You know you're scolding your child too much when........

One morning, as soon as she woke up, my girl said to me.....

My Girl: Mummy, sorry.

MG: Why are you sorry?

My Girl: Because its Christmas and we play with so many things under the tree and then I dream we eat ice-cream.

MG: But why are you sorry?

My Girl: Because I dropped the ice-cream.

MG: Oh. You don't have to be sorry. Its just a dream.

My Girl: No... Sorry!

Oh dearie me. I think I must have been yelling at my girl too often. She even wants to say sorry to me because she dropped her ice-cream in her dream! These days she says sorry for a lot of things. "Sorry mummy, just now I didn't eat my food". "Sorry, just now I messed up the place." are some examples. I must really stop yelling at her and start explaining things to her nicely.

I really have been raising my voice at the kids too much. "Don't do/touch/mess up/tear/go there/spill/play with your food ........." "Don't fight/snatch/bully/scream/jump around like that ....." Blah blah blah. You can hear me at it all day. I even SHOUT out "Don't SHOUT/SCREAM!" to the kids. (Talk about teaching by example. *Rolls eyes*) Last evening at dinner, hubby asked me "How come you don't have very much patience with the kids?"

MG's mantra for the day: "I shall not YELL. I shall not SHOUT. I shall not YELL. I shall not SHOUT."