Asher Makes Me Laugh

Okay, I have to explain the picture above. This was taken this past summer, and the clothes that they are wearing are Amalia's. They were brand new, the boys found them, and of their own volition, insisted they put them on. They were really excited to wear them. Asher could pull of being at girl, but Hyrum is definitely a boy, even in girl clothes.

Since Hyrum and Asher are so close in age, they are best friends, having always had each other. Constant companions and playmates.

"Asher makes me laugh."

This is what Hyrum told me yesterday. He had asked me to hold him (he's going through kind of a cuddly stage right now), so he sat on my lap. Asher was at the kitchen table, eating from a very large bowl of popcorn. Amalia in her high chair, also eating popcorn. Hyrum started laughing to himself.

"Asher's funny, he makes me laugh."

He continued to chuckle to himself. I can only imagine what images he had of Asher in his head that made him laugh. Asher dancing around, like a court jester, singing gibberish? Asher jumping from one couch to another? Asher doing something silly like putting underwear on his head?

Asher is the family clown (I hope every family is fortunate enough to have one of these). It's often easy to get frustrated with his antics. For example. Last night. Aunt Michelle, cousins MacKenzie and Kyle were over to play. Michelle and I sat in the living room, chatting. After about 20 minutes of virtually uninterrupted conversation, I went into our toy room where the kids had been playing only to find the contents of that same bowl of popcorn (from the previous account), strewn about the entire room. Popcorn on top of the toy box, the bowl overturned, kernels and popcorn everywhere. At the same time, I heard Michelle asking one of the kids: "Who spilled this water all over the floor?" (Answer: Asher). As I clean up the popcorn explosion, I pause to check on the kids who are now in the living room. Pine cones litter the living room rug. The culprit? Everyone agrees: Asher. At this point I'm convinced there is a need for some intervention. Oh, how I would have liked to swat his little bum. But with Asher, spanking does not work AT ALL. You must talk to him, and although you often wonder if anything sinks into that sometimes absent mind of his, it's the best we can do.

I picked him up, put him at the top of our dark stairs, told him he was in time out because he had ___, ____, and ____ and set the timer for 5 minutes. Sure I had to keep shoeing him back into "time out," but he did stay for the 5 minutes. At the end of the 5 minutes, I put him three stairs above me, so we could look eye to eye (we make our kids do this when we are talking to them, especially in matters of discipline).

"Asher," I said, "What did you do that was naughty?"

No hesitation. "I dumped the popcorn evwee whare."

"What else?"

"I was thwoing the pinecones."

"What else?"

I had to prod him along with this last one, but it finally came out:

"I spilled wata on the floor."

"Yes, that was naughty, wasn't it?"

"Yes." He nodded, his elf-like grin spread across his face, wisps of his blond hair nearly covering his eyes.

"Are you going to do that again?"

"No." He said, and I think he believed himself. Now you and I know, he's going to do something "naughty" again. But that's not the point, hopefully, this is one baby step, one of the many thousands of small teaching moments that I have as a mother, where hopefully I'm not messing it up too bad.