Caroline has this little chair that used to belong to P when he was a little boy. It’s a sweet little wooden chair and it spent most of her babyhood sitting in a corner of her room. A few months ago, she discovered it and has been keeping it in the living room. Sometimes I let her sit in the little chair at the coffee table and eat her lunch while she watches Charlie and Lola.
Well, the other day, she was eating lunch in her chair and I heard a crash. Somehow, she had fallen backwards in the chair, but since it’s so low to the ground, she wasn’t hurt, she was just mad. She looked at me and said, “Mama, I don’t like that chair anymore. I want you to put it up.” I told her I would, and then just kind of blew the whole thing off because that’s pretty much how I handle everything.
The little chair remained in the living room. Then about 2 days ago, she was already upset about something, because she’s 3 and that’s part of her schtick, when she noticed the chair out of the corner of her eye. She stopped in mid-tirade, looked at me and said, “I thought I TOLD you to PUT THAT CHAIR UP!”
I realized two things. One, we need to work on her attitude and two, she was serious about the chair.
It’s such a cute little chair that I didn’t want to put it away, but wasn’t sure what to do with it. So, I put it next to my desk chair in the kitchen. Then, this morning, she walked over to where I was typing at the computer to tell me something and when she turned to walk away, she tripped over the little chair and fell.
That chair had crossed her for the last time.
She stood up and kicked the chair and then, for good measure, kicked it again. Realizing this wasn’t causing the level of destruction she was looking for, she stomped her foot down hard on the seat of the little chair. At that point, P and I talked her down and pulled her away from the chair. If she knew what an obscene gesture was, I have no doubt she would have directed one in the chair’s direction as we dragged her away.
Needless to say, this house isn’t big enough for the two of them. I’m thinking the chair has to go.