"Dump Truck...Time Out!"

Parker gets the occassional time out. He may get a time out when he hits or refuses to do something we ask him to do. So, here's how time outs may go. Let's say he is hitting his dog Ellie with a drum stick. We'll give him a warning and say something like, "Parker, don't hit Ellie. You will go to time out if you do that again." Let's say he hits her again. (And, yes, he does test us...so we make sure if we make a threat to give a time out, it must be followed through!) We take the drum stick away and place him in the time out corner.

2 minutes pass by.

We always go right up to him, sit down next to him and ask him why he was placed in time out. And, he will tell us why. "Hit Ellie." We give a brief statement on why it isn't nice to hit. Then we tell him we love him and ask for a hug. Then we can go play.

So today, Parker and I were playing trucks. I had a plastic toy tractor and he had his big John Deere Dump Truck. We were rolling them around the floor and he takes his dump truck and "hits" my tractor with it. Then he says in a stern voice, "No hit tractor!!!" Takes his dump truck to the time out corner and says, "stay!" He waits for a few seconds, goes up to his dump truck and sits down by it. He says, "Dump truck hit tractor. Say Sorry!"

Hey....at least he is making the connection!
I love this precious baby boy!