night to remember

tonight was a night we will talk about for awhile-in the same way grant and i talk about the time i had to take all the toys out of his room. not a good kind of memory but one that hopefully sticks with them long enough to help make better decisions.
it started because i found some cute shoes at a little boutique in prairie village. they were 40% off and See Kai Run has been a favorite of mine for awhile. unfortunately, the only go up to a size 9. great for anneliese, but no luck for emily and grant. i bought them anyway and let her wear them yesterday. grant and emily didn't react to much (we try and emphasize that we get shoes when we need them-and that's not always at the same time). however, grant's torn up tennis shoes did need updating and he was itching to go find some today. i REALLY didn't want to take all 3 kids to the shoe store-but after lots of tears from the girls about how they would be REALLY good and they wouldn't ask for anything, wouldn't grab boxes off the shelves and beg me for new shoes i caved. this was the beginning of the end.
i will try to be brief-
they were really doing great-and then those big piles of toys at kohl's caught emily's eye. she started asking if she could have a toy. "can i please get a toy" "i want a toy" "i really want a toy" "i really do want a toy" i told her if she asked again about a toy i would take her back home and return to the store with grant to get shoes. she did it-it was like she couldn't stop herself and then it was gushing and i had already given the ultimatum-ugh! so i drove all the kids back home and had bobby help emily out of the car.
anneliese, grant and i proceed back to the store wear he tries on every pair of tennis shoes in his size. anneliese did very well although she kept saying "you know that kiddy toy at that store where grant tried on shoes but they didn't have his size? can i get that for my birfday? when is my birfday again?"
we return home and i'm feeling kind of bad-and then bobby tells me that emily told him she had to come home because she had a 'hurt finger" OH NO! she lied. she lied repeatedly. bobby has always told the kids that if they don't tell the truth they will be sent to bed for the rest of the night. luckily by then it was already 600. so we did it-we stuck it out-i brought her dinner to her bed and she had to read books by herself. i did cry a little-and it hurt to watch grant and emily outside playing without her-but honesty is important to us. parenting is hard. really hard.

she is so big now-and i just love her so much-my little sweet pea.