Fighting Children

Now that I have praised my kids (refer to end of last post about our family camp), it is time to complain about them.

Ty and Dessa have started school already, and I thought it would be a good break for mom if Annee were to walk to pick them up and they stay alone at the house until I get home from work. They did very well that first week of school, before our camp trip and I was expecting more of the same this week.

Not so much. Monday, Dessa was sick, so she stayed home and I asked mom to pick up Ty so Annee could watch Dess. That went fine.

Tuesday, I had Dessa calling me right when they got home saying how the other two were picking on her and so on. Her voice was whiny, but also squeaky, like she had a sore throat, so I told her to just rest and told Annee to leave her alone. Not a horrible day.

Then, yesterday, I get a call from Annee when they get home. Apparently, Ty was taking a long time getting to the front of the school, so she went back to see what was going on. She found Ty playing his Nintendo DS with his friend Jake. She told him to go, but he took his time, according to her, and wouldn't stop playing. So she took it upon herself to take the DS away from him.

Ok, so that was her mistake. She needs to learn to not do things like that and let me handle things later. But the bigger problem was with Tyler. When she took the DS away, he started hitting, scratching, and hurting Annee to try and get it back. She said she was bleeding on her wrist from a scratch he gave her, she thought her thumb was disconnected, and her neck hurt because he pulled at it.

They were lucky that they weren't caught by the teachers. I'm not sure what the penalty for siblings fighting on school grounds would be, and I don't want to find out!

Tyler is so obsessed with those games! I really am not sure what to do. When I ground him from them, (he won't be playing for at least the next week, more likely a month,) he gets moody and angry. I might just need to keep them away from him for a good long time. Make him find other things to entertain himself. It is just really hard when I want so badly to make the kids happy. And when I am so tired all the time that I don't spend enough time with them, I want them to be able to do what they want. But Ty's obsession has gotten out of hand.

I am actually thinking about getting rid of the internet and cable, to save my budget a little. But I really need the home phone, especially for things like this incident when the kids are home. I have looked into it, and I am not paying a whole lot more than I would for just a phone line, so it seems silly to cancel the other services to save $10-$15 a month.

So anyway, mom's little break is over. I am asking her to pick up the two little one's every day and keep them at her house. Annee only has next week before she starts school, and I will decide at that time if we go ahead with the original plan of them staying home when mom picks them up, or if mom should keep them with her. I really hate having to make these restrictions. I think it is better for the kids if they can just get along and stay home. But I can't allow them to fight like they have been. It's not good for me to get those kinds of calls at work. Luckily it is slow this week, so I have been able to use the phone a lot. But it isn't always like that.

Can't we all just get along?!