Granted, Amy is only eight-years old, but there are times when I feel dread for the upcoming teen years. Last night, for example, she was in a contrary mood. She had a writing assignment at school that is due every Monday. For a couple of weeks, she/we would forget about it until Sunday night and it was a rush to get it done. So I/we decided that instead of waiting until the last minute, the paper would be written on Tuesday night. It was a relatively non-busy day and would give her plenty of time to get the paper written.
To her credit, she did do her writing on Tuesday this week, but the story was just not flowing well and she needed to do some fixing. She was upset then because it was hand-written and she didn't want to write it again. (I have to remember that a half page of writing to a second grader is a lot of work.) So Wednesday night was busy with Activity Days; the next logical day to write the story was Thursday. It was rather busy with piano lessons, but she still had time. My argument to her was that we're usually busy doing stuff as a family on Friday and Saturday, so if it wasn't done Thursday night, it wouldn't get done until Sunday. (I'd rather she didn't do it then.)
Well, she threw a great fit, complained that she couldn't come up with any ideas even though I was trying to give her some, and ended up in her room. She had to have the paper done before dinner. Chris came upstairs from work and asked what all the kafuffle was about. I explained and he went up to talk with Amy. They worked things out and he gave her an idea to write about. But what I noticed was that she was very effectively ignoring me and very pointedly asking only her dad questions when she came back downstairs. I'm sure I must have caused my parents stress as a teenager (and maybe still do), but I am not looking forward to even greater battles with my hormonal daughters.
