Inara the Bully

Compared to other children, Jadzia has really been very easy and well behaved. She certainly has her moments that drive me nutty but she's a good kid and always has been. Inara, on the other hand, seems to be payback for the easy first one. She pinches, she hits, she throws stuff - 90% of the time laughing or happy when she does it making me think she's playing. The other 10% mostly consists of her throwing something on the ground when she gets frustrated.

Today she smacked Jadzia in the face with a wooden recorder. She laughed as she did it and was perfectly happy at the time. She was scolded, hugged Jadzia to apologize and was sent to time out while I made sure Jadzia was okay.

Later she was playing near where Anya was on the floor and started covering Anya with a blanket and pushing on her - like rough housing. She and Jadzia will chase each other around and play on the floor together so I know she didn't mean Anya any harm and Anya was perfectly fine aside from being startled by Inara. Again I let her know that she couldn't play like that and redirected her to something else that didn't involve smothering her sister.

Then still later she picked up a plastic piece that occasionally comes off the bottom of the fridge and threw it - cracking herself up. No one was in the line of fire and nothing was broken but we don't throw things in this house. Even balls are rolled while inside the house! That was when all the screws that were previously secured became loose (get it: a screw loose?). Sadly there was still a couple hours until bedtime even then!

I think she has all this energy and is also still adjusting to the no nap thing so it's like pent up over tired energy coming out in bizarre ways. Oh yeah, and she's two and is a total daddy's girl but daddy isn't here - I'm sure that's not helping either. Unfortunately I'm not sure what the best course of action is to fix it or channel it. Some days she's perfectly sweet and awesome - then days like today happen and my head starts spinning..