Got scolded today

Ms. Yvonne asked Ivan four times today to stop peeling the paint of the walls. He disobeyed. She scolded him. He got time out.

But then Ivan gave them the slowmotion quivering lip, followed by a "protest" (laying flat on the floor). Ms. Yvonne said Ms. Azeb couldn't take it and had to hug him.

Ms. Yvonne told Andy all of this, who told me.

This was the first time that they saw the lip and the protest. We know, the lip is especially hard to resist. One just has to hug him.

I'm sure that of all the kids, they never expected Ivan to give them trouble and disobey them. The lip definitely disarmed them.

It's funny this happened. Over the last few weeks Andy and I have been discussing the need to start disciplining Ivan. My strategy for doing so it to say "no," accompanied by the pointed finger. But as Andy remarked, "no" should be used sparingly for chosen occasions, so not to dilute its meaning.

Most of the time, it's hard to scold him because whatever he's doing is really funny and I have to try hard not to burst out laughing. This is especially true when I try to stop him from doing something or try to take something out of his hands and starts yelling these quick high-pitched "nos" as he's trying to run away from me. It's too funny. I just want to pick him up and squeeze him, not scold him.

He's also learned to give me this disarming, twinkly look, that just makes me want to giggle.

I've also tried the "stop doing that. If I come over, I'll...[fill in the blank] take it out of your mouth, etc." It doesn't really work. Instead he tries to test the waters and limits, to see how far he can push something. For example, I tell him not to put a wire in his teeth (or mouth) and I can tell he does it on purpose, looking at me daringly, as if what are you going to do. So I go to him. He takes the wire out of his mouth, only to put it back in as soon as I return to my original place.

And for temper tantrums, including the floor protests, we do our best to ignore them. I only intervene if the protest is happening in a spot where I don't think he should be laying in, such as the cold porch floor, or the disgusting obgyn's office.

This weekend, Daria and I were discussing discipline options. Then the following day, Jo talked about disciplining Seger. I guess this is the age when this starts.

Daria told me that she heard through the (Russian) grape wine that one of the mom's has a policy of never saying no to her child (and the nanny has to obey.) Instead she tries to redirect the child toward doing something that's allowed and positive, without ever explicitly telling the child no for the negative action the child did (such as running away from the playground down a trail).

Daria and I pondered whether that tactic could work. We were not so sure. We agreed that we think it depends on an individual child's temperament.

Apparently, the culture of not saying no is how Japanese parents raise their children. The theory is, according to Daria, that if parents constantly tell a child no that then the child will never feel confident enough to try things and be daring. Except I don't think that one can compare American culture where our kids will grow up in with the homogeneous Japanese culture where the culture itself puts on various breaks on children, indirectly forcing them to fit in and obey the wider society and elders. There is nothing comparable to that in this crazy everything goes society. So I find parental controls a bit more necessary.

(Well, I was definitely told no all the time as a kid, and who knows maybe I'm not as daring as I could've been, maybe I'm too malleable to authority, and maybe I'm just a chicken overall as a result of this. Who knows?)

Then the following day at the playground, completely unrelated to Daria and my conversation from the evening before, Jo said that she's been trying the 123 rule with Seger. If she can't get him to do something (like get ready to leave the house), she tells him she'll count 1 2 3. If he doesn't obey by 3 that then the window of opportunity for doing whatever was at stake has passed. Apparently by now, Seger asks her if she will count. Again, she doesn't the word no.

Apparently, some parenting book about the 123 principle exists, as Melissa from work told me, but Jo had no clue about it when I mentioned it.

Daria has been using the time out approach with Bella, who is a bit more wild than Ivan. She picked up the technique from the Super Nanny show. A child gets put in a time out for as many minutes as his age. So the two year-old Bella has to sit still for two minutes on a bench in their foyer. When she gets up, Daria puts her back repeatedly, until the two minutes are up. And when the time out time is done, she gets to her eye level, explains to her why she was put in time out, then hugs her to reconcile and that's it.

I remember this technique from the Super Nanny as well, but not in so much detail. But next time Ivan's naughty, I'll try it, especially, since he got his first time out in daycare.

Except I know that the quivering lip will get me. It always does.