screaming

For the past few days we have had one major issue in our house. Well, besides needing a plumber to come out and finding that we need a valve that is expensive. The issue has been screaming. The non-stop screaming from the 3 little ones in our house is overwhelming this week. If one of them looks at the other one of them, then it is screaming. As I am writing this Jacob screamed the loudest scream, because Penny pulled his hair. Now, don't get me wrong, Penny did something that she should not have done, but is the blood curdling screaming necessary?? Yesterday Erin stayed after school to work on her science fair project. The Wardlings + 1 and I went to Wal-Mart to pick up laundry detergent. Meanwhile, a few of them had to pee. Penny was screaming and crying, while signing potty to me...she is still in diapers, so I am assuming that it is time to officially potty train her...anyway, she sits on the potty, Blaklee sits on the potty, so on and so forth. Then it happened and I just have to say that I cracked. Blaklee was washing her hands and in one of the 2 sinks. Penny goes up to wash her hands in the same sink and Blaklee starts in with the screaming. Penny is also beginning her scream. I ask her to be quiet and the screaming only gets louder. Then I tell her to be quiet and again the screaming goes up. I grabbed a handful of cold water and splashed her with it and the pure shock of the cold water got her to be quiet. She then kinda calms down but begins to cry because her shirt is wet. Penny got splashed too, btw. We left the store and headed to get Erin. We get Erin and the screaming starts up again on the way home. It rose so much that I even pulled over with a slight tap of the breaks to jostle them a bit to get their attention. Why does there have to be so much toddler screaming??


When I dropped Blaklee off yesterday I told her Mom what I had done. Blaklee has a big vocabulary, so I know that it would come out. Blaklee's mom said that her dad had done the same thing not a few days ago, so I didn't feel bad that I had done it. After having the screaming noise of children for the past 11 years, along with having our 2 nieces this past year, and let me say they screamed ALOT, I can just feel my blood pressure go up each time I hear any of my children's voices being raised. I now have to ask people to repeat themselves because I think that I have physically lost hearing due to the noise. I think myself to be a firm mother, so it isn't as if I allow them to scream without some type of time out or punishment...but it is the noise until I can get to them. Why all the screaming??