The Dreaded "D" Word.

Lately we have been watching the Sesame Street Alphabet video my sister and niece got Tyler for his birthday and we have been doing our alphabet flashcards.  Not that we think our 1 year old is going to recite the whole alphabet, but to expose him to the sounds and letters.  So the alphabet is fresh on my mind and well, I have decided in the past few weeks there is one word that starts with the letter "D" that I am struggling with.... And the word is........ 

DISCIPLINE

I am a teacher so I deal with discipline on a regular basis.  I am used to disciplining as needed and one thing I have always said is "If you do not follow through on discipline, it is pointless."  I see so many people (sorry if you are one of them) who says "On the count of three I am going to _____.  One, Two, Two and one quarter, Two and one half, Two and.... " and never ends up following through.  As a teacher I know that kids test their limits.  I WILL NOT be one of those who does not follow through.

However; my son Tyler is testing the waters right now. It is not as easy to discipline a one year old because you think that they do not know better.  Well, my son does.  You can see him do something and then when you correct him, he waits a minute and does it again with that mischievous little look on his face.  And let me tell you, he looks so stinkin adorable doing whatever it is that he is not supposed to be doing.

I do not mind getting on to him and correcting the behavior.  That part of discipline is not the part getting me.  The real challenge is when you do correct the behavior, he gets SO ANGRY.  I am talking about hitting, kicking, and his newest habit: head-butting. (Thank you Aunt Carrie who used to do this all the time when she was a baby- I blame you!)  

How do you correct this?  Well, with a one year old, we already have a "time out" chair.  I feel when he is this young he cannot fully grasp some sorts of discipline, but he definitely does not like the time out chair.  It was hard to determine where "time out" would be because we don't want him to hate his bed if that was time out or hate his chair in his play room.  So we chose the office.  It is a big brown leather chair right by the desk.  I can see in the future us having many "chats" here.  We make him sit there until he is done throwing his temper tantrum (which is usually only like 2 minutes tops). 



This is not a very good picture, I took it with the webcam on the laptop but it is not the clearest.



  Many people say things like "Oh, 9 months is my favorite" or "At 12 months it is so much fun!".  I would have to agree that these times are all great but I can say one thing for sure..... 14 months is not going to hit the books as my favorite time! I love my son so very much and I thank God for him daily, but this whole throwing a fit thing is getting VERY old! I can now look back and say parenting has been a breeze up until this point.  He slept through the night very early on, hardly ever cried, laughed all the time, would eat anything and everything, and the list goes on.  This is where the real challenge of parenting is starting for us.  Wish me luck! We are going to need it with this little strong willed boy!

P.S. I am sorry if you do not agree with my ways of disciplining my son, but I think every child is different and this is what is working for us at the current time.  :)  Don't judge please. :)