What do you do...

[SoupDragon]

... when your DSs (5 and 3) ar running riot round a small chemists, you've told them in no uncertain terms to stop running, to sit down and be quiet, you've threatened and begged and loudly declared to them that you've had enough and what you really want to do is give them a damn good slap on the legs and shout at them to sit down and shut the up?

Obviously I didn't tell them to shut the up, nor did I smack them. I do know that if we'd behaved like that as small children, my brothers and I certainly would have got the slap on the legs. I was (and still am) absolutely fuming!

All I wanted to do was get passport photos of me and DS1! Easy I thought...

and to cap it all, the photos are cr*p!

Can you take them in separately, then they may be more likely to be calm(?)

Did you see that programme 'Little Angels' on the BBC Tuesday night? All about sticker charts etc, might be worth a try....

its hard when other s are watchin g isnt it?
try whispering threats into their ears - an ol d teaching trick . It is supposed to remove the element of bravado and challenge from th teenager concerned so that only htey know what you ar threatening them with. In your case you can be as nasty as you like - or bribe as much as oyu like without anyone else hearing

glad its not only me this happens too dd grabbed a big box of cooks matches of the person in front load and emptied them all on the floor. Me meanwhile looking at hello on end of checkout....oops

I really told ds off yesterday aswell because there was no-one around and then when I got to the other side of the road I noticed there were some people sitting on a balcony watching me

They got the riot act when we were back in the car

Sadly I can't take them separately since it was DS1 who needed the photo. I was going to take him on Tuesday when DS2 was in nursery but the annoying child came home from school with severe hayfever eyes!

Coddy, I would have loved to have whispered dire threats in their ears if only I ever got close enough to wisper them

These incidents aren't frequent enough to warrent a sticker chart really. It's a shame because they worked so well for potty training.

Sigh. They've not had any TV this evening.

oh I'm so glad I've read this.

I've just been shouting at ds in the street (I know - BAD mummy). I decided to take them out for a quick bike ride before the bath and dd trotted back in quite nicely. Ds stamped his feet and refused to go back in the house. I knelt down and did the quite whisper in his ear and he then wacked me one at which point I totally lost it and started shouting at him (thinking no-one was watching) only to turn around and see the lady at the end of the road standing in her front garden about 10 foot away from me with a horrified look on her face.

She then proceeded to ask me questions about whether I felt I was coping now that dh has new job and is not around very much!! Ho hum (she's probably calling SS as we speak!).

soupdragon, it is very annoying in shops especially when they spur each other on and you have the added delight of onlookers all thinking you can't control your own children!

ooh hard soupy good

I seemed to spend the whole time shouting their names out followed by "just sit down!" or "Sit there and be quiet!" "Don't touch anything" "Get away from the door!". Is it any wonder the photo makes me look like a 45 yo harrassed mother of 12?

DS1 by himself is generally pretty good. Add another child and he starts showing off and getting over excited. DS2 is simply a born maniac.

I certainly can't go back to that particular chemist again - luckily it wasn't my most local one.

Foxinsock, in your situation I have been known to simply pick the stubborn child up and carry them where I want them to go. When we're behind closed doors, then they get the Stern Talking To.

yes, I normally do that as well. Thank goodness I can still pick him up. I just couldn't get him off his f'ing bike and neighbour was watching so I didn't want to manhandle him publicly (if you know what I mean).

In terms of shopping with both of mine, dd is OK (as long as she is not spurred on/showing off), ds is an absolute nightmare so I normally warn him before I go into a shop that if he doesn't listen to me, he'll get punished. It doesn't always work but at least it does sometimes.

He's at a similar age to your ds2 so I'm hoping that as he gets older he will get better (let's hope I'm not grasping at straws here!)

We went into a Mamas and Papas shop (deserted, thank heavens), and my kids (age 2 & 4) obviously thought it was a kiddy furniture theme park. DD kept pinching all the precisely placed stuffed animals off of beds and cots, and DS kept crawling under the beds and cots (I kept them off the beds, at least). They ran riot... for ages. I gave up on them ever leaving on their own.
Must admit it's one of the few occasions I bribed them out with promises of sweets! They wanted to run riot in the Boots next door, too, but threats of sweetie withdrawal kept them in line.

I conditioned ds, at home, he learned that if I caught his attention using his full name, looked him in the eye with a cold hard unimpressed stare and then when up close would hiss, behave or else.
It worked, it even got to the stage where just the stare would freeze him into goodness.
Someone once commented, how many times had I had to smakc the hell out of him to merit such a response...
The answer
never!

DS2 just smiles angelically and runs off when I use my Paddington Bear hard stare. It really doesn't help that he looks positively angelic - it just makes me look like a worse mother!

No one tells you about this before you get pregnant do they??

At the moment, I ask ds if he wants to go in his buggy (he loves walking 'free'. He says 'no', and I then threaten it if he keeps misbehaving. Then, if it doesn't stop, I start to count to three. Luckily, so far, it has always worked...

Been where you are though Soupy. I have had to pick ds up off the floor on our driveway, and manhandle him into the house, nearly dropping him head first on the paving!! I often wonder what my neighbours think of me