Beach

We've been at the beach with Cathy's side of the family this week. It's been fun to see everyone. The picture is of Dalton building sand castles (thanks Jim!). This was a relaxing moment for Cathy and me. We weren't there.

Parts of the last two weeks have been anything but relaxing. Dalton has entered a sensitive phase for tantrums. He's working hard on them. He has been averaging one a day for the last couple of weeks. Unfortunately, it's been more like two a day with break days with none at all. Those double tantrum days can be pretty tough.

Yesterday, we had an early tantrum (I don't even remember what over) and then one before bed. The one before bed was over a refusal to brush teeth for the fourth day in a row. It consisted of Dalton literally screaming at the top of his lungs about how he needed to get to bed for over 90 minutes straight. Our philosophy on these things is to wait them out whenever possible. We don't always have that kind of time or patience, but how do you force a kid to brush his teeth (or let you brush his teeth) anyway?

After much drama (did I mention 90+ minutes) Dalton finally let Cathy brush his teeth and was in bed shortly after. About a half hour later, he had cheered up substantially. He left the bedroom following a very cranky Cathy exclaiming, "Guess what Dad? Mom forgot to brush her teeth."

So, he understands irony.

Why doesn't he understand that if he spends one minute brushing his teeth, we could all get to sleep an hour and a half earlier?