A tantrum-filled day

Forgive me if I'm a bit disorganized in my rambling....there have been so so so many tantrums lately and the sleep deprivation is really getting to me. Poor Baz is still cutting 4 teeth at once. I thought they must be close to through by now, but he started biting me today- ouch! He had no idea he was hurting me- apparently my knee looked like a good teether, but when I pulled away and yelped, he looked so surprised! The point of this is that boot camp is pointless if he's waking because of pain/discomfort rather than habit, so the wakings will continue.

Yesterday was just a gem of a day.....after getting up at 1,3,and 5am and up for good at 6, I was so proud of myself for getting all of us up, dressed, brushed, and packed for the day. Anya came with me to work before school and was very well behaved. I managed to drop her off on time and even pick her up early- go team!!! She wasn't the least bit tired or cranky on the way home, so I decded to stop at BJ's to pick up a new digital camera. She was happy to do so- she liked seeing all the Halloween decorations the last time we were there, so it seemed like a good idea. I loaded Baz into the stroller and let her walk and in we went. Found the camera and the memory card..checked out...no problem. THe trouble started as we waited for the clerk to bring us the items. Anya smacked Baz in the face.....I sternly warn her not to do it again or she won't get to back for an encore presetation of the halloween things. 10 seconds later, he gets smacked again, so I tell he we aren't going back into the store. Oh.my.god. I totally became that mom as she screamed and flailed around. I was kinda stuck because he was in the stroller and when I tried to pick her up, she turned into a wet fish and wiggled out of my grip in seconds. What to do? There's no way I could smack her hard enough to stop this one without doing some real damage, which wasn't an option anyway (ummmmm...don't hit your brother or I'll hit you harder? Weird logic by my figuring). So what's a mom to do?

Lucky for me, I had the middle-aged man selling home improvements to solve my woes. Rather than just give me the "I've been there and done that and it totally blows" look that the other parents gave me, he came right over and told me how his mother would toss him in a tub full of cold water to shut him up. Gee, thanks dude- that really helps me! I know he was probably just trying to be helpful, but I really didn't want to talk to anyone then- I wanted to get my screaming, wailing kid out the door and into the car. After a short stop on a bench by the food court, I finally did just pick her wiggling body up and essentially drag her out to the van. Once in the car, I could threaten to drive off without her being buckled in, which immediately settled her down. After about 2 minutes of complaining about he head hurting, the whole incident was a thing of the past and she was back to normal and happy again. WTF?????

CLearly, this was a tired toddler pushing her limits to get her way and learning that she can't. I'm fairly certain there were a couple of other episodes after that, but they're gone from my sleep-deprived brain by now. She did have another incident where she tried to write "bathroom" on the bathroom door. Of course, it came out more like annaanyaanna since those are the letters she's used to using. As a punishment, daddy went "Simpsons" on her and sentenced her to writing "BATHROOM' 20 times. SHe only made it to 10 after almost an hour, but it was really impressive how much her letters improved in that time.

This was all on Tuesday...today was much better- no hitting at all, so maybe it was worth it? I'm hoping for a better night tonight..c'mon Baz..sleep!!!