The Magic Word!

Try as we may, Hubs & I have been unsuccessful in getting N to say "please".  But tonight that changed!!  N wanted some more milk and he came up to me in the kitchen and asked for "more".  As I always say, I said to him "more milk please".  And then he repeated "milk please", but it came out more like "milk peas!"  I was ecstatic!!  I think manners in children are so important, as I have seen my fair share of poorly behaved (actually brats, if you want to get right down to it!) at my old job and I always swore that my kid would never be allowed to act like that.  While I am on my high horse tangent, I should also admit that I find myself allowing N to do things that I swore I would never do before I had kids.  I used to look at people whose kids had on messy clothes in public and think, what's wrong with that mom?  Why can't she put her kid in clean clothes?  Well now I can tell my judgemental ass that of course that mom left the house with her kiddos in clean clothes.  But somewhere along the outing, a snack/juice/water became involved to keep the peace that ended up EVERYWHERE on the kid.  I know because this has happened to us too many times to count.  I also used to see moms giving kids "bribes" to behave in the grocery store.  I would think, "Yikes, that kid is a BRAT!"  But I can't deny that I let N eat a box of ritz cheese sandwich crackers one day when he wouldn't be quiet in line at the deli.  And it was a HUGE box.  I don't think he ate lunch or dinner that day after polishing off that partially hydrated, sodium laden, fake cheese monstrosity.  I was recently reading a quote in a kids activity book and it really resonated with me.

Before I got married I had six theories about raising children; now I have six children and no theories.

John Wilmot

I will never give up on the importance of manners but I have definitely eased up on some of my other rules!  And I am thrilled to pieces that N said "peas"!!
Here are some recent pics taken by our good friends.

Love this pic of N & Daddy-O