Taking the Sass out of Sassiness

Is your child talking back to you? Thinking that it is way too early for your child to be acting this way? Wondering how to deal with a sassy 5 year old? Sorry, I don' great parenting tips for you, but I would love to hear about how you dealt with it if you have been there.

Last week, I was working like a mad woman one night. I was literally doing 3 different tasks at once: feeding baby G, cooking dinner and putting away dishes. While I was running around the kitchen and feeling pretty stressed out, I noticed that there was a pair of scissors on the kitchen counter. I nicely asked DD to please put them scissors away back to their proper place. Her reply was.... (insert drum roll here)... "Why? You are not a baby. You can do it yourself. Don't you have arms?" I nearly lost it when she said that to me. Luckily, I did not lose it. I knew I did not have the time or energy to deal with her at that moment and I also recognized that it was a teachable moment. I screamed for my husband to deal with my sassy 5 year old while continuing to feed the baby, cleaning the kitchen and cooking all at the same time.

DH came to the kitchen and sat DD down for a talk. Ok, it was more like a lecture. He explained that her mommy (me) do things for the family all of the time. Her mommy gets her dressed every morning, packs her lunch, does her laundry, cleans up after her, takes her to playdates, buys her toys, baths her, cooks for her and brushes her teeth very day. But mommy does not complain that she has so much work to do everyday, so if mommy asks you to do a small thing to help out, then you should just do it. After the lecture, DD appeared to have understood what her daddy was trying to express and apologized to me for being sassy.

I was really grateful that my husband was home to deal with the issue. I honestly don't know how single parents do it, I have a lot of respect for them to be able to do it all. Anyhow, I don't know if DD truly understood what my husband was trying to explain. I think it is hard to show and tell a child how to be a part of a family unit. A family is very much like a machine with every member of the family as a working gear. If one of the gears is not working, then it could lead to big problems later on. Even at 5 years old, we expect DD to contribute and help out with the small tasks because that's how we keep the household running smoothly.

I suspect that there will be a lot more sassiness to come. I know that I will have to stay calm and deal with it as each situation raises. I know some of my readers have older kids, so I love to hear your tips or struggles so I can better prepared myself.