The Munchkin

Oh my. I don't even know where to begin on this one.

I guess for starters, vacation has been good....we're having a good time and for the most part, having no problems.

Munchkin is loving the beach and the water and sand.....heavens, she is such a water rat!!! She is NEVER ready to get out. And is very vocal about it.

"ME NOT READY TO GO!!!!!"

For the most part, she's been very well behaved. However, I feel like we're constantly having to threaten her with the beach in order to maintain good behavior. I'm not sure we're doing the right thing with that, but it's about all we have to work with since we're not at home. Anyways, she has had a couple of really good days, but there are a few things that have just came up during this trip and I'm not sure what has triggered them to suddenly become a problem.

First it started with her calling me Mommy Faith. And she did it in a tone and with the body language that she uses when she's trying to push my buttons. Which of course I knew what she was doing, but but she's never used that to try to push my buttons before and I've never heard her call me that before either. And don't get me wrong, if a foster child feels more comfortable calling me Mommy Faith or whatever, i'm cool with that. Actually, as long as it's not a bad name, they can call me whatever they feel comfortable with.....however, it DOES bother me when she starts to call me this after months and months of calling me "mommy." At this point, I'm just mommy, don't start....particularly with that kind of tone and attitude. But, I don't let it show that it bothers me, I just calmly tell her that I'm her mommy and if she is going to have an attitude, she can go sit in time out. Anyways, after a few times over that, she hasn't said that much since.

But also about the same time as the previous started, she started giving us the finger. Now, I am aware that she's three. And I'm sure she has no idea what that means, but I do know that she knows it's something you do when you're mad at someone b/c she's proved that in the way she uses it. I also know that she's always had a tendency to use her middle finger when pointing but this is totally different from that. We've let it slide b/c we knew the pointing was innocent, but now we're correcting it.

"No, you don't use that finger. Use your first finger."

And we've also not made a huge deal about it, but it is very annoying to get the finger from a three year old. And ya'll, I am not kidding. I'm talking, she was sitting in the cart and started to get mad at us over something completely minor and then she throws up her middle finger and holds it up at us with a look of complete defiance. I mean, she didn't say a word, but that look could not have said "what are you going to do about it" any louder than if she'd SCREAMED it.

It is absolutely insane. And there's no explanation. We don't watch any movies where she'd have picked up anything like that, none of our friends are into obscene gestures such as that, and I don't have a clue other than her biological childbearing unit, where she'd get anything such as that. I know that the "mommy faith" stuff came from her, but why she suddenly started saying it to me with an attitude is beyond me.....

And all that was confusing to deal with, but then today.......

Well, that's over on the private blog. It was that bad.

I just don't get where this monster, who was our sweet little munchkin, has came from.....sheesh. I want my sweetheart back. And like I said, she's been super sweet for a LOT of the time on this trip, but these weird moments are SO not fun to deal with. *shaking head*

Anyways. We've hit two thrift stores while down here.....both were incredibly disappointing. YUCK. We've decided not to go to anymore of those......LOL. Other shopping has been productive and entertaining though.....*grin*

And then there's the beach. Ohhhh....love me some beach. Don't love the sunburn....got a lil bit of that today, but other than that......sweet.

Alrighty then....I'm ready to go to sleepytown.....

By the way, huge congratulations to Denise (aka NYNative) who had her baby.....WOOHOOO!!!

Later!