Wednesday, October 12, 2011

I Completely Blame Chopper

So it's "V" week in the Whittacre household and I decided I wanted to do the science-experiment-volcano thing.  So on Monday, Megan and I make the play dough.  Well, I make the play dough.  Megan dumps ingredients in the pot and Abby eats some when it's all done and promptly bursts into tears because despite being edible -- it's really gross.

Anyway, then I build the volcano form around an empty soda bottle and leave it to dry.  And the rest of our day goes something like this:

Megan -- "mommy take the play dough off the bottle."
Me -- "we have to let it dry before we paint the volcano"
Megan -- "but we need to take it off."

Then she refuses to go in the dining room where the volcano is and asks me to put it in a closet.  At this point I'm starting to think there's a fear issue and then it dawns on me.  Chopper (my darling, YouTube loving husband) has shown her countless videos of volcanoes erupting.  And told her about lava.  And how dangerous and hot it is.  And this is the girl who runs across the kitchen when I open the oven door (unlike Abby who gets closer to see what's inside).

Ding ding ding!
So I explain to Megan that this is a PRETEND volcano and that it will be full of BUBBLES.

No go.  Monday night she has a nightmare where a shaking volcano laughed at her (that's what she said, I swear) and doesn't go back to sleep for THREE HOURS!  We talked some more.

Regardless, when we set the thing off today for playgroup, I was in the dining room surrounded by excited toddlers and Megan was in the living room staying as far away as possible.

I blame Chopper absolutely.  And I worry.  This girl has so much fear about so many things.  And she's angry all the time and so easily frustrated.  I just don't understand what's in her head.  Or how to help her feel better. Hopefully someday I'll figure it out.

1 comment:

Alicia said...

Oh dear. It is a good thing she doesn't hang out at our house or she would be full of fears...we talk too candidly about all medicine things sometimes. I'm sorry it wasn't a smash hit!