Milk

Last night Noah and Eli were unloading the silverware from the dishwasher and I was putting things in high cupboards away when Eli says, “Noah ate that!”

I look at Noah and he has a horrible look on his face, so whatever it was he sure didn’t like it.

“That” turns out to be a clump of the dishwashing powder left in the cup of the dishwasher. So I read the box and it says to drink water or milk if ingested, so I pour Noah a full cup of milk. He drinks about a sip and wants to be done, but I make him drink some more. Then he tries to dump it out in the sink and I told him he could just save it for dinner, and not to dump it, that’s wasting.

Then I realize I haven’t started a fire in the stove since we’ve gotten home. I leave the boys in the kitchen with instructions to finish putting the silverware away while I start the fire.

I should know better than to ever leave the room they are in. Eli runs in to the living room and says, “Noah dumped his milk out!” Noah follows and confirms the story. I tell him to sit in the “naughty” chair. He just cries and says, “I’m sorry Mama!” and doesn’t go to the chair. So he got spanked and sat on the chair. Time outs are really for me to regain composure be able to deal with my children rationally. I just can’t tolerate deliberate disobedience.

Eli and I go back in the kitchen and finish the dishes and set the table. When it’s time to eat I allow Noah to come back in and sit at the table. Before we eat we pray and usually they do a prayer from the daycare but in the last week or so they’ve started praying like I do—ad lib. So Noah prays, “Jesus, I’m sorry for dumping my milk. (pause) Okay. Okay. Amen. Mommy I told Jesus I was sorry and he said Okay!” “He sure did, but Mommy’s still angry you wasted your milk, so you don’t get any more to drink with your dinner now.”

He made a nasty face, but we blew by it and everything went well until dinner was almost over and he got thirsty. I wouldn’t budge on my stance, so Eli, the ever helpful Eli, says, “Take a bite of your mash-edd potatoes and chew it and it will be like water in your mouth.” Which is really funny considering we were having baked potatoes, and they were a little dry, but his did have butter and other fixin's, I'm not cruel! But maybe now Noah will not waste his milk or deliberately disobey me. (I sound like Mufasa from The Lion King, “Simba, you deliberately disobeyed me!")