Time Out Face

We posted on January 8th of this year that we thought that Lucas would be the "future king of timeout". We were joking then, but looking back, maybe there was some truth to that! Our little stinker is really testing us lately with his hitting. The thing is that he doesn't do it out of anger. Most of the time he is giggling or looking at us to see what our reaction will be. The doctor said this is all to be expected and that we should just make sure we set boundaries and teach him what is acceptable. Anyway, we've been taking him to timeout when he hits one of us or Tyson. Jeff and I can hardly keep a straight face when we sit with him in timeout. Lucas senses that there is some tension in the air and tries to make light of it by giving us the biggest fake smile you've ever seen. I'm talking about teeth clinched and eyes squinched type of fake smile. It is hilarious. After we sit with him for about a minute and talk to him about what he needs to do differently we ask him if he's sorry and to give us a high five or a kiss. If he needs to apologize to someone else we ask him to give them a high five too. I just looked up the sign for "sorry" tonight, so we'll start using that now. So far I really like timeouts - it's a time for us to step back and bring something to Lucas's attention and have a little chat about it. It's really the only time all day he sits still, so that's nice too.

I shouldn't have done this, I know, but he made me giggle while I was talking to him in timeout so I got the camera and tried to capture his new fake smile. I didn't get it, but I did get this sweet little expression...