Special Treat! Special Treat!

Lily doesn't get candy very often. When she does, we call it a 'special treat' and give her one (yes, only one) jelly bean or jujube. She's thrilled, and Mom and Dad get to have the rest. It's a good deal for all.

Tonight, at my mom and dad's, Lily slid off the bed after a diaper change. Usually she wants to do one of the following:

1 - steal the remote for the ceiling fan.
2 - steal the remote for the TV
3 - steal the cordless phone

So she can "Push a button"

Her favorite sentence right now is "I want to push a button" And does she ever! Mom's buttons? Nope. She's a good kid, but she really can't resist a button. The dishwasher, the microwave, elevators, handicapped power-assist doors, the dashboard of my dad's new car, my computer, the TV, phones - you name it, if it has a button, she HAS to push it.

So when she slid off the bed, I just figured that she was stealing some kind of device with buttons. I headed out to the hall, and called after her to follow me. She streaked out of the room yelling "Special treat! Special treat!"

My mom asked what she had, at which point both of us started chasing her as neither of us had given her a "Special treat" Lily thought this was really funny, and ran faster. After we tackled her, I pried open her sticky fingers to find her so-called special treat. The turkey had stolen Tums from my dad's bedside table. Berry flavored, pink Tums. Actually they do taste pretty good - they helped me through the nasty heartburn stage of pregnancy. That aside, they were definitely NOT a special treat. Luckily, she only ate one, and since they are only calcium carbonate, they won't do her any harm. My dad has a habit of leaving the Tums in a tidy little pile on his nightstand. (Any other medication is up and out of reach - none of us even thought to make sure these were out of reach because the big bottle is locked in a cupboard.) Indy, our last dog, acquired a taste for them, and would regularly help himself to the 'special treats' that dad left out. Not sure if the Molly-dog does the same. Yet another thing to teach Lily - that she can't help herself to things, and that only Mom & Dad or Buppa & Lala can give her things to eat. Impulse control is such a hard thing to teach and must be so hard for her to learn right now.

She was fine, and we all learned a lesson. Oh, and the button? She didn't steal the phone or the remotes. Perhaps she is learning some impulse control after all.

That's my girl!