Life with Kids and Traveling with them too!

We’ve all heard about or experienced the dreaded terrible two’s right?  We were fortunate with my daughter that the terrible two’s never came.  We waited anxiously when the three’s came expecting them to rear their ugly head……fortunately, they didn’t.  We internally thought, ”thank goodness” as we witnessed other 2 and 3 years old stamping their feet with red faces and screaming in defiance, as their parents looked helpless feeling defeated trying any means to get them to stop.   Yes, our daughter was very easy during those toddler years.  We were fortunate, we know.  However we weren’t let off that hook that easy.  Our son is definitely making up for our daughter’s lack of defiance.  At only 14 months old, my husband and I often look at eachother baffled that at this age he has no problem letting the world know when he is not happy.  It’s suprising, because as an infant he was very calm and mellow.  I think now that all those times we were gazing into eachother’s eyes he was trying to tell me, ”Just you wait mommy…..”.  This may come to a surprise to many of our friends.  In fact, they probably don’t believe me.  We’ve had many play and lunch dates and he has been a happy go-lucky 1 year old.  Yes, he saves his “vibrant, spirited, determined” little self for us at home.  While we’ve never had to deal with these little outbursts of tantrums with our daughter, this is all very new to us.  To see our son go from his charming, happy self to an episode from the exorcist, all in an instant, is well, shocking!  I never knew his little body could be so flexible during those times of frustration, but, he has a backbend like I’ve never seen before!  I definitely know the helplessness feeling now.  Yes, I’ve read the books, I know the distraction technique,  time out, etc. etc.  But, usually, my husband and I just stop and watch in fascination with it all.  We usually look at one another and than very quickly say, “he got this from you!”  Then we burst out laughing, because well, its probably the only thing from preventing us from breaking out into tears……and that typically changes the mood because my son will stop baffled at our reaction.  Afterall, that’s why our children act defiantly, for our reaction, right?  Yesterday I had the pleasure of experiencing a little “outburst” alone.  I didn’t have my husband to help feed off of and I would have felt downright silly laughing to myself….so I did try somewhat of a distraction technique.  Although, I must admit, at the time I didn’t think of it as a distraction technique. Instead I thought, “I am going to take pictures for his scrap book, so that when he gets older, he can see how silly he used to be.”  At first he ignored me as I clicked away, and then he stopped, interested.  Then his frown turned upside down instantly as it became a game!  I then had my happy, go-lucky, baby boy back.  The only problem is, now I have to take my camera with me eveywhere! :0)  For all you mommys and daddys dealing with toddlers, hang in there.  If anything, remind yourself You Are Not Alone in this adventure!  And then break out the camera too!  For your viewing pleasure, a few pics from this experience……