One child families please don't click

[SylvanianFamily]

.... 'cos I'm going to break ettiquette and observe: it's so easy and peaceful when only one sprog is home.

My 'problem child' 'king of the tantrums' 4 year old spend an hour quietly sticking and drawing this morning (an hour!), then went out in a civilized fashion for a mature lunch with his Dad, then spent over an hour playing an educational and improving game on my ipod, and now is eating a yoghurt and drinking a glass of milk while browsing a nature book.

This, this , is what I thought parenting would be like. No screaming, no damage to property, acitvities lasting a resonable duration without tantrums, nice and improving outings, time for independednt interests.

Don't get me wrong, I miss the other two buggers like crazy, but suddenly I don't feel like such an inadequate mum (to half feral children) compared to all the well-behaved quiet one-tuplets that we know.

yup, I know exactly what you mean!!!

Although I had 36 hours with only DC3 (also my most problematic child). And although he didn't have a single strop and was quite cheerful, he also never stopped TALKING. He wanted all my attention constantly. I couldn't even persuade him to watch TV. Was quite relieved when his siblings returned to wind up play with.

My DS talked without stopping for two hours on the drive home from my mums (before dropping off to sleep in exhaustion).

I feel a little guilty, tbh. He's in speech therapy for speech delay. It was quite noticeable that he was taking more time to speak and enunciating more complicated sentences when he wasn't being interupted by his sibs.

Yeah, same here re speech problems!! 85% of what DS says is so... convoluted and far removed from normal English, I'm only human, I need a break.

Ha ha ha ha ha Its bliss just having 1 wth you :p especially after the 6 week hols and you have had to drag the whole brood with you everywhere :p