Lesson Learned?

Lilly loves Thomas and Jackie and their kids and loves to give Thomas a hard time (he starts it usually). The other day while we were visiting she was eating animal crackers. The bag was ripped to the bottom and when she lifted it up they all started to spill out. Thomas started to say, "No no no no!!" which in turn piqued Lilly's interest and encouraged her to dump the rest of the entire bag (crumbs included) on their kitchen floor. I started laughing (which I know is totally inappropriate) because the worst thing you can do is get really loud and yell, "NO" to Lilly... Defiance kicks in and I would think by now Thomas would know this! So he told me to let him handle the discipline (fine by me) and he told her she had to clean it up with the vacuum. I told him she was very afraid of the vacuum cleaner and he told me he would handle it (they love Lilly like their own by the way). So I sat back and watched him get the vacuum and turn it on and Lilly start crying which made him feel horrible and pick her up and love on her (I was still laughing) and then make it a fun game (great discipline technique) with the wand of the vacuum. She actually liked it and started vacuuming! I couldn't believe it. Here she is in action...


She did a very good job cleaning and just yesterday when Andy was vacuuming her bedroom she asked me if she could use the wand and she vacuumed under her dresser and crib all by herself. So while I don't think she learned not to dump the animal crackers on the floor she did overcome her fear of the vacuum cleaner which is great.