Ways in which I'm a strict mother - giving in

This post is dedicated to Claudia :) as promised

I'm doing my budgets (fun fun fun! - a topic for another post because of course I'm not serious) and deleting the millions of messages from my bank.

They send me a notification everytime something happens on my account.

I keep these texts and as I update my spreadsheet, I delete them from my phone.

South Africans - how do you deal with these notifications?

Anyway, I also found an old message which reminded me of something I wanted to blog about.

Incident 1

We went to that birthday party a few weeks ago and Connor saw this car in the sandbox.

A small, old car.

He was hooked on it - obviously - and when I said we need to go and to give the car back to Aunty Kirsten, he looked at me with terror and then Aunty K said, "it's okay, he can have it".

As we left (I'm strict but not stupid), I quickly distracted him and took the car, leaving it on her entrance table.

She sent me a text saying, "you really could have taken the car for Connor" and I said, "I know but he needs to learn that no is no".

Incident 2

Actually, same party!

Kendra had nibbled on two of those marshmallow in ice-cream cone sweets. I told her, "that's enough. no more".

She snuck away from me to get number 3.

I marched over to the kiddies table, removed the sweet from her hand and she started wailing.

One of the other mothers even said, "oh Mommy, it's a party".

I felt like saying, "can she come spend the evening with you then?" but I said, "she's already had two and that is enough".

Well, Kendra is a master of the dramatic and WAILED as if her heart was breaking.

I just walked back to the step I was sitting on and continued talking to whoever I was talking to.

Within about 10 seconds, she was done and had joined in the playing again.

Incident 3

The other day I was brave and took the kids to the mall by myself.

We walked into CNA (stationery shop) because I can never resist "just looking" and I purposefully walked up a "boring" aisle but somehow someone had left a lovely bright kiddies book in the midst of the boringness and Connor wanted this book.

I said to him, "no, we're not going to get the book" and he said very sweetly, "just looking" so after a bit of back and forth about how we're just looking and we're leaving the book, I handed it over (rookie mistake!) and carried on browsing.

5 minutes later I was done and said, "let's put the book back". He said, "no, Mummy, still looking" - very polite but still.

So I said, "Connor, we're leaving now, I'm not paying for the book (R84) and we need to put it back on the shelf".

WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

I think I even added, "I really don't care if the other half of the shop also hears you scream" because of course, by this point, I'm getting the glares from other people.

here's the thing - I don't give one iota about what people think in situations like this - I will not give in.

And so I wheeled the two of them all the way from CNA through the mall past the parking, into the parking lot and into their car seats.

All the while Connor going WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH at the top of his voice.

Charming.

Security guards, shoppers, other mothers were all looking but not one said a thing to me - maybe they could see I meant business?

My view is I pick my fights carefully but once I've decided, I will not give in.

Hmmm, for this one, I'm a 9 on the scale of 1 - 10.

Where are you?

PS My cell phone text inbox is finally clear - it really is a miracle!
PPS what else is there left to discuss around strictness???? :)