Tuesday, October 30, 2007

The no TV week

Last Tuesday after I put the girls to bed, I was up decorating cookies while Roger was securing birthday gifts. It's not uncommon in our house for the girls play in their room before they settle down for the night. Last Tuesday was no exception. I could hear them playing and didn't think anything of it until Avery starting crying and was coming downstairs to tell me something. I met her in the stairwell and saw that she was covered in white stuff. That's never, ever a good thing. I went upstairs with her and there was white stuff everywhere. Said white stuff was my expensive face lotion. I was furious. I continued to investigate and saw that lotion was all over Avery's bed frame and the carpet near her bed. I looked in the bathroom and there was RED stuff all over. I couldn't believe what I was seeing. I was so furious that I removed myself from the situation. I left them upstairs until Roger came home. Apparently they found a couple of tubes of lipstick and thought it would be fun to paint everything in sight, including themselves. Then realizing that they weren't supposed to be doing that, they tried to clean up with my lotion. They were also using a towel that is now permanently covered in red lipstick. I hate, and I mean HATE, things like that. I know they know better and it infuriates me. We thought it was appropriate that they lose TV privileges for a week. It actually didn't punish me as much as I thought it might. I will be the first to admit that my girls watch way too much TV. I think I'm just nervous that I won't know what to do with them when the TV is off. But I think we did just fine this past week. Here are some pictures of things we did.
We played with play doh. Those are snowmen because we are excited for snow. Have you ever tried to make stick arms out of play doh? It's not that easy, that's why my snowman looks like a penguin.

We carved pumpkins. Roger was working late so he missed out! Avery didn't want me to carve hers, she opted for coloring on it instead!

And we made more cookies for school. What's Halloween at school without sugar cookies?

Overall it wasn't too bad of a week. I learned that we are capable of entertaining each other without the TV. I will now make a renewed effort to reduce how much we watch!

5 comments:

Nancy Clark said...

What, no pictures of the lipstick and lotion?! I'm not sure if I should have read this today. My TV has been on so much this last week, I'm surprised it still works. Actually, I guess it's good I read this, because now I'm inspired to do a bit more with the kiddos. :)

Nancy Sabina said...

You are brave Chels. I also let my kids watch way too much TV. I recently cut back on Asher's TV time - but Naomi is totally addicted. Watching TV is really her favorite thing in the world I think. Of course, I know that doesn't mean I should let her do it all the time. And really, she's happier when she doesn't watch too much TV in the long run. But it sure is hard to turn it off and take that slightly bigger step of getting out some supervision-required toy.
Anyway - there's my rant on TV. Congrats to you for breaking the cycle.

Brittany said...

What is it with lipstick? My children have been doing pretty much the same thing. The other night Grace and Sarah were in the bathroom, Grace then told us that Sarah made a huge mess. We go in there and there is pink toothpaste all over the sink and counter, yeah sure it was Sarah. There was also bath salts all over the floor. Then the next night Grace slept over at Ramona's, got into the lipstick, wrote on the walls and on her stomach! I too was infuriated. I think I just yelled though instead of doing something constructive like taking something away. What really got to me was that she lied to me about both of these situations. Anyway, sorry for the long comment! But I feel your pain!

Anonymous said...

I am glad that I am not the only one who lets me kids watch too much TV. You are an inspiration :0) I have tried to stop and Noah just throws fits guess that means he really watches too much huh? BTW I am going to post on how to make the wipe cases they are fun and easy and way cute!

-kim said...

chelsea...i was trying to think of a good arrested development comment like, "so that's why you don't yell in the car..." but i couldn't come up with one....don't you think experiences like these just make the best journal entries....a story that the girls will want you to tell them over and over again when they are older....alright, enough with the glad game for today...