Jack-ism

The other day... was a...rough one. Shortstop just loves saying no to anything and everything, even if he wants it or does it. And now mealtimes are the BANE. OF. MY. EXISTENCE! He turns his nose up at almost everything I make but that is not the part that gets me. The part that gets both Mark and I is that he will quietly and sneakily sit there and drop his plate, fork and cup on the floor soon to be followed by whatever food he has chosen to hate. I am always on my hands and knees cleaning up spills. We have tried time outs, ignoring him, putting his stuff back on the tray without saying anything, putting his stuff back on the tray while getting after him, putting him in his room right away, excusing him from the dinner area...you name it and we have tried it. But I digress.

So the other morning he was finishing breakfast, one he actually likes, and still threw his stuff everywhere. We got him down and he proceeded to make a mess all over with his discarded food before I could get to it. My hands were soapy doing dishes and Mark was busy doing some Saturday honey-do list item so I said in a very exasperated tone "Jack! You know what...go sit on your time out stool until I can come to you." Now he is only 21 months and I knew there was no way this would work. But I was wrong. He looked at me, put the toy he was playing with down, hung his head and sauntered into the other room. Mark said he watched him from behind the door as he sadly sat on his stool, put his hands in his lap and with the cutest pouty lips ever, kept his head hung until we came in a minute later. I forgot why I was mad at him and just hugged him (while trying not to let him see me laughing for fear of giving him mixed signals...) Turned out to be a pretty good day.