Parenting

Yesterday Ty was 35 minutes late coming home from fishing in a neighborhood pond. I was annoyed, but I tried to be calm instead of angry. So I said, "What do you think your consequence should be?" and he said, "No fishing for the rest of the week." and I said, "No fishing for the rest of the week." 

No voices were raised, no temper tantrums were had, no negativity. Just a choice and a meaningful consequence (because I had to stop him from going fishing by way of a neighbor's backyard at 8am the other morning...crazy about the fish, that one is).

I'm not known for being calm or making good decisions in the heat of the moment, necessarily. I try not to yell at my kids, but usually that just means I'm bottling up the yelling instead of making an altogether different and more productive choice. But this fishing consequence? My single shining moment this year. I'm not proud of it, I'm learning from it. A ton. 

Our kids are so much smarter than we give them credit for.