Living In A State Of Perpatual Time Out

I feel like I'm at my wit's end lately. My sweet little girl has disappeared beneath a thick layer of defiant opinionated brattiness. It's been especially hard to handle with the Holidays.

For starters, she can't keep her hands of the frickin Christmas tree. I keep finding ornaments hidden around the house. Like on the bathroom floor where you step out of the shower. Or in my sheets. The ornaments left on the tree are all clumped onto three poor little branches. What hasn't already been destroyed is starting to look shabby from being played with and I'm sure won't survive the season.

Thank goodness I only unpacked half of our Holiday decorations. At least I have some stuff in the garage that's intact for the next time we decorate. Which most likely won't be next year.

Next year we're just stringing popcorn. Which will actually come in handy when she gets hungry for the millionth time in a day. She can just eat the popcorn strands. Then by the time Christmas rolls around, we won't have anything to clean up and pack away. And no broken ornaments or decorations to mourn.

Even the advent calendar had an early death. I got so sick and tired of Gabi begging all day long for just one more that last Sunday I threw the box on the floor and told her to go at it. She ate the 14th through the 25th in one go. I should've known this would happen after last year's candy cane fiasco. We hung candy canes on the tree and from that day forward my whole house was sticky. At least she was much more sly last year, taking them when we weren't looking and hiding the wrappers in her underwear drawer. She at least knew to feel guilty. This year she's just pretending we don't exist when we tell her something she doesn't want to hear and being naughty right in front of us.

I have half a mind to tell her that Santa Claus is real after all, and he's watching her every move. Maybe the fear of losing Santa's gifts would keep her in line. She certainly doesn't care that I'M watching.

She's in time outs so often that I think it's time to move on to confiscating toys. Like the new life sized Barbie that her Godfather gave to her. She drags that thing around the house, bumping into things and knocking stuff over. Insisting that it come with us whenever we go somewhere. We have a rule that it stays in the house, and we've stuck to it, but that means more often than not we're dragging a kicking and screaming kid to the car. Oh, and she calls it her big sister. So as she's being dragged to the car, she's screaming, "I just want to bring my big sister! She's your daughter too! You can't leave her or she'll be all alone! She's only six and can't be left alone!" The neighbors must be wondering if we're hiding a child in the house. I'd be so happy to see that doll go!

To top it all off, Gabi recently learned how to shoot rubber bands. We don't even have any rubber bands in the house! But somehow she's managed to find one whenever she feels like freaking me out. I have a really weird fear of rubber bands, and she thinks it's funny to watch me become hysterical, hands waving wildly in front of my face to protect my eyes as I try to wrestle the rubber band away from her.

I have a sneaking suspicion it was Gilberto who taught her, but he won't admit it. Not now that he sees my sanity slowly slipping away.

Four was so good for a while. She's outgrowing all the clothes that were too long for her just a month ago, so this could just be a stage, right? Please please please tell me this is just a stage.

And, um, Happy Holidays! I hope your tree is fairing better than ours!