First Time Out

I did it. I put my daughter in time out. Oh my goodness that was hard. As I mentioned in my previous post Hitting... Ouch!!! Tesla has been hitting Jason and I a lot. This weekend she hit me over the head with my hair brush, not with the top of it but with the side. Hard and multiple times. But I just took the brush away and said that it hurt and didn't let her play with it anymore that day. (She likes to brush my hair... it generally hurts when she does this but I figure there's a learning curve there. My sister also used to hurt me when brushing my hair and she's 8 years older than me. Did I mention that she's turning 40???)

Okay we're getting off subject, anyway, this morning I was cleaning the floors. I was down on my hands and knees, with a bowl and sponge and Tesla kept hitting me, over and over, did I put her in time out... no. But I did finally get the nerve up to put the pack and play up for time outs. I figured that I couldn't put it up and stick her in it for something she did 10 minutes earlier, but that it was time to finally put it up and not just talk about it. It's time for ACTION!

So later, Tesla discovered that she could pull the intake grate off of the wall. The screw head must have broken  off and she started to pull the cover off, potentially hurting herself on the grate, falling in the whole and damaging the wall since one side was still attached and dry wall seems to get flimsy when it come to toddlers lately. So I said "Tesla, no." She stopped for a second, looked at me and then grabbed it again. I said, "NO, Tesla." Again she looked at me, then put her hand back on the grate and looked at me some more. I then rushed over, reaffixed the grate to the best of my abilities, and she grabbed it and yanked on it. Clearly she was going to do it no matter what. Now the grate won't go back into place without some serious attention by me, and I need Tesla to understand. So I picked her up and said "no Tesla you cannot touch the grate, you have to go in time out because you do not listen to mama." (I know she doesn't understand.) But I put her in the pack and play and oh lordy did she scream, it was one minute but you would have thought it was an eternity by the look on her face. I fixed the grate, blocked it off with a chair, and wrote a note to my husband, in case I forgot to mention it later to rescrew it into the wall. I then picked her up and kissed her and hugged her and told her how much I loved her and that she was in time out for touching the grate when Mama said No. (It's probably way to much explanation for her, but I think it's good to get in the habit.)

So we made it. We didn't die. She's okay and it really was terrible, but we're okay and we didn't die. We didn't I swear. 

Thanks to the Lazy Organizer for talking me through it too.  I'm not sure I would have tried time out yet, if it wasn't for your email.

Photos: I didn't manage to take any good pictures recently. But this one is from a year ago... back when she was only thinking about hitting me. =) What a cutie. Still is!