Summer Holidays and Discipline Issues

I have always tried to be gentle in the way I manage my children.  I prefer not to hit them and to use time-out methods or to make clear I am upset about something which also works fairly well (especially with Little Man who hates me to be disappointed in him).

But as it’s the summer holidays and the kids are at home all day with their grandmother whilst I am at work, they seem to be running wild again.  Part of me likes letting them have some freedom.  They have become very independent and good at entertaining themselves.  They have free run of the garden and have re-arranged all of the garden furniture to make space to play.  They have also been planning a garden party with the little girls from next door (so I expect my kitchen is going to be raided).

On the other hand, they eat rubbish all day, their grandmother who takes care of them cannot control them and threatens them with “Wait till your mum comes home” rather than putting her foot down (that’s grandparents all over I think) and Little Lady changes outfits throughout the day strewing clothes across her room and mine.

The main problem I have been having though is with Gorgeous.  On his last day at school his teacher mentioned he had lost a little of his happy, bouncy sparkle.  At home he had been fine, if a little more mischievous than normal.  The one thing that has changed though is that he has been wetting himself, which he has almost never done since he was potty trained.  The timing coincides with him finding out that a new baby might be coming. 

I have tried to tell him that we won’t bring a baby unless he wants it to come.  I have tried to reassure him that he is still my darling beautiful, clever little boy.  But the issue is ongoing.  I’m glad I will be off and plan to spend lots of time just hugging and holding him.

Last night was a nightmare with them.  I asked Little Lady to pick her clothes on the floor and she gathered all of the clothes she could find, including all of her brothers clean jumpers and costs that were hung up and dumped them all in the wash basket.  In the meantime, Gorgeous was trying to hide the accident of the day, so I quietly sent him upstairs to get changed.   I came up to find he had dumped his wet clothes on top of all the clean ones.  Then I noticed a wet trail all over my bed.  I called him back to ask him what it was.  After much threatening and cajoling he half admitted he had peed on my bed!!! How on earth he managed to pee a trail all over my bed, by “accident” I have no idea!!  I told him to run downstairs before I did something crazy.

I have no idea how I took a deep breath, left everything where it was and prayed my maghrib (evening) prayer before stripping the bed and sorting the basket full of clothes out.  The other thing I did was clear half of Little Lady’s wardrobe out and ban her from wearing anything apart from salwar kameez (trousers and tunic) for the rest of the holidays.  Hopefully that will fix the problem of her traipsing about in mismatched leggings and little t-shirts all day.

I am sooo glad I have lots of leave and then maternity leave coming up.  Normally they have school and then me at home, so the discipline and routine is there.  At the moment though I am playing catch up after work after a day of them doing whatever they want and to be frank, I am much slower than usual at keeping up with them.