No birthday toys for ONE WHOLE WEEK!

Don't let this super sweet smile fool you...





Beneath the surface lurks Logan's alter ego: a completely irrational and angry little beast. Of course it's all good when everything goes according to HIS plan, but if not, better look out because he's going to unleash the beast.

So yeah. One whole day after he got them at his birthday party, Logan has already had all of his birthday toys taken away for one week. All because Adam and I had the audacity to ask him to clean up the toys, every.single.one of which was in the middle of the floor of various rooms throughout our house.

Yep. All of those.

All 4,376 of them.



They're all gone, including the Magic kit, watch and skateboards Aidan lovingly picked out at the dollar store.


This led to one of Logan's infamous meltdowns, this time about how he hates cleaning up. Here's basically how our convo went and how ridiculous Logan can be:

Logan: I ALWAYS have to clean up EVERYTHING in this house."YOU AND DADDY DON'T DO ANYTHING!" (Which he said to me while I was in the middle of putting clothes in the dryer.)

Me (calmly, it's very worth noting): Mommy and Daddy do plenty more in this house than you and Aidan do. When was the last time you had to do laundry, dust, mop the floors, clean the toilets and sinks, vacuum the upstairs carpet (we do have them vac the rug under the kitchen table), or change the sheets?

Logan (defiantly): All the time.

Me: No you don't, Logan. But we all live here and we all have to help out in some way. That's what's fair.

Logan: No it's NOT FAIR!!!!


Me: You know what?  If you don't want to clean up your own toys, then I'll do it. But if I have to clean them up, I'm taking them to someone who will treat them with more respect than you do. If you can't clean up your toys, you don't get the privilege to keep them.

Logan (with tears in his eyes): All of them? Every single one?

Me: Yep, every single one.

Logan (with an evil look in his eye now): Then I'll just punch you (as he raises up both of his fists).

!!!!!!!!!!! I wish I had my camera to capture the look and the gesture he gave me when he said that. It would have been comical, if it wasn't so wrong.

I immediately sent him to his room for timeout, but he kept talking back to me, repeatedly opening then slamming the door shut (while Lorelai was sitting right outside), and kicking the door. I gave him several warnings that if he kept talking back and didn't calm down, I'd take all of his new birthday toys away for one week. Surprise! He didn't calm down and even started throwing around words like stupid and worst birthday ever.

I got Aidan to help me gather up all of his new toys. I felt bad about that, but only because Aidan was really enjoying the new toys, too. I apologized that this ended up being sort of a punishment for him too, but that I had to do it. He said, "I know, you warned him. He should have listened." Thank goodness at least one of my children understands. Too bad it's not the one that mattered most right then...

I predict quite a few  meltdowns in the next few days every time Logan realizes he doesn't have any of his new toys to play with. Or the Lego Star Wars Wii game, that's still confiscated since the birthday meltdown.

Too bad, so sad. No tennis this week!

Killer boots, dude. They're mine until Sunday.

Oh, and to start my Monday off just right, I had to physically force Logan into his pre-K classroom this morning because he decided that he hates school and didn't want to go into that particular classroom with those particular friends and those particular teachers (the SAME ones as almost every morning!). The drop off room is usually the younger preschool classroom, even though one of his pre-K teachers and some friends are already in there. He said he didn't want to be in the "baby" classroom. If you ask me, I think he belonged just fine. UGH!

It's going to be a loooong week. But um, happy Monday?!