Cold weater (indoor recess) + fatigue from returning to school x substitute teacher while regular teacher finishes up holiday vacation to India = grumpiest child on earth.

Now there's an equation for you. We've had quite a week with Christopher. The long stretch of this cold snap, which has left Anchorage without a day over 0 degrees since Christmas, has really started to impact us. So has having a substitute teacher for a week (with one more to come). It's easy to take for granted the impact that a given teacher's routine and classroom management skills have on a classroom. The 3 primary teachers (teaching first/second combo classes) all went on vacation to India over the holiday and aren't back yet. While the subs are good, they aren't the normal teachers with the normal routine and way of handling the class. Add being tired after getting back into the routine of early morning carpools and you can imagine life around our house these days.

After several hard days where we worked with Christopher to talk through issues using reason, and all that good stuff, yesterday he had another big blow out and (again) start yelling at other kids that we had invited into our home -- for third time of the week. Yes, the little kids had destroyed his Legos Star Wars base. Not good, but we had had several conversations about putting people above toys and other things this week. It's a bummer, but the Legos base can be rebuilt. Rebuilding friendships is harder.

With words not working, Christopher was sent to his room for the entire night last night (about 3 hours before bed) and lost all screen time (computer games, video games, television, movies) for an entire week. There has been some continued stomping and attempts to get us to change our minds, but I think he has figured out that we're serious. I'm hoping for some improved behavior shortly. I woke up this morning and wasn't sure I was ready to hop out of bed and deal with him yet.