Its 2016!

Happy New Year to all my readers. Whether you are just starting your family, growing your family, or enjoying your current family, wishing you all the best in 2016!

The holidays were exhausting. Two weeks (mostly rainy) is a long time trying to come up with fun ideas to entertain a toddler 24/7, but we did some fun things. Beanie and I spent New Year's Eve at my parents and then came home around 10:30pm. She went straight  to bed and I watched the ball drop, sneaking up to give her a midnight kiss. 


I am hoping that 2016 is not the year of the epic tantrums, because its sure started out that way. Beanie has had two (2!) tantrums this weekend, and they were not fun.

The first one was Sat. We had planned a fun day at Tar.get for her to walk around and play with the toys followed by lunch out. Tar.get went well, even though she kept getting in/out of the cart which was a weird one with two seats at the ground level. Anyway, all was well until it was time to go which was also okay until I said I needed to use the restroom before we went to the restaurant.

She refused to come and started fussing and saying "No!" etc. I tried to reason but there is no reasoning with a 2.9yr old. I realized I was not going to get anywhere and we went back to the car and I proceeded to drive home since I needed to use the restroom (we live 2 min away by car). I knew she would not let me use it in the restaurant either, hence the decision. I told her since we were going back home simply for me to use the restroom, we were likely not going out again.  Massive tantrum ensued. Finally she calmed down, I gave her some space and went up to the bedroom while she was in the lobby area sniffling away. Then she came up and we "talked" about it. I told her that when its just her and I, it is not acceptable for her to not allow me to use the restroom, since I cannot leave her by herself.  (BTW -- She did the same thing earlier in the week. Luckily I had a friend joining us for a play date, so I was able to go). After some talking and big hugs we decided that we will go back to the restaurant and reclaim our day. She was very compliant at the restaurant and left there without a fuss.

The next day (Sunday) we planned to go back to the local shopping area again with my Mom. This time BBB and then maybe lunch out.  Beanie said she wanted to go to Tar.get to look for a yellow bike like Cur.ious George (sigh!). I said we could go there after Grammy and I finish our work at the other store, She was fine with the plan until we parked the car and she saw Tar.get across the car park. So again a big meltdown because she wanted to do Tar.get first.

After 2 weeks at home with no breaks, I think my patience was totally frayed and I was not in a good mood. I needed to get some work done at BBB and I knew that doing T first would mean being there f.o.r.e.v.e.r. I told her the plan was quick stop at BBB and then Target so she would have more time to spend there and if she was going to act up then we will do neither. Again I drove back with a screaming kid to drop off my Mom and by the time we reached their house (3-4 min) Beanie had calmed down and was more rational. She agreed to the original plan and we ended up having a  good time in BBB, going to Tar.get and later lunch.

Geez!

I am not sure if I handled these situations right. Maybe I should have stuck to my guns of NOT going back out after we came home, but it seemed needlessly punitive. I do feel that if this type of behavior continues then next time I probably will not go out again. How do you guys handle such situations?

Parenting is hard!!