Early to bed....

Early to bed, early to.... well, nope.... just early to bed. That was the theme of Meagan's night tonight. Poor girl just can't seem to figure out that when I say no backtalk, I mean it. To spare you the painful details of trying to get her to cooperate during clean-up time, we'll skip to the part where I warned her that if she talked back to me again she would go to bed for the rest of the night... and then she talked back again.... and then I sent her to bed. It was 7:00, so, by all means, it was definitely close enough to bedtime that this was not cruel and unusual punishment. She was tired. She was not listening. She had been warned. She got exactly what I warned her she would get.

It was a long night of putting her back in bed and listening to her cry, scream, yell, and even beg. She tried everything... she even tried to "I'm sooorrrryyy" her way out of it. I simply told her, "Thank you for saying sorry. I accept your apology. Now go back to bed." Not the result she was hoping for, I'm pretty sure.

At last, by about 9:00, she finally gave in & stayed in bed, and she is now sound asleep. I wonder if she will believe me the next time I tell her she will have a consequence for her sassy behavior. If not, I guess she'll be going to bed early a few more times until the lesson sets in.