A Well-Played Guilt Trip

My kids are driving me insane today. I realize it probably has to do with the "free-for-all" events that have been taking place this past week as I painted and reorganized four rooms in my home. I make no excuses for it. It's a fact. My children are making me insane. It's hard to finish organizing the contents of a room with three kids fighting with each other in one instant and in the other playing so nicely with each other it's like night and day. Then add in the constant whining or shrieking cry when one plays, insults or injures another party emotionally, physically or both. It just plays on my nerves.

Add to the mix the fact that I'm boxing up stuff as I go to donate, trying to finish Mount St. Laundry and pack for our impending trip up North on Saturday, you can see how little things tend to annoy me. When I'm in a groove, I can go full throttle all day. Interrupt my groove and well...I get really annoyed.

I was looking through the fridge today to see what fresh fruits and veggies we need to get eaten up before we leave and found the two packages of strawberries I picked up and had failed to eat. Lovely. They need to be eaten and pronto. So, I baked an angel food cake figuring I can add the strawberries to that and have a nice dessert to go along with our feast of leftovers we're having.

Maddy walks up to the kitchen and sees the cake and starts bouncing with excitment. Whoohooo! Cake! For dessert! Awesome! I let her know that dessert would depend on their behavior over the next little while and whether they all ate their dinner. John piped in that he wanted cake and he wanted it NOW! Ah, no dice little boy, but nice try.

He tried bargaining with me. He tried cajoling me. He tried sweet talking me. He tried to use his cute little face with a cute little feigned expression of love and adorableness to break me down into saying yes. I stuck true to my word and he got MAD! Stomped his foot and smacked his thigh. Mad, I tell you. He demanded cake. He screamed for cake. He tried the ultimate guilt-trip for a slice of cake. He said "Mommy, you DON'T have JESUS in your HEART!"

I seriously had to stiffle a laugh before I replied. I said "Really? Jesus isn't in my heart? Why not?" His immediate response was "Because JESUS wants you to give us cake! JESUS is not in your heart if you do not give us cake!" OH, MY! I asked him if the way he was acting showed he had Jesus in his heart. He ferverntly nodded yes. So, I clarified...."You mean, acting like this....demanding cake after acting like a naughty boy...JESUS wanted you to do all that?" "YES!" he shouted. "Yes, Jesus DOES!!!!!"

So apparently I do not have Jesus in my heart. Gotta love their Catholic Preschool instruction for that one. I guess I'll have to feed my babies some angel food cake and strawberries tonight...I wouldn't want Jesus to not have a home, after all! ;)