toys and ponies.  

As for the dog, I'll get back to you about how to become your dogs pack leader once I am promoted from disrespected pack shift supervisor who is the only member of the pack not privy to his impending sixty day notice. This may take a while folks. 

Happy Birthday Grammie!!!

Back like a rebel making trouble

Despite the warning from my friend Shane that the purchase of a Macintosh computer becomes, invariably, the fast track to Scientology, I have at long last decided to purchase an IMac with some early Christmas assistance from Grammie (Thanks a million, Grammie, you earn the Mr. Steve Humanitarian award for the year even though I know that seeing pictures and videos of the kids is one of the larger motivations behind your tremendous act of altruism) and additionally from all of you folks clicking on the completely non-enticing ad at the top of my blog page in contribution to my twenty fifth concurrent occupation. Thanks, friends and family. Welcome back.

The Mac functions have a wee bit of a learning curve to them which feel a bit like driving in London for the first time... Big Ben... Parliament... but not so bad that I inadvertently end up in Piccadilly Circus. I based my decision to go Apple on the fact that everyone I know who has gone over to the dark side of Macdom has given nothing but positive feedback, so there may yet be something to this hype. Besides, I need a reliable computer that will wash the horrible taste of the old Dell laptop out of my mouth lest I turn against computers all together and opt to live in a cave atop the Himalayas, leaving only little scribblings on the wall. Hail Xenu.

Lately, Amelia is finally giving forth the additional effort to actually repeat the words Nadine, Elijah and I say to her rather than just labeling everything with a blanket statement of "that". With this important development comes the challenging part of attempting to decipher the language she tries so desperately to master as she frustratingly regurgitates it back to us in a series of monosyllabic phonemes progressing inevitably into a crescendous screech. Ah, the joys of having a high frequency high amplitude vocal cord. Fortunately, as the weather gets colder, the question of whether Amelia wants to scream outside upon each offense is answered most often with a simple "no". 

Zach has concluded the world as he knows it is no more than his own private jungle gym as he has been getting in touch with his inner monkey. If an object has a foothold, no matter how large small or wobbly, Zach will climb it like it were Kilimanjaro. He seems at his absolute happiest when he can climb up on the couch while holding a toy of his choice as if he has finally come to achieve one of his most coveted life goals. Come to think of it, that so happens to be one of my life goals, too. Huh, that's weird. 

Equally chatty, though not yet quite as intelligible, Zach often speaks streaming sentences like a news radio host, all in a language he invented.  My best guess is that he is making up jokes since he will often stop talking to laugh spontaneously at the punch lines only he seems to understand. Here's one of my favorite jokes he tells; budga-budga-budga-budga, hahaha. Well...perhaps it loses something in the translation. 

      

I'm sure some of you are wondering how the training of Niko is progressing. I'm happy to say he is coming along nicely in both departments of obedience and operation dry carpet thanks in no small part Cesar Millan. After reading his books, Cesar's Way and Be the Pack Leader, I have managed to get Niko into a more submissive state by establishing my position as a calm assertive pack leader. It is truly an exhilarating experience to walk an animal the first time without it being the other way around. One thing I've discovered with puppies, though, is that they require a continual reminder of their subordinate position otherwise, if not addressed immediately, my control of him quickly degrades from status of dog whisperer to old yeller. In short, he goes right back to being a doggy dog. Take for instance Saturday night, as Niko was fervently exploring the living room, he managed to get his head stuck in a jack o lantern candy bucket. He ran around in haphazard circles wearing this large toothy pumpkin grin juxtaposed humorously to his obvious state of panic. It was exactly like a scene from America's funniest home videos except that I wasn't so cruel as to leave it on him for fifteen minutes while I found the video camera and some working double A batteries.  No, I got him calmed down as quickly as I could. After a few moments of realizing that flying blind may not be the wisest mode of locomotion he stopped and I was able to free him from his plastic pumpkin prison. 

Perhaps the only thing more exciting than having a well trained puppy is having well behaved kids. I can remember having that feeling long ago when Elijah was 20 months old. He was proudly one of the best behaved kids I have ever met, even to this day. I used to call it beginners luck and in retrospect that might have just been the case. Amelia has just a couple social graces short of Jackie Kennedy and may need a bit of polish. Perhaps I am to blame for not realizing that my one concrete adage of understanding about the female mind, which is "let them have their way" may have one little thirty pound caveat.