The Logic of Children

Am I the only mom who takes advantage of the fact that her kids logical reasoning skills are not fully developed? Seriously, sometimes it seems so easy to "trick" my kids into doing what I want them to do that it's scary.

Tessa is a good example. She's three, which is an age I find difficult. She often says "no" to pretty much any question that I ask her. "Tessa, are you ready to get dressed?" and "Tessa, do you need to go the the bathroom?" are regularly answered by "No." Even when I don't phrase things in the form a question, as in "OK, Tessa, it's time to get dressed" she'll say "No" and run away hiding. However, if I say (in practically the same breath) "I'll race you upstairs", she's up and running upstairs as fast as she can move. Then it's easy to get her to get dressed. As long as it's a race, I can get her to do pretty much anything (put on her shoes, go potty - the list is endless).

William is the same way. He has started asking to take what he calls "early baths". Normally his bath time is 7:45, which leads to him getting into bed around 8:00 pm. But he'll ask to take a bath soon after Tessa is done, like at 7:20 or so, and ask if he can "stay up until 8:00", like for some reason he's pulling one over on me and getting to stay up later than normal. But it's a pretty small thing that he asks and it makes him happy - as long as he's bathed and in bed around 8 pm, I don't really care what the order is, you know? But I feel a little guilty, like I should let him know that he's really not staying up any later.

Tessa I don't feel guilty about, though. Whatever gets me through the day with her is a valid parenting technique in my book. It's a good thing she's so cute (in the picture she's holding her princess music player - Bibbiddi Bobbidi Boo just never gets old).