My Strong Willed Child

Dash-1 (aka- our first born) is such a fun, happy 2 1/2 year old.  Did I mention he's strong willed?  As in "Dear God!" strong willed.  He is absolutely the funniest combination of compliance and strong willed defiance.  He genuinely desires to please... really.  He can be the most polite 2 1/2 year old with the cutest little dimple smile.  The thing is, there's no telling when or over what topic his compliance will turn to strong willed defiance.

The past few weeks he has been issuing a steady stream of requests (always using please Mama)... only to refuse whatever the requested item was when I finally bring it to him.  The end result was this last night...

Yup.  See I wasn't expecting him to dig in and launch into a solid hour tantrum (a pathetic performance compared to last week's 3 hour tantrum)... and while I have plenty of wine in the house (which should not surprise anyone who knows Parker), none of it was chilled.  My aunt has been in town the last week visiting and well... Parker had worn her down yesterday. End result? My beautiful crystal vase was given a new role last night... ice bucket for the winos.  And what precipitated said tantrum? This...

He asked for a strawberry so I cut one up and gave it to him.  Oh no!  Now he wanted juice... and he wanted to be rocked and he wanted a hot dog... and on and on the list of demands went. And when I insisted he eat the strawberry that he had so politely requested... well, that was entirely unacceptable and so began last night's tantrum.  An hour later, the entire strawberry was consumed, half the bottle of wine was consumed and the 3 adults were sprawled all over the family room, exhausted and wondering he was going to tuck the little boy into his bed.

I love my strong willed child.