At-ti-tude
I am a little upset with those who coined the phrase 'terrible twos.' While they rightly named this wonderful time in a child's life, they also gave false hope to parents that the period of frustration, fits and fall-outs would only last approximately one year. What they failed to divulge is that the 'terrible twos' are so much easier than the 'attitude threes' as I like to call it.The other day my three-year old son got in trouble by my husband, Mike. He was told to go into time-out for something as simple as not listening. My son walked away and stood with his back towards Mike.
(Now one thing about my son, he is very boy. Everything is Buzz Lightyear, Spiderman, Transformers, if it's a superhero he loves it. In fact, the other day I heard him introduce himself to someone with Buzz Lightyear being his middle name.)
As he stood there you could see him getting madder and madder that he got in trouble. He didn't cry, hit or yell. He did what would hurt Mike the most (in his mind at least.)
As I sat on the couch watching the whole thing unfold (staying out of it since Mike was the disciplinarian of the moment) I saw my son turn around and raise his right arm out straight and with his left hand push an imaginary button on his inner elbow. Then quick as a flash of lighting, he raised both hands with palms facing up, middle fingers bent in with the other three fully extended – Pshoo, pshoo. Unbeknown to Mike, who had his back to my son, he was shot!
Seeing the whole thing I said to my son, “Did you just shoot your daddy with a lazer?”
He quickly responded with a look of admirable annoyance – eyes squinted, grimaced mouth -- “And I shot him with TWO (holding up his fingers) webs!”
As I hid in the couch, trying to hide my uncontrollable laughter. I thought ... “This is going to be an interesting year!”