“Lord help the mister who comes between me and my sister”
~ Irving Berlin
Munchkin and Peanut play together very well 90% of the time. They are loving and caring. Lots of hugs and cuddles with each other. And they look out for one another.
But that remaining 10% isn’t fun.
SciFi Dad, over at Tales from the Dad Side, wrote a post entitled “Warm“. He discussed a little incident where Buddy seemed to be getting some revenge against his sister. You have to read it… it’s VERY funny!
SciFi Dad was wondering what things our kids have done for revenge. This is what I wrote:
Last weekend the girls wanted to play in the snow.
I bundled them up and sent them out to the backyard. 45 mins later, Munchkin comes in saying she’s cold and doesn’t want to play any more. Peanut is now in tears. “I have no one to play with”. I got Munchkin a sweater (she was in just a t-shirt under her coat) and bribed her with hot chocolate if she played with her sister more.
A couple minutes later, Peanut is back inside, screaming and crying, and covered in snow. I ask her what happened… “Munchkin threw snow at me!”. I ask Munchkin what happened.. “I was carrying snow and she got in my way.” (Ya, right) So I then ask her, “Did you throw on your sister so that she’d want to come inside?” And surprisingly she was honest, “yes”.
So she got what she wanted — she came inside. But she was sent to her room with no hot chocolate.
I know that the girls aren’t always going to get along but to do something vengeful like that to get what you want, isn’t going to be tolerated. (She should have been mad at me for sending her back outside, not her sister.)
There are many time when they will have to do something they don’t want to do.
There are many times when one of them doesn’t want to share.
There will be many times where they’re not going to want to play with each other.
But guess what, girls?!? You’re not going to be rude about it. And I’ve called them on that so many times already (see example above).
Here are some of the outcomes, if one is rude at the other:
Don’t want to share!
My response: “Then neither of you will play with the toy” and the toy gets taken away
Don’t want to play with you!
My response: “Okay, go play in your room by yourself then” and child is sent to their room
Throw snow in sister’s face
My response: “No hot chocolate and you can go spend some time by yourself” and off they go
Some time I wonder if I’m being too hard on them. It’s not like they disagree a lot, but c’mon…she’s your sister. Be nice!