None of Us Really Know how to Save the Ornaments

Today I found myself disciplining my child over hoarding Christmas ornaments.

While I was cooking us lunch she decided that she wanted Minnie, C-3PO and a few other decorations to join her collection of toys. I, being the observant father that I am, didn't find out until I was picking up her purses and putting them back on their hangers, hours after lunch. I noticed Minnie, sitting in a pile of blocks, no longer with her hook, no longer on her branch.

As I found the other 10 or so ornaments she had hidden away, my daughter came into view. I pulled her up close to me and I pointed at her stash and said, "Baby, these are for decoration only. No touching."

To which she responded with her characteristic, "No touch, no touch."

So I put all the hooks back on the ornaments and turned back around to the tree to put them back on their branch pedestals just to see her casually removing my UCF candy cane with a mischievous grin.

Now I have a conundrum facing me. Do I applaud her choice of ornament or spank her for obvious insubordination? I mean some of these things are glass and we've already lost half a dozen to my clumsiness...I decided to go halfway and placed the black and gold plastic candy cane back on the tree and told her again, "No touch. Not for Emma."

I sat down on the couch and turned on a Christmas episode of Mickey Mouse Clubhouse I've already seen twenty times this week but she has infinite patience for. And wouldn't you know it, she's at the tree, grabbing down Winnie the Pooh and Friends.

So I take the ornament away from her, place it back on the tree and spank her hand lightly. "Emma, no touch."

Now, I don't know if you have children. I don't know what kind of children you do, will or would want to have. But my child is going to compete for an Oscar.

She opened up that mouth as far as it could go, squinted those baby blues and let out a soundless yell before beginning to choke out a wave of tears that would break your heart if you weren't laughing at the silliness of  the situation. She's obviously not hurt, she's just so sensitive to me raising my voice or being displeased that she can't contain the tears...

But she also really wants to play with the Christmas Tree and my opinion on the subject doesn't matter.

So here I am, holding my sobbing, calculatingly manipulative little girl, thinking--not for the first time, not for the last time--about what kind of parent I want to be.

We all ask ourselves these questions of personal philosophy and morality (about parenting and life in general) and I think we all fall somewhere on the line of "disciplined, but cool." Like, I'm going to spank her when a spanking is needed, but she's going to love me for it in the end. Or maybe, I'm going to be so intimidating at my worst, and so understanding, lovable and funny at my best, that I'll never need to physically discipline her. She'll just be awesome because I'm awesome. She'll be a perfect angel because I'm willing it to be so. But we never really know what works and what doesn't. We just take our best guess and swing for the fences. I'm pretty sure I've struck out with the ornaments and I'm resigned to losing a few more over the course of this Holiday Season. (Which, if I have my way, would last sometime until mid-March.)

I think I have to come to terms with the fact that my kid is going to be who she wants to be and my job is to keep her as close to whole and happy as possible.

If I can keep my ornament collection intact that's just a really sweet bonus.