Just when I thought I had it made, my daughter threw up.

We’d gotten a movie early: she picked the only two in the video store guaranteed not to scare her. Connie the Cow and Bob the Builder. We had French Toast for dinner. I’d even made it with my homemade bread. The baby’s cold showed little signs of existing. He was "jammied up" and ready to go to sleep.

My computer was on, and I was going to sneak in a few taps at the keyboard (you know, a little "me" time) while Connie the Cow finished up and my son wound down with string of beads he twirled on the floor.

What was I thinking?

Mommy my stomach hurts! Coco cried.

Her and I are butting heads a bit lately because she orders me around. I really do understand her predicament: she’s short and only six, so it’s hard to get at things a lot of the times. But the tone lately…the tone. She’s forgotten that "special word." She also "cries wolf" when nothing is really needed except a attention.

I lost it when she was laying on the couch and yelled at me to: Shut the door! that I’d opened to the balcony. I looked back and saw not a six year in need, but an over sized couch potato sipping beers and eating potato chips who’d lost the remote while opening a bag of M&M’s.

Needless to say, I lost it a bit.

She spent a little time in her room; I went to my closet so I could get "jammied up." After I put down a list of demands (hoping I’d remember them because if she crossed the line, I’d have to enforce them). I turned back on Connie the Cow, and we continued on with some sort of an evening.

When she started screaming her tummy hurt, I closed the
bathroom door on her because I couldn’t bear another syllable
formed in the shape of a whine.

My throat hurts! she screamed.

Bed time, I said.

As I was helping her with her pajamas, up the vomit came. Loads of it. I saw all my hard work: the homemade bread; fresh squeezed juice; yogurt with applesauce on her skirt, bedspread and the floor - why bother?

I’m always quite amazed at how much a child’s stomach can actually hold.
We decided maybe two large cookies before supper was a bad idea. But this is the dilemma I often face: When do I say no to the cookies, and when do I say yes? The whining or the vomit?

Decisions, decisions.