I’m not so good at disciplining Rex (3). It’s not a matter of wrong intentions, it’s more like he doesn’t care. Harrison, as a five-year-old, gets stuck in the corner on a regular basis (because he’s sassy). But now and then Rex really does have it coming.

So yesterday Harrison came upstairs crying because Rex had caused him bodily harm. I wasn’t paying much attention to Harry and kind of mumbled the standard, “Oh, I’m sorry honey blah blah blah”. Then Harrison looks me in right in the glazed over eye and says, “Well, aren’t you gonna give him a time-out?”

Snap. Oh. Right. I’m supposed to give him a time out. “Uh, sure honey,” I respond half-heartedly, trying to surface long enough to play Mommy. But Rex was downstairs and I was upstairs, I didn’t really want to…

“Rexy!” Harrison yells in a cheerful sing-song voice. “Come up and see Mommy! She’s got CANDY!”

Candy? I have candy? Wait wait wait. Is my son really using candy to lure his baby brother into a web of time-out?

“It’s so yummy, come see Mommy!”

Horror, shock, where did he learn this?

“Candy?” Rexy calls out in his chirpy three-year-old voice, “I love candy!” He bounds upstairs and into my reluctant arms.

There was so much wrong with this situation that I didn’t even know where to start parenting. I’m supposed to let Harrison LIE in order to find personal justice? I don’t think so. But then again, I wasn’t jumping out of my chair to discipline his naughty little brother and a little part of me kind of respects his forwardness.

So, Rex got a time-out and Harrison got the lecture about lying. It goes something like this.

“Harrison? Where do liars go?”
“To the Devil,” he mumbles.
“That’s right. And you can’t take Mommy or Daddy or your blankie with you to the Devil. Is that what you want?”
“No.”
“Then apologize to your brother and next time, tell the truth.”

Aren’t I a good Mommy?