I don't know if it is the fact that we have a new little baby in the house, or the fact that he just turned 3 on Sunday, or the fact the he is just crazy but this last week Mason has decided to crank up the naughty meter. At first I felt bad for him because I know that his world has been permanently altered with this baby but all sympathy feeling have fled and I am left with exhaustion and frustration. In less than a week he has:
* Left the house without my knowledge and wandered to my friends house. Thank goodness she found him and saved him from the elements. I promise to never leave him to brush my teeth again!
* Screamed for 45 minutes because I put the frosting on his toaster strudel and he wanted to.
* Decided that Cade needed to be held while I was in the shower and I found him with Cade in a choke hold trying to drag him out of his bed.
* Threw sand in Tylie's face repeatedly while she sat there and screamed. ( Tylie obviously could have ran away but she is always one for a flare of drama!)

I could go on but for the sake of his future self esteem, I will stop with the highlights. I feel bad that he is struggling. He is bored. His mom doesn't leave the house because of this new baby. The weather has gone bad so it is hard to be outside. He wants the attention that he is used to getting but now has to split with another little human. I recognize all these things but in the heat of the moments when he is blatantly disobeying me, it is hard to remember why I feel bad for him. He is trying to find his place. His is smashed somewhere in the middle of this family and he is determined not to be forgotten. He is very good at this job.
Today he is off at his cousin's house playing for the day. I am so grateful that he can go to a place he loves and I don't have to worry a bit about him. He can expend all that energy and come home and collapse weary from play. Things will settle down and get better. I feel that Mason is, in many ways, a mirror of myself. He is acting out what I feel inside. Things are chaos right now. I never expected the transition from 2 to 3 to be this hard. Once I start to figure things out I am sure that a new routine will fall into place and Mason will calm down. Until then, I pray that the house is still standing at the end of this.