Ella at three is absolutely kicking my butt. Well, starting at the end of two and now the first part of three. There is whining and screaming and crying. I know a lot of this is developmental and maybe some of it has to do with adjusting to Tylan's presence, but it just seems that much worse than it was with either Accalia or Cole. It's one of those periods of parenting where you think, "What did I do so wrong that my child is acting like this?" There are times, I hate to say, that I really just do not want to be around her. Ella at the present and Accalia at age 7 have so far been the toughest times for me to parent. I've felt as if I have no clue what is going on and really start to wonder what I did wrong.

At the same time, though, I can see some of the things that she's working through and how it will hopefully be once we're past this phase. Ella's becoming more and more verbal and more easily understandable. She's vocalizing a lot of her thought processes, whether it's counting, identifying letters, colors, objects, etc. or talking about whatever is on her mind. She's asking a lot of "What's that, Mama?" or "Whatcha doing, Mama?"

The whining, though, drives me absolutely nuts. It feels as if it came out of nowhere and is like fingernails on the chalkboard. If she starts whining, I'll say something like, 'I can't understand you when you talk like that. Can you tell me what you'd like?" Usually she's stop and say in a normal voice, "I want chocolate" or "I want to watch the Wiggles" or whatever it is she'd like.

Oh, but when it's like tonight when Ella is tired and cranky and just won't settle down and I have a headache starting up, I'm so ready just to skip ahead a few weeks or months or however long it will take to get past this.

Thankfully Cory will be home in less than an hour (hopefully!) and I can let him deal with some of this.