Well, at least we are trying not to. A few weeks ago I decided that there was way too much yelling
(and screaming and exploding sounds) going on in our house and in a moment of desperation I whipped out this lovely little chart...
Everyone started out with 10 smiley faces. Anytime you yelled, one of your smiley faces got crossed off. However many smiley faces were left at the end of the week (Sunday was going to be the day of reckoning), that's how many "special treats" you would get. I thought it was pure genius. Well it wasn't...at least not at first. Within minutes Marian was down 3 smiley faces and by the end of the first day Jack was down 4. Things did get better over the next few days but by Sunday afternoon the totals looked like this:
Chad: 10 smiley faces
He's not much of a yeller and let's be honest, he's not around enough to lose any smiley faces anyway
Mary: Just a few less than 10 smiley Faces
Jack: ZERO smiley faces
Marian: ZERO smiley faces
Blast! It appeared that my experiment had not worked. I had bought ingredients to make
"Wicked Good Marshmallow Brownies"
But I told Chad that since the kids weren't going to get any I thought I should make graham cracker treats or something little like that instead. "Oh No!" Chad said. "Just make the brownies, don't say anything about it and then when they are done and the kids ask for them just say, sure...how many smiley faces do you have left." I was a little hesitant thinking of all the drama that would ensue, but I also knew that Chad was right. So...I made the brownies. Jack and Marian even helped.
Then the brownies were done.
"Okay I'm ready for my brownies" -Jack
"I want some too" -Marian
"Sure! Go check the smiley chart to see how many you get to have" -Me
LOOKS OF SHOCK and HORROR-Jack and Marian
There was MAJOR weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth as Chad ate his 10 smiley face proportion of "Wicked Good Marshmallow Brownies" and I washed down my 10ish smiley face proportion with milk. Jack was beside himself with grief. He kept saying he didn't think we were going to make brownies! He thought the treat was going to be cookies!!!! (apparently cookies would have been less awesome). I tried to basically ignore the drama until Chad told me to go see what Jack was doing. Expecting to see Jack devouring brownies out of the pan as fast as he could I was pleasantly surprised to find him creating this...
Translation: Pughs don't yell
Dad
Mom
Jack
Marian
All with 10 fresh smiley (some cyclops thrown in for good measure) faces!
So we went for round two! In the car that night Chad asked the kids how many brownies they thought they could earn during the week
"10"-Jack
the optimist
"Probably 6 or 7"-Marian
the realist
