Adjusting

To say that we’ve been going through a lot of changes in our lives would be an under statement. Selling our houses, fitting what we can of our belongings into a 24′ trailer, moving across the country with preschoolers, and not having a place to live? It’s a lot of change.

Change is hard on adults and children alike, so we have seen some behaviours from our kids that we don’t like. We know it’s hard, but the basics of respect, honesty, and obedience need to stay in place. With Jason away at work during the week, and the rest of us staying at the farm, there isn’t the routine and consistency that the kids are used to and I was starting to feel like I wasn’t in control anymore. Disrespect, dishonesty and disobedience were wearing at me.

So, we had a family meeting before Jason left for work last Sunday and we talked about the changes and the expectations. We made a little flip chart with happy faces. If disrespect, dishonesty, and disobedience were becoming a big problem, 1 warning would be given and then a happy face would disappear. If all of the happy faces were gone at the end of the day, there wouldn’t be a special activity to do together. If there was at least one happy face left, then an activity could be chosen to do together.

Now, clearly, I am not an artist and this is a low-budget deal here, but it worked.

The activities Mikail chose to pick from were, fishing with Daddy, the park, going out for icecream, and playing ‘Jake and Boss’ (imaginary play with Nana).

We had amazing results with positive behaviour this week. He only needed a warning. That was enough to reel his mind back to what proper behaviour in our family is.

Today Mikail, Jason, and Papa went out fishing as one of his activities and Mikail caught his first fish ever.

Jason and Papa were skunked. Too funny.

Mikail has been talking about keeping the fish they catch and then eating it. We told him that if it was big enough, he could. Well, he took it literally and we didn’t have the heart to say no. So, at 9 p.m. on a Saturday night he had fresh fried silver bass as his night time snack.