The other day our oldest daughter got herself into some trouble with her mom at her grandparent’s house. She was upset with her mom about something and ended up not even saying goodbye to her grandparents when we left their house. I don’t even remember the details of the argument, but her consequence was losing her American Girl dolls for a couple of days.
The next day we told her she could EARN her dolls back, one night early, if she wrote a letter of apology to her grandparents for her poor behavior at their house. She was resistent to it a little bit, because she doesn’t like to be wrong EVER, but after weighing her options she agreed to it.
She went to her room and returned a few minutes later with a note that said the following:
I’m sorry I acted like a nut ball.
Signed Mysterious
——
After holding back tears of laughter I asked her why she signed her letter, “Mysterious,” She said it was so they wouldn’t know who was apologizing. Oh boy. We have a lot to learn. We then talked about how the whole point of apologizing is for the person to know you are sorry for what you did.
After a little discussion of some possible ideas, she wrote a rough draft, then a final draft and drew a nice picture to send with the letter. Next, she was excited to address the envelope, put a stamp on it and take it out the the mailbox.
Two days later she received a phone call from her “Mimi” thanking her for the letter. It’s a nice feeling when, every once in a (long) while, you feel like your doing something right as a parent.
-Pete
