Lauren aka supreme ruler of the preschool

I have gone quite a while without updating this, mostly because we have been struggling with Lauren and I didn't want to have every post be, "Lauren terrorized her preschool teachers again today...."  I'm not sure we are over the mountain yet, but at least she has been having good days of late, so I feel ok with writing about it here - that it won't be all negative!

It all started one day in September when serendipity struck Lauren.  She was in a contrary mood and wouldn't be quiet during nap time, so the teachers removed her from the room and she hung out with the principal/director of the preschool.  She had a grand ole time in there as the director talked to her and gave her fun things to do.  When they told me that night what had happened, my first thought was, "Oh great, this is not going to be the last time this happens" and, sure enough, about a week later she was misbehaving during nap time and was removed again.  And again.  And again.

You would think they would have connected the dots that she would see being removed from the room as a reward, but alas, the realization did not come until it was too late.  After a week of Lauren being removed during nap time, the director called and talked to me about the situation.  She said that she felt like it was her fault since she was nice to Lauren that first time, but since then nothing has worked to discourage Lauren from her quest to be as naughty as possible so she can not have to nap and no one in the preschool has any idea how to get Lauren to lay down for nap time.

And, honestly, face it, if you are three, this is a pretty fun gig.  You get to run around the room with the teachers chasing you, yelling and tossing stuff around, stepping on napping kids as you evade The Man until you finally get caught and thrown in a sunless jail cell another preschool room where you get to play with older kids who are not napping.  Yeah, there is really is no downside from Lauren's perspective!

So, Scott and I being good parents, started plotting how to make Lauren's life a living hell until she started complying but all the things we could think of just made our life a living hell!  Then I came up with a system where she would get a happy, medium, or sad face every day at nap and Scott came up with the idea that if she got a happy face she would get to wear a dress the next day to school.  Sad face meant no dress.  Megan came up with the idea that if she got a happy face she could wear a giant poofy dress, medium face meant a regular dress, and sad face meant no dress.  This truly was a family affair.

Results forthcoming.....