Wednesday, June 1, 2005
Just now, as I was putting Alesia to bed she said, “I want candy.” I said “Nope, it’s time to sleep.”
“I want candy,” she repeated, pouting.
I said “Nope. You had an ice cream cone earlier, that’s all the sweets you need tonight.” She kept pouting.
I said, “If you eat candy all the time, your teeth will rot and drop out. And you’ll be really fat. You’ll be a big fat toothless girl.”
“No. I won’t never be fat.”
“Yep, if you eat candy all the time you will be,” I repeated.
She kept pouting.
“I eat candy in Russia and I not fat.”
“Well, in Russia you didn’t get vitamins or good food, either.”
After a short lecture about candy having no nutritional value, and a repeated warning about being fat and toothless, I let it go.
Just before dinner tonight she had pouted because I insisted she said Yes M’am instead of “Yeah.” I explained it’s about respect, and I expect her to say it. More pouting.
When I got home and gave her 2 new Leap Pad games, she was irritated that she already had one of them, even after I said we’d exchange it for another one.
I finally said to her tonight, “Alesia, you’re getting spoiled and I don’t like that. You’re not going to eat candy any time you want it. You won’t get a bicycle just because you demand it right now. I am not made of money. You’ll get things when I can afford them. That’s life.”
As Mom said, she thinks we are very rich, and she doesn’t understand we have monetary limits. After I finish paying off the move and the adoption there will be little, if anything, left over. I have a feeling I am going to be in debt for a long time.
A funny observation: in Russia, like Europe, drinks never have ice in them. Alesia has now gotten so used to America she fills her glass up with ice whenever she drinks water or the occasional soda. Sometimes there’s very little liquid, just a lot of ice.
She was irritated the other day when we got Granny a cell phone and not her. She is totally an American adolescent now…
