An incident

An incident, not to be confused with an accident happened at our house the other day. Small in scope, but you know how things snowball with a house full of boys.

A loaf of bread was laying open on the counter. With about six pieces stacked up on the counter beside the open bag. Next to that was a lone heel with one bite out of it.

I called all of the boys in the kitchen and asked who left the bread out. I had my suspect as I know who always asks for the heel, which is the same boy who was the last one in the kitchen finishing his lunch. But I believe in not accusing without proof.

No one 'fessed up.
"I didn't do it."
"It wasn't me."
"I didn't do it."

Tim said they would all be spanked if someone didn't admit to doing it. Then they all started accusing each other. I stopped that-again I believe there must be proof before accusations.

A round of spanking.
"I didn't do it."
"It wasn't me.
"I didn't do it."

Another round of spanking. Same answers. Fine. "You're all grounded until someone admits to it. No TV, movies, computer, Wii, candy or cookies. Don't ask!" I thought for sure that would bring on a confession. No. The offender was standing firm in his lie. Now I'm beginning to doubt my initial suspect, he seems so genuine.

My boys are a lot alike but so very different. They all handled the grounding in different ways.

There's Eli who is a rule follower and wouldn't let anyone forget that they weren't supposed to get dessert (which I didn't ground them from but in his mind was the same as candy and cookies, so I ran with it) or even watch Tim play Wii.

Then there's Noah who, by dinner (with stale bread), was tired of not being able to watch TV at all and decided to "just say" it was him so he could go watch TV. I was waiting on one of them to take that approach so I voided that idea.

Last is Simon. He takes punishment as a violation to his soul, but yet abides. Tim and I were in the family room playing Wii and Simon came in so I could help him snap his pants. He walked in with his hands over his eyes so he couldn't see the TV, and then walked out of the room backwards so he wouldn't see the TV.

By the next day they all understood what being grounded meant and didn't like it. However that didn't stop someone from making a mess of one of the stale pieces of bread all over the floor. This time around, Noah confessed he told Simon to do it. Noah cleaned up the bread mess and further admitted he was the offending party who left all of the bread out in the first place.

Just as I suspected.

Much ado about nothing much if you ask me. But when you draw a line in the sand as a parent, you have to stand by it.