Car Ride

We headed out to the Garden State Discovery Museum on Tuesday morning. We picked up Trina and Jeremy on the way and decided to make a morning of it. Jeremy is an easy going 18 month old. (I'm so not used to that!) He's gets along with everyone and is very passive. He really likes playing with Jameson and Stellan but he stands back if they get too crazy. He's a sweet little boy and we love spending time with him and his mom. I have to wonder what he was thinking when he got in the van with my crazy boys. This was a particularly crazy day and it seemed to reach its peak during the van ride.
Jameson and Stellan typically do pretty well in the van now if they are well supplied with book and toys. They tend to prefer their books and a special toy. That day the toy of choice was their Dora and Diego magna-doodles. (They have been renamed "field journals" in honour of Diego's field journal that he carries with him on his animal rescue missions.) Jameson also had a spy scope, something else from his Diego obsession. Half way into the trip Stellan asked Jameson for his spy scope. Jameson wanted his field journal so I thought it would be a fair trade. I explained to Jameson that I would give him his field journal once he handed the spy scope to Stellan. Simple enough. But Jameson decided to be a stinker and dropped the spy scope by the door where it was impossible for me to reach. I told him that he was not getting his field journal due to that behaviour and he ended up ranting for several minutes. It got so bad that I told him to stop acting that way or we would pull over to the side of the road. He continued acting up so I merged into the right lane and warned him again. The unacceptable behaviour continued so I pulled over and stopped at the side of the road. I went to his side of the van where I proceeded to get him out of the van where we had a "talk". I told him that I would put him back in the van once he was calmed down. He quickly did and I put him in his car seat. No sooner was the buckle fastened when he started screaming again. Just as quickly I unclasped the buckle once again and pulled him out of the van. More "talk" followed and he eventually calmed down. We made it to the museum without further incident.
Now I only hope this lesson will stick. It's such a pain merging onto the highway again.

So soon?

We had Hana and Aida over for a play date today. I love having them over because it's great for my boys to play with girls for a change. Besides, I get along really well with their mom too! It was at the end of the playdate when Hana came upstairs and said, "Jameson tried to take my shirt and pants off". Uh oh. I totally didn't expect to have to talk about that yet. I realize that Jameson and Stellan do this more often than I would like but I didn't expect him to ask someone who wasn't his brother, let alone a girl *gasp*, to take off her clothes. We went downstairs where we found Jameson clad only in a pair of pants. I briefly explained to him that it wasn't nice to ask other people to take off their clothes and you shouldn't try to take anyone else's clothes off for them. He got the basic point and then apologized to Hana.
I can't believe he's 3 going on 13 already.