Just breathe

So I take the kids to the "red ball" store because Aidan needed new shoes. Mia was just not that impressed with the red ball out front. I'm thinking she got an overdose of red while in China and just isn't that impressed with anything that is that hue even if it is a big ball a little kid can sit on. Obviously she is not a modern art fan. Things went well only as long as I was able to push those fishy crackers in her mouth. But when I was out, she turned into what would be best described as a hostile hydra in a sack - in this case, the Baby Bjorn. It is red, perhaps the problem. I'm starting to think Mia sees red like a bull sees red and half the time I feel like I'm running in Pamploma. Most probably need to get her a bunch of calming lavender stuff. So, the timing of the cracker deficiency was right when we had darn near all the shoes off the rack and on the floor with my four-year-old saying he needed help with the shoes. Over and over. All in all, not a good situation. So, I ask Mia for her help. "Mia, what mommy needs here is your cooperation. Do you want Aidan to have to walk to school barefoot like I did when I was a kid? In the winter?". Doesn't work. The four year-old continues to ask for help in his usual manner, "mommy, mommy, mommy" which is slightly better than how he engages his father, "daddy, Robert!, Robert!," as Aidan has discovered what Robert responds to the quickest. So, while he is mommying me, he also pulls on me for emphasis. I decide to take control of the situation and set him straight so I tell him, "son, this is how the process works. You say "mommy". You then shut your mouth and take a breath. A long one. I will then say "what" at which point you "open your mouth and tell me what it is that you want to tell me." As the hydra continues to wiggle and kick, I suggests he immediately applies the lesson to our communications. And then I heard the laughing from the other side of the shoe aisle. I picked up a shoe and lobbed it over the rack. Okay, not really but I did try to put my boxes back on hard enough to cause those on the other side to fall off. Wasn't successful. We did find where they kept the fishie crackers though.